Life story interview questions for a memoir you talk out loud

Writing a book about your business or expertise instead? Use the 100 interview questions for a nonfiction book, which follow the shape of a method book rather than a life.

The follow-ups that turn a summary into a scene

Most people answer a life question with a summary first. "My father worked hard." "College was a blur." "We moved a lot." A summary is true, but a reader cannot see it. A memoir is built from scenes: a particular day, in a particular place, with people who say things. The questions below are how you get from one to the other. Keep them in front of you and use two or three after almost every answer.

1. When exactly was this? What year, what season, what time of day?
2. Where were you standing or sitting? Describe the room.
3. Who was there? What were they wearing, doing, holding?
4. What did it look like, sound like, smell like?
5. What did you say? What did they say back, as close to the words as you can remember?
6. What did you feel at the time?
7. How do you feel about it now? What do you understand now that you did not then?
8. What happened right after?
9. Is there one day that sums up that whole period? Tell me that day.
10. Does anything from that time still exist? A photo, a letter, a scar, a recipe?

An example we wrote to show the difference. The summary answer: "My mother was strict about homework." After three follow-ups (when, where, what did she say): "Every school night at six, the kitchen table was cleared, the radio went off, and she sat across from me with her coffee and said nothing until I closed the book. I hated it. I do the same thing with my daughter now." The second version is a scene. The first is a fact about one.

Early life and family (questions 1 to 12)

Start here even if your childhood is not the point of the book. These are the easiest memories to reach, and they warm up the storyteller.

1. Where were you born, and what do you know about the day itself?
2. Describe the first home you remember, room by room.
3. Who lived in that house with you?
4. What did your parents do all day?
5. What is your earliest memory? How old were you?
6. What did a normal weekday look like when you were eight or nine?
7. What did your family eat for dinner, and who cooked it?
8. Which grandparent, aunt or uncle do you remember best, and why?
9. What were you not allowed to do as a child?
10. What did your family argue about?
11. What did your family laugh about?
12. What story did your family tell about you over and over?

Places and turning points (questions 13 to 24)

Lives turn on moves, departures and decisions. These questions find the hinges of the story, which often become chapter breaks.

13. Which places have you called home? Which one still feels like home?
14. Describe the neighborhood or town you grew up in to someone who has never been there.
15. When did you first leave home? How did you leave, and who saw you off?
16. What is the farthest from home you have ever felt?
17. What decision changed the direction of your life more than any other?
18. Was there a moment you knew your life had split into a before and an after?
19. What did you almost do instead?
20. Which news or world event do you remember exactly where you were for?
21. What was the bravest thing you did before you turned thirty?
22. What is a place you can never go back to, and what would you see if you could?
23. Which birthday or year stands out, and what happened?
24. If your life were a book, where would the chapters break?

Work and calling (questions 25 to 36)

Work fills most of an adult life, but people often skip it as dull. It rarely is once you ask for a specific day.

25. What was your very first job, and what did it pay you in money or lessons?
26. What did you want to be when you grew up? What happened to that dream?
27. How did you end up in the work you did for most of your life?
28. Describe an ordinary day at that work, from arriving to going home.
29. Who was the best boss or mentor you had? The worst?
30. What was the proudest day of your working life?
31. What was the day you most wanted to quit?
32. What did you know how to do that most people never learned?
33. Did you ever lose a job or a business? How did you hear, and what did you do that night?
34. What did your work give you besides a paycheck?
35. What did it cost you or your family?
36. If you could do it all again, would you choose the same work?

Love, friendship and the family you made (questions 37 to 48)

Ask these gently and let the storyteller choose how much to say. Some of the best material is in the friendships, not only the marriages.

37. Who was your first best friend, and what did you do together?
38. Which friendship has lasted longest? What has kept it going?
39. How did you meet the person you shared your life with? Tell the first meeting slowly.
40. What did you notice about them first?
41. When did you know this was serious?
42. What was your wedding, commitment or moving-in day like?
43. What was the hardest year of that relationship, and what carried you through it?
44. Describe the day your first child was born, or the day you decided not to have children.
45. What kind of parent, aunt, uncle or godparent did you try to be?
46. What family tradition did you start yourself?
47. Who became family without being related to you?
48. What friendship ended, and what do you wish you had said?

Hard times and what got you through (questions 49 to 60)

These are often the chapters readers remember. They are also the ones to approach last in a session, never first. Make it clear any of them can be skipped.

49. What was the hardest period of your life?
50. How did it begin? Was there a day you realized how hard it would be?
51. Who helped you, and what exactly did they do?
52. Who did not help, when you expected they would?
53. What did you do each day just to get through it?
54. Have you ever been really frightened? Tell me about one time.
55. What loss changed you most?
56. How did your family handle grief when you were young? How do you handle it now?
57. Was there a time money was very tight? What did you go without?
58. When did you surprise yourself with how strong you were?
59. What did that time teach you that nothing else could have?
60. What would you tell someone who is in the middle of something similar today?

Beliefs and lessons (questions 61 to 72)

Beliefs are abstract, so always follow these with "when did you learn that?" and get the story behind the belief.

61. What did your family believe in, whether faith, politics, work or something else?
62. Which of those beliefs did you keep, and which did you leave behind?
63. When did you change your mind about something important? What changed it?
64. What do you believe now that would surprise your younger self?
65. What is a rule you live by? Where did it come from?
66. What does a good life mean to you?
67. What are you most grateful for?
68. What do you regret, and what would you do differently?
69. What mistake taught you the most?
70. What is something you were taught that turned out to be wrong?
71. What advice did you ignore and later wish you had taken?
72. What do you know for certain?

The people who shaped you (questions 73 to 84)

A life story is full of other people. These questions bring them onto the page as characters, not just names. Keep in mind they may still be alive and may one day read the book.

73. Who had the biggest influence on the person you became?
74. Describe your mother as a stranger would have seen her. Then as you saw her.
75. Describe your father the same way.
76. What did you inherit from each of them, in looks, habits or temper?
77. Which teacher do you still think about?
78. Who believed in you before you believed in yourself?
79. Who did you look up to who turned out to be different than you thought?
80. Who was the funniest person you have known? Tell one of their stories.
81. Who did you lose touch with that you still wonder about?
82. Who did you have to forgive? Did you?
83. Who do you owe a thank you that you never said out loud?
84. If you could have one more conversation with someone who is gone, who would it be and what would you ask?

Legacy and what you want readers to know (questions 85 to 96)

These belong at the end of the book and the end of the interviews, when the storyteller has seen their own life laid out across the sessions.

85. Who do you most want to read this book?
86. What do you want your grandchildren, or someone not yet born, to know about you?
87. What is a part of your life that nobody in the family has really heard?
88. What do people get wrong about you that you hope this book sets straight?
89. What are you proudest of that has nothing to do with work?
90. What family story should never be forgotten?
91. What skills, recipes or sayings do you want passed on?
92. How has the world changed in your lifetime in ways young people would not believe?
93. What do you hope stays the same?
94. What would you like to be remembered for?
95. What is the one thing you want a reader to take from your life?
96. Is there anything we have not asked that you want on the record?

How to run a life story session

A life story session is gentler and looser than a business book interview. The goal is not to cover a chapter outline but to bring back memories in enough detail to write scenes. These habits help, whether you are interviewing yourself or someone else.

1. One theme per session

   Pick a single theme from the list, such as early life or work. Jumping between childhood and retirement in one sitting keeps every answer on the surface. One theme lets memories pull up other memories.

2. Bring photos and objects

   A photo album, a medal, a wedding invitation, an old recipe card. Put one on the table and ask "tell me about this." Objects reach memories that questions miss, and they give a nervous storyteller something to look at besides the recorder.

3. Start easy

   Open with a happy, familiar question, like the first house or a favorite meal. Save the hard-times questions for the middle of a session, once both people are comfortable, and never end on them. Close with something lighter.

4. Give permission to skip

   Say it out loud at the start: "You can skip any question, and we can stop whenever you like." People tell more when they know they are in control of what they tell.

5. Record everything

   Start the recorder before the first question and leave it running through the small talk. Some of the best stories come out while you are pouring the tea. Say the date and the theme at the start of each file, and back it up the same day. The recording setup guide covers phones, rooms and remote calls.

6. Keep it to 60 to 90 minutes

   That is a sensible length for most people: long enough to get past the well-worn version of a story, short enough that nobody tires. For an older storyteller, shorter sessions more often may work better. Stop while the energy is still good.

If you are interviewing yourself, it helps to imagine one listener, a grandchild or a friend who never knew you young, and tell the story to them. If someone else is interviewing you, the guide to being interviewed covers who to ask and how to brief them; the same advice applies to a memoir.

Interviewing an older parent or relative with care

Many life story books start as a son or daughter recording a parent. (Recording a grandparent? Start with these 75 questions to ask your grandparents, or these 80 questions to ask your parents.) That is a privilege, and it comes with responsibilities that a business interview does not have.

• Ask for consent, and explain the purpose. Say clearly what the recordings are for: a private family book, a book for sale, or something in between. Ask before you press record, and record their yes at the start of the first session.
• Let them set the pace. Book short sessions at the time of day they feel best. Watch for tiredness and stop before it shows in the answers. A memory that does not come today may come next week.
• Handle sensitive memories gently. War, illness, loss, abuse and family secrets can come up without warning. Do not push. Ask "would you like to keep going, or come back to this another day?" and accept the answer. If a memory clearly distresses them, stop the session and spend time together without the recorder.
• Respect what they want kept private. Agree that they can mark anything "not for the book," during the session or later, and keep that promise. Read them back what you plan to use before it is printed.
• Think about the people mentioned. A life story names siblings, ex-spouses, neighbors and colleagues, many of them still alive. Decide together whether to change names, leave details out, or ask those people first. A private family edition and a published book may need different choices.
• Accept that memories differ. Your aunt may remember the same day differently. You do not need to settle it. Write it as the storyteller remembers it, and note where others disagree if it matters.
• Keep the recordings safe. Store copies in two places, and agree who in the family gets the audio. For many families, the recordings themselves become as precious as the book.

Professional oral historians work to written ethical standards on consent and on care for people who may be vulnerable. If you want to go deeper, the Oral History Association publishes its Principles and Best Practices.

From recordings to a book

Recordings are raw material, not a manuscript. Once you have a few sessions on tape, the work moves from asking to shaping.

1. Get them transcribed. Software is cheap and good enough for most family recordings, though names, places and dialect words need checking. The transcription options guide compares software, human services and doing it yourself.
2. Sort by theme or by period. Put every transcript into folders by theme or by decade. You will see quickly which parts of the life are rich and which still need a session.
3. Choose the scenes. Mark the passages where the storyteller gives a specific day, place and conversation. Those are your scenes. The general reflections go around them.
4. Find the shape. Most life stories run in time order, but some work better by theme or around one turning point. Decide what the reader should feel by the last page, and order the scenes to get there.
5. Rewrite in the speaker's voice. Spoken words need cutting and reordering before they read well. Keep the phrases and humor that sound like the person. The transcript to chapter guide shows the edits on a worked example.
6. Fill the gaps. Make a list of missing years and unanswered questions, and book one or two more sessions to cover them.

The free worksheet turns a chapter list into a recording plan, with questions for each chapter and an estimate of how much talk the book needs. For a memoir, list your themes or life periods as the chapters.