An autobiography is a first-person account of an entire life, while a memoir uses a person’s life story to elevate a larger theme or idea.

A: In some general contexts, memoir and autobiography can be used interchangeably. In fact, Amazon.com puts them in the same category. An autobiography focuses on the chronology of the writer’s entire life while a memoir covers one specific aspect of the writer’s life.

What is the difference between autobiography and memoir? Autobiography covers the authors whole life, while a memoir focuses on a specific moment and shows a clear theme. Autobiography is a life story written by the person who lived the life. Biography is a life story written by someone else.

Both involve written depictions of personal experiences. The two are so closely related that Merriam-Webster.com defines a memoir as “a narrative composed from personal experience.” A key difference is that a narrative focuses on an event, while a memoir centers on an individual, who is usually the writer of the book.

1. Truth vs Fiction. A memoir is a true story, even though the memoirist uses fictional techniques to engage readers and to make the story more vivid.

Order of Events Most memoirs, however, tend to flow chronologically. That is, they run through events in the sequence in which they happened. But even a chronological memoir isn’t purely chronological since the narrator is now an adult filtering past experiences through the lens of a wiser, more mature person.

Characteristics of a Memoir

• #1. It has a specific focus.
• #2. It makes the subject come alive.
• #3. There must be an ABC story arc.
• #4. Memoirs are often limited in nature.
• #5. The story is more important than 100% accuracy.
• #6. The writing of a memoir is deliberate in nature.
• #7.
• #8.

Memoir Topics

• Your favorite place.
• Your best or worst day(s)
• Your most memorable teacher(s)
• Your most prized possession.
• Someone you will always remember.
• Something about your life or yourself you wish you could change.
• Your proudest moment.
• Winter/summer/fall.

Memoir word count tends to be right there in the same range as novel word count, or 60,000 to 80,000 words. Shorter than that, and you may not have enough substance to truly excite readers, you may not be going deeply enough into your story, or telling enough of it.

165 pages

Just as with a great novel, the ending should satisfyingly “wrap up” the story and any loose ends. You may want to skip ahead in time, perhaps many years, to conclude your story and wrap things up for your readers long after the “period” your memoir covers ended.

around 65,000 to 75,000 words

2,000 words is around 4 pages of A4 with single spacing, or 8 pages of A4 with double spacing.

2 pages

A memoir is a work of art much more than the typical non-fiction book. As far as length, popular memoirs range quite a bit from about 60,000 words to 120,000 or more. If you’re a new author, I’d recommend staying on the shorter side, perhaps around the 75,000 word mark.

From these numbers, we can establish some guidelines: the average word count of a chapter typically falls somewhere between 1,500 and 5,000 words, with 3,000–4,000 being the most common sweet spot.

While there is no single best way to start a memoir, you can always consider beginning by making the readers:

• wonder.
• smile.
• relate.
• worry.
• roll their eyes.
• sympathize.
• say “yuck!”
• sigh.

between 2,000 and 10,000 words

This book is considered a memoir though it is a fictional story about a non-fictional war. Possibly the main purpose for writing a memoir is simply to tell the story from the author’s perspective, which is of course the first person perspective instead of the broad view that we get from something like a history book.

A memoir is a collection of personal memories related to specific moments or experiences in the author’s life. Told from the perspective of the author, memoirs are written in first person point of view.