New year, new habits: How to start writing with author Kelly Corrigan

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It is that time of year, maybe, when we feel a little wistful about what was and what's even to come. And maybe you have thought about getting some of those thoughts down on paper, even writing a memoir, maybe for yourself, or even to share with the world. So writer Kelly Corrigan was recently on our episode about how to be brave in relationships.

But I also wanted to ask her about how she approaches her craft, because Kelly became a best-selling author by writing about the mundane and ordinary aspects of her family's life and her own life. But capturing those moments in an extraordinary way, I want to read you a brief passage from her latest book, which is called Tell Me More. It's about spending time with her dad during the last few days of his life.

After we got him to bed that night, my mom explained that he came downstairs once a day to sit by his new gas fireplace that turned on with a remote control. She also said his pain was extraordinary. Cancer that had been many years before and his bladder had bloomed in his right shoulder blade and rooted in several spots along his spine. Still, for the four or five hours a day, when he was awake, my mom said he was himself, which is to say positive.

During that first week, when he wasn't in his spot by the fire, my mom, my brothers, and I cycled in and out of his bedroom, pulling up a chair if he was awake, turning off his light if he had fallen asleep. There was so little to be done, so little that could be done. We watched whatever was on ESPN, even bowling.

and talked about Duke basketball, Notre Dame lacrosse, and whether LeBron could hold off the Warriors. I felt lucky that my work and my children were back in California too far to pull me from him. Edward, that's her husband, kept saying stay. We're fine.

So I did. For 14 days, I cleaned his reading glasses and showed him pictures on my phone, stretching them so he could see the detail hidden in the pixels, which often led us into the catalog of spectacular people he had known, the all-time greats as he dubbed them. Listening to him gush about jock janky and noodle's nulker, it occurred to me that if this newest cancer was going to kill him, he had made good on life's most exquisite promise.

and was loved in equal measure. Isn't that so beautiful? So how does Kelly do it? I wanted to understand her approach. When we come back, our chat about writing, her dad, her wildly successful memoir, The Middle Place, and her best advice on how to get started.

I think a lot of people, you know, we live in an age where we really think about chronicling and documenting our lives. What are your suggestions to anyone who's thinking, I want to start doing this either for myself or maybe for a wider audience?

I think it's a daily habit. I think there's a lot of value in reading while you're writing. I think it's helpful to have a little writing group or like an accountability partner. I also think it's interesting and bonding so you get a lot of value out of it in and of itself and then also it can help move you along in the writing process.

I think having a fantasy about who you would give this book to or these pages to or this document to can be very motivating. Like for me, that's what got me to sit down every day was I'm going to write the story of what it is for me to be George Corrigan's daughter. And I'm going to hand it to him. I'm going to give it to him. And I did. And he put it in his bathrobe pocket.

So I was like, waiting for him at the kitchen table one morning. And I was like, here, and then tears in my eyes. He's like, lovey. What is it? And I'm like, you'll see. And he went upstairs and he came downstairs like four hours later. And he just put like his fist to his heart and was like, mmm, lovey.

And I was like, I'm done. That's all I needed. I mean, the outcome of that book, it's so crazy that it had this fantastic commercial life. And we passed Obama on the bestseller list. And my husband made this classic joke of like, do you think Michelle just rolled over to Barack with the New York Times bestseller list in her hand and said, who the hell is Kelly Corrigan?

which was like the perfect visualization. So that it had a life for people. It's kind of amazing. I mean, my mom when she read it said, well, Kelly, it's very good. There are no grammatical errors and there's no spelling errors. But who's going to want to read about us? We're not rich. We're not poor. We're not dumb. We're not stupid. And I said, I don't know. I really don't know. That's not actually our problem. That's the publisher's problem.

But I hear what you're saying. I do think it's unlikely that people are going to want to read about us. On the non-fiction bestseller list, it's a lot of men, and it's a lot of men's stories. At the time, it was Barack Obama and Tony Dungy, who was an NFL coach, and like Leaia Koka. So there are all these

business, sports, musicians, actors, writing their memoirs. And then conquering heroes. Yeah, conquering heroes. And then there was like my dad, basically. And I would say week after week, I would say to my dad, how crazy is this?

Like, you're on the bestseller list. You. This is what people want. It's just a story about an ordinary guy who was especially good at loving people. That's so great. It's such a great fact about the world that people are interested in that story because there's typically like one slot on the nonfiction side for somebody like me. Like, you pray love held the slot for a long time before me was glass castle. But those are typically like horror stories in a way.

Yeah, shocking. Yeah. Abuse and rape and abject poverty. And this was like such a happy story. It was a love story, basically. And it worked and people wanted it. I just think that's so great.

Maybe that's why I'm an optimist, you know? Well, for sure. One of the things, though, that I think is so attractive about your writing is that you're very, very detail-oriented. And so the mundane, you just feel like you're standing next to you, eavesdropping. Like, you note how strong the drinks are or what color the pile of laundry was that was annoying the crap out of you.

And did you keep journals? Like, how do you? I did, I do, yeah. Every day? No, but more than once a week. And for so long now, Manouche, like seventh grade. So, I mean, I have like, I have crates. And also, I was a letter writer. So, I used to write these long, detailed letters home from Camp Taco. I used to go to this YMCA camp on the Chesapeake Bay for a month every August.

And I would send home like 14 page letters about the bug juice and the suute dance and the tether ball match. And so I think that for a long time, I was in the habit of chronicling and categorizing what was happening. And it's funny, I have done a little teaching over the years. And I always say to people,

It's the detail that makes it come alive. So don't say like, I had a drink, say I had a soda, and don't say I had a soda, say I had a fanta, and don't say I had a fanta, say I had a great fanta, and don't say I had a great fanta, say I had a great fanta, and the condensation was making my whole hand wet. Like all of a sudden, you went from like having a drink

to being somewhere, to being this one place in space and time with this one set of objects around you. And that's just totally different experience for a reader. And I feel like that in person, like I feel like that's the difference between a good conversation and a great conversation and a good question and a great question.

Do you think you have to be a writer? You sound like you've always been compelled. I struggle with this. I don't think it hurts me to sit down and write. And I think there are other people who are like, they just like, their body just moves them to the desk and they pick up the pen and there's a force within them that

takes their ideas and puts them on the page. That is not me. That is not me. Oh, good. Okay. I mean, I'm compelled to communicate. I'm compelled to make sense. I'm compelled to compare notes, but it doesn't have to be in writing. And in fact, in all the ways that I work in the world to do those three things, writing is the least satisfying for me because it's solitary and I'm not a solitary gal.

And sometimes I feel like the reason why the writing right now and the wake of my mom dying is more enjoyable for me is because grief is isolating. And so I might as well just be in it and try to make sense of it.

And you know, like I cry a lot when I'm writing and that's probably a good thing. I mean, it's probably helps move things along inside me.

That was best-selling memoirist Kelly Corrigan. Her latest book is called Tell Me More. Again, if you'd like to get access to all of our bonus episodes and add for you listening and support public radio, please consider signing up for TED Radio Hour Plus. You can find out more at plus.npr.org.

If you are already a Plus supporter, thank you so much and please tell a friend or give a gift subscription. We're always asking for more. Wait, sorry about that. Make sure you listen through December and January as we bring you more on how to start your new year off right.