Dear Abby: To write or not to write, that is the question

[cereta]

DEAR ABBY: My family is colorful, to say the least. Many co­workers, neighbors, friends and in-laws have asked me why I haven't written a book about my life because of the stories I have told them over the years about my family. I have always wanted to, and feel there are enough stories to not only fill one book but several. Some of them are so funny, scary, sad and outrageous that I see a miniseries or a movie being possible.

My dilemma is how my brothers and sisters will react to my putting it all on paper and the world seeing it in print. I kept telling myself, "Just wait till Mom (many stories start with her) passes away, so she won't be hurt." Well, now she's gone.

What do you think? Should I write it all down or not? If the answer is yes, how do I tell my brothers and sisters? Or should I not tell them at all? -- FAMILY SECRETS

DEAR FAMILY SECRETS: If you would like to write the stories down, that's your privilege. However, if there is anything in them that could be hurtful or embarrassing to your relatives, I recommend you change all the names and locations, and publish it under a pen name. Some of the greatest writers of the past have done that with great success.

Comments

[recessional]

Okay tho pen-naming is only a half-solution, because frankly THEY still know who they are and what the stories are about.

Everything else is so . . . contextual, it's hard to even remotely generalize. There are so, so many factors - how WILL your siblings feel about it? how will they behave those feelings towards you or towards others? what stories would provoke what feelings and in what measures if you were to share? do you care about what your siblings think? how are these stories going to make your siblings look? what do they think about looking like that, even by pseudonym? and like it goes on and on like that for a while, as far as I'm concerned.

Because hell, there's stories I wouldn't want anyone to know, not even because they're bad - some of them are even good - but because I don't want to deal even intellectually with the idea of them being out there, even with identifying details changed.

I mean fundamentally it's your life and you get to write it down, and as long as you're not disclosing information that hits the legal no-nos (libel, endangerment, invasion of privacy - which is the one that gets a little complicated, but generally as long as the stories are things that happened to YOU you're okay - etc) you get to do whatever you want with it.

And then you get to deal with the consequences of doing whatever you want with it.

(I personally with my family would outright go over the stories with them and weigh pretty heavily how they feel about it being shared, but I love my family and don't want them to be hurt, even by things like I mentioned above - things that aren't BAD, but feel to private for them to want out there - and want to maintain our pretty damn good relationships. I have friends, conversely, who I've literally advised "if your mother didn't WANT to end up in a tell-all memoire or thinly veiled lifestory, she shouldn't have done all the shit she did", sooo. . )

[azurelunatic]

Start writing now, and practice good security to reduce the chances of your writing being seen unintentionally. You can make the decision to start submitting for publication later, after discussing things with the people most likely to be affected (assuming you're looking to keep a good relationship). The world is much more likely to see it in print if you're at the top of your craft.