What Goes in Your Memoir’s First Chapter (and What Almost Always Shouldn’t)
When a new writer sends me the first chapter of her memoir, it often begins with a recounting of her life. She was born in a small-town hospital, her grandmother had a farmhouse down the road, and there’s a paragraph explaining who married whom. I not only get the writer’s full life story, but their genealogy, too! I completely understand that instinct. Most of us have it! You want your reader to have everything she needs before the real story starts. And by everything, I mean your complete backstory.
Here’s the thing, though. A reader usually decides within the first few pages whether she’s going to keep reading, and background information rarely gives her a reason to stay. So when my writers and I work on a first chapter together, we look for the moment that will make the reader lean in.
Literary agents know this better than anyone. Agent Noah Lukeman wrote an entire book, The First Five Pages, about how often manuscripts get set aside within their opening pages. Readers do the same thing when they flip through a book in the store or download a free sample online. So those first few pages deserve a little extra love.
Your first chapter has one main job. Once you know what that job is, the rest of your decisions get so much easier.
What Your Memoir’s First Chapter Actually Has to Do
I like to think of chapter one as a promise to your reader. It tells her what kind of story she’s stepping into, and gives her a reason to care how it all turns out.
The strongest memoir openings I’ve read, including the ones my writers have created, place the reader inside a specific moment. They also hint at the question the whole book will answer. Will she leave the marriage? Can he forgive his father? What does a woman do when the business she built is gone at 45?
That last question is mine. In my mid-forties, I rebuilt my life from scratch, and if I ever write that story, I already know I’d begin in the middle, at the moment everything I’d built came apart. That’s the moment a reader would be most interested in. (Why are we so drawn to moments of tragedy?)
How to Start a Memoir: Begin With a Scene
One question I get a lot is, “So how do I start a memoir?” My answer is almost always the same: begin with a scene.
A scene happens in a specific place at a specific time, and someone in it wants something. Your reader can picture it and hear what people said (or close enough, since none of us remembers conversations word for word).
Here are two ways to open the same story:
“I grew up in a small town in Ohio, the oldest of four children, and my mother was difficult.”
“My mother set my suitcase on the porch the morning I turned seventeen and told me she’d already called my aunt.”
Both are true, and both cover the same moment. The first one gives the reader information, though, and the second gives her a question. Why is the suitcase on the porch? How is the aunt involved? Now she wants to turn the page.
Some of the most beloved memoirs of the last few decades open exactly this way. Jeannette Walls begins The Glass Castle in the back of a New York taxi, wondering whether she's overdressed for the evening, when she looks out the window and sees her mother digging through a dumpster. Cheryl Strayed opens Wild high on a mountain trail, watching one of her hiking boots tumble over the edge. Both authors save the backstory for later, and both make you need to know how they got there.
Your opening scene doesn’t need to be the most dramatic moment of your life. It just needs to carry a little of the tension that runs through the whole book. Often, that’s the moment right before something changed.
What Not to Put in the First Chapter of Your Memoir
When I read a client’s first chapter, I almost always suggest moving a few things somewhere else in the book. It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t write them. They just do their best work a little later in the story.
Your birth and early childhood, in order. Unless your memoir is about your childhood, starting at the very beginning of your life often means starting fifty pages before your story really begins. Those early years can come in later, in small pieces, right when they matter most.
The whole family tree. Your reader will meet your people as they become important. It’s a lot to ask anyone to keep track of eight relatives on page two (I’d need a chart!), so let them arrive one at a time.
Why you decided to write the book. Your why is meaningful, and it deserves a home. That home is usually an author’s note, a prologue, or the introduction. Your first chapter can show the reader why this story matters without needing to explain it.
The lesson you learned. It’s tempting to open with where you landed, because that’s the part you’ve worked so hard for. If you hold it back, your reader gets to discover it alongside you, and that’s a much richer experience for her.
Everything important, all at once. Your opening chapter has room for one moment and one big question. Don’t worry, you’ll get to tell it all. That’s what the rest of the chapters are for.
How to Write the First Chapter of a Memoir When You’re Not Sure Where It Starts
If you don’t know where your story begins, please don’t worry. That’s completely normal, and it usually means you haven’t quite named what your book is about yet. Here’s an exercise I use with my writers.
Write down the question your book answers in one sentence. Then list five or six moments from your life that connect directly to that question. Look for the one that happened just before everything shifted. That’s often your opening scene.
Don’t be surprised if the opening you write first later becomes chapter three and something else gets moved up to the top. That happens all the time, and it shows that you’re paying attention to how the story should unfold. Writing your first chapter is one of the best ways to discover what your book is really about.
Should You Write Chapter One First or Last?
You may have heard writers say you should write your first chapter last. There’s some wisdom in that, because you’ll probably revise your opening once you know how the book ends.
For most first-time memoir writers, though, I recommend writing chapter one early. It gives you a place to stand, and it helps you find your voice. There’s something else, too. Having one finished chapter printed and in your hands changes how you see yourself. Suddenly you have proof you can write your book, and that confidence motivates you to keep going.
Of course, you’ll revise it. You'll rewrite every opening (I’ve rewritten mine more times than I’d like to admit). But a rough first chapter gives you something real to work with, and that’s worth so much more than an idea that lives only in your head.
Write Your Memoir’s Opening Chapter in 14 Days
If you’ve read this far, I’d bet you already have a scene in mind. Maybe it’s a kitchen table, or a phone call you can still hear word for word.
I created The First Chapter Challenge for exactly this moment. Over 14 days, you’ll get one short prompt each day, about 10 to 15 minutes of writing, that gently walks you from that first image to a complete, readable opening chapter.
Week 1 helps you find your moment and get a rough scene on the page, and Week 2 is where you finish it. One of my favorite days is Day 8, when you write three different first lines and choose the one that makes you just a little uncomfortable. (That one is usually the keeper!)
You’ll also get a printable progress tracker and my Line Edit Cheat Sheet, which is the three-pass method I use to polish a chapter once it’s drafted. It’s self-paced, so you can start whenever you’re ready, and the materials are yours to keep.
By day 14, you’ll have your first chapter written and ready to build on. I can’t wait for you to see it.
