COMMENTS AND REVIEWS:
BREATHE LIFE INTO YOUR LIFE STORY

BARBARA RENICK, professional genealogist and nationally known lecturer; author of Genealogy 101: How to Trace Your family’s History and Heritage.
From a distance, writing looks easy. I know from personal experience it is not. The Thurston’s fun and useful guide to writing a personal history is full of sensible help and upbeat advice. The quotes alone make entertaining reading; but even more, each chapter is loaded with essential guidelines and good ideas, supported by apt examples. The book helps you bring your life into focus to write an engaging story.

RICHARD BUSHMAN, Gouverneur Morris Professor of History, Emeritus, Columbia University; recipient of the Bancroft Prize for From Puritan to Yankee: Character and Social Order in Connecticut, 1690-1795.
This is a powerful book—and a kindly one. The authors know the pain of learning to write well and are right beside you through the struggle. They may shake you up a little with their concrete, practical recommendations, but if you stick with them they will make you a better writer. You will learn if only by paying attention to their own fluid style. They show as well as tell.

JEFFREY NEEDLE, AML. The Thurstons have written a clever and lively how-to book with the tasty subtitle “How to Write a Story People Will Want to Read.” This is harder than you may imagine. Even the most interesting life can be written in a dull, lifeless way. The Thurstons want all of us to know that there are techniques that can be learned, and practiced, in pursuit of a lively, readable story.

Much as an exercise instructor teaches his student to breathe and bend, to twist and turn, the authors transform the awesome task of writing into a series of rhetorical exercises. Step by step, they lead the prospective writer through the steps of building a proficiency in telling the story. They detail the pitfalls many writers face, and explain how to move from envisioning your project to bringing it to completion.

Each lesson has a “Learn by Doing” exercise, designed to hone the skills taught and to give the writer the confidence to move on to the next step in the writing. In the margins are quick inspirations and, at times, hilarious observations by writers we know and respect. …

Finally, … the authors take a holistic approach to writing. They insist, and I agree, that one’s entire life must go into the project. People who read your life’s history want to relive that life with you. They want to walk where you walked, even breathe the air you breathed, as much as is possible through the medium of the printed page. The authors are relentless in pushing the aspiring writer into achieving a great victory over the fear and uncertainty that face new writers.

Breathe Life into Your Life Story is a great introduction to writing that even experienced authors will find helpful…. Maybe we should be aiming at developing the confidence, and the skills, required to pen an exciting autobiography. This book is an excellent place to start. It is highly recommended.

PHYLLIS MATTHEWS ZILLER, Genwriters – Writing for Future Generations

The pages of this newly-published how-to book are filled with helpful advice and examples to help the reader create an interesting, well-written life story. The authors, Dawn and Morris Thurston, have presented a methodical approach to putting your thoughts and stories on paper. This book will be helpful to those who have always wanted to write their life story but never had the courage to pick up a pen. It also serves the experienced writer well with ideas, hints, and tips to overcome a writer’s block hurdle.

The authors offer an abundance of quality writing examples throughout the book. These examples serve to accentuate the points made in each chapter. Many how-to books tell the reader how to write. This book offers numerous examples of good writing throughout each chapter that demonstrate each principle. These examples illustrate the authors’ point of showing your readers the details of your life through your life story rather than merely superficially telling a story. Showing involves action and vivid descriptions. This principle of “showing” resonates throughout the book.

Dawn and Morris Thurston have written a useful manual. Their years of experience in writing, and helping others to write, shine through in the pages of Breathe Life into Your Life Story. If you have been thinking of writing your life story, or even if the thought has not crossed your mind, this book will provide the encouragement and the guidance to put your life stories on paper. Your grandchildren will be glad you did.