Write Your Life Stories

"Like many of us, I have embraced social media and smartphones and use both to keep in touch. As a writer, this is second nature. I've written books (this will be my 32nd), articles, poems, blogs, training courses, brochures, letters and emails over the 30 years I have accompanied my husband, Ian, on a series of eight moves. We left England for Dubai in 1987 where we had our sons, Sam and Joshua. From there we moved to Oman, then Stavanger, back to England, over to the Hague, briefly Brunei, Kuala Lumpur and now find ourselves back in the Hague. Throughout this time I have continued to work as a writer, publisher, teacher and writers' mentor and run residential Writing Me-Treats worldwide. It's been and continues to be fun yet I admit it can be darn tough too. Writing this book and the emails from which it grew has been a revelation, deeply fulfilling and a joy. Social media has its place but please let's revive the art of writing letters."

This book comes as part of a complete home study course, comprising a 60 minute video, 2 hours of audio and over 200 JustWrite Inspirational stickers in addition to this text book. Inside the text book is information on how to obtain the 8 audio lessons, video and stickers. This home study course has been created, written, tested and produced by Jo Parfitt, herself a writer of 26 books, hundreds of articles, blog posts and columns in the 26 years she has worked as a writer and teacher. Its eight lessons include: Introduction to the SPICE method for making your life stories leap off the page; letting it flow; writing about childhood; writing about people' writing about places; writing on a theme; writing humour; writing complete stories with beginnings, middles and ends. There is an additional bonus lesson on the 20 most common mistakes and the editing process.

Each lesson comprises an introduction to the topic, a limbering up exercise and a variety of examples of life story writing taken from published authors and the author's own students. The lesson concludes with a written exercise. Personal feedback on one or more pieces of homework is available for an additional fee. The author has lived abroad in seven countries - Dubai (UAE), Oman, Norway, France, the Netherlands, Brunei and now Malaysia, in addition to her native England. Living in an international community means that her course includes many extracts and examples from students and authors of over 10 nationalities.


The course is ideal for anyone who wants to write about real incidents from his or her life and turn those into individual stories, full-length memoir, blogs, columns, a family legacy, self-help books or fiction. Jo Parfitt has been teaching for 20 years and her students claim she is inspiring and empowering.