I’m dedicated to helping writers put their good words into the world.
– Suzanne Sherman
I’m an author, editor, memoir teacher, and experienced publishing professional, working in the field for more than forty years. For over 25 years I have specialized in creative nonfiction. My clients have published with Chronicle Books, Wiley & Sons, Ten Speed Press, and a number of others. I have also helped authors successfully self-publish.
Some of my memoir students and coaching clients prefer to write for personal pleasure or to create books for family, and they call me an invaluable guide.
With a BA in creative writing from UC Santa Cruz (1982) I began my publishing career as a magazine editor at Women’s Sports & Fitness. Following that I was an associate editor at Ortho Books and a regular freelance editor for Ten Speed Press, Chronicle Books, and other Bay Area publishers before starting my own editing and consulting business in 1995 and teaching memoir at colleges and universities. I am the author of two books, Lesbian and Gay Marriage: Private Commitments, Public Ceremonies (published by Temple University Press), and Girlhood in America: Personal Stories 1910 – 2010).
I believe in the power of the personal and enjoy helping transform the story of experience from truth to art. I know that well-written memoir can be a great teacher. I have spoken on memoir at the California Writer’s Club, Story Circle Network Conference, and the National Memoir Writers Association and I was an editorial consultant for three years at the San Francisco Writers Conference.
As a memoir teacher I’ve worked with hundreds of writers and assisted with the writing of thousands of short memoirs. I’ve taught weekend memoir intensives and online classes at several universities in California and Oregon and I taught memoir year-round at Santa Rosa Junior College for sixteen years. Currently, I offer a weekly memoir writing workshop on Zoom and I make available a video recording of a talk I’ve given for a webinar series addressing self-exposure and the exposure of others in memoir.
I live in Sonoma County, where I write, study piano, take lizards away from my orange tabby cat Sunshine, and work with writers from around the country and around the world from the beauty of my countryside office.
