There's just one more week to submit your work to Must Love Memoir!
You're about to fall in love with reading your work in front of an audience.
Note: I'm resharing this post for anyone who missed it the first time around or has remained on the fence about submitting their work. Jump to the bottom for all the logistical stuff. 👇🏻
*Originally published on September 30, 2024*
Hello dear memoir lovers,
You may or may not already know this, but reading your own work in front of an audience can be better than sex. Or at the very least, better than a perfectly made iced coffee, which can also sometimes be better than sex.
You may also know that Must Love Memoir has never opened for submissions before. Since it began over a year ago, it’s always been an invitation-only reading series — and that was for several reasons. Mostly because I’ve always wanted to protect the time I put into planning and organizing the event each month — fielding inquiries felt like a slippery slope I wasn’t sure I could handle.
I’ve also never seen myself as a gatekeeper. I don’t want to pretend I have any right to deem certain stories worthy of an audience and others not. Especially since I believe everyone has a story to tell and that that story will always find the people who need to hear it most. But maybe that’s just the dreamer in me.
Over the past year, I’ve put together my lineups by inviting writers I know, love and/or respect to be a part of this series. And by some combination of hard work and luck, each event has been an incredible success, and I’ve been able to watch this community flourish and grow.
As it grows, it feels right to take this series into a new space. I know there are so many emerging nonfiction writers out there with amazing stories to share, and I’ve decided I don’t want to miss out on those stories anymore. Which brings me to the very exciting news that Must Love Memoir is opening for submissions on Monday September 30, exclusively to its annual Substack subscribers (and it’s 50% off for the month of October!)
This is mine and Hope’s opportunity to say thank you to the members of our community who support the work that goes on behind the scenes; who understand what it takes to sustain this reading series, so we can continue to hold a safe space in NYC for nonfiction writers.
It’s also our opportunity to invite more people into this community and create a place on the internet where writers can connect and support each other. We don’t just want to see you read your work at Must Love Memoir — we want to see you come write with us during our virtual write-ins and join our workshops and keep in touch in our subscriber-only accountability chat. We want to get to know you!
So if you have been unsure about getting more involved in this community, I hope this opportunity gives you the little nudge you’ve been needing. After you upgrade to an annual subscription (remember it’s 50% off for the month of October), you’ll find all the details below on how to submit your work.