Everyone has a story to tell. We all walk around with the
characters and dramas that comprise our lives. But not everyone
takes the time to write.

The chapters in this volume. Wait Until You Read My Memoir,
are just that--chapters--in the lives of 19 unique individuals. They are
interesting, insightful, and very well written. Some will make you
laugh, and some will make you cry. All will make you think and
wonder.

The 19 writers in this book signed up for a seminar, Wait Until
You Read My Memoir, offered by Florida International University's
Academy for Lifelong Learning because they wanted to write their life
stories. Some started with little more than ideas; some came in
carrying 300-page manuscripts.

Over weeks-and then months--the participants in the Memoir
seminar talked about and worksnopped their drafts, read and
critiqued each other's manuscripts, and wrote and re-wrote. No
matter what story each writer was telling, we agreed that each
chapter would have to stand on its own, have its own sense of time
and place, its own characters, its own specific conflict and resolution.