Synopses & Reviews
Thousands of people around the world responded to
SMITH Magazine's call for six-word memoirs. Following up on the smashing success of the
New York Times bestseller
Not Quite What I Was Planning, here are more memoirs from Sarah Silverman, Junot Diaz, Neil Patrick Harris, Suze Orman, Gay Talese, Tony Hawk, Amy Tan—and hundreds of never-before-published writers.
Funny and bittersweet, witty and wild, or downright tragic, these addictive life stories are both monumental and miniscule. Six-word memoirs have become a globalphenomenon, offering anyone and everyone a telling peek at humanity and a chance to find the writer within.
"Father: ‘Anything but journalism.' I rebelled." —Malcolm Gladwell
"Live man's life in woman's body!" —Diane von Furstenberg
"Met wife at her bachelorette party." —Eddie Matz
"The miserable childhood leads to royalties." —Frank McCourt
"I never checked my lottery ticket." —Casey Burra
"Shiny head. Hippie hair. Shiny head." —Wally Lamb
"Bipolar, no two ways about it." —Jason Owen
"So would you believe me anyway?" —James Frey
"Can't look at heart donor's picture." —Tonia Hall
"Healed with steel, then got real." —Dr. Mehmet Oz
"I still practice my Oscar speech." —Jennifer Labbienti
"I've done it all except hear." —Marlee Matlin
Review
“A good number conjure up both a story line and a worldview. Six-word review: Buy it, keep it in bathroom.” Philadelphia Magazine
Review
“The brilliance is in the brevity.” New York Post
Review
“Irresistibly clever.” Chicago Tribune
Review
“You could spend a lifetime brainstorming.” The New Yorker
Review
“Will thrill minimalists and inspire maximalists.” Vanity Fair
Review
“A perfect distraction and inspiration.” Denver Post
Review
“The petite self-portraits encompass love and love, joy and sorrow-everything youd expect from a longer book.” ReadyMade Magazine
Review
“Six-word memoirs leave book lover speechless.” Rocky Mountain News
Review
“A fabulously appealing exercise both for writers and for readers.” Telegraph
Review
“Makes for compulsive reading and prove arguably as insightful as any 300+ page biography. Taken as a whole, this cascade of quotes from contributors famous and unknown creates a dizzying snowball effect of perspectives and feelings.” Publishers Weekly
Review
“The pithiest of life stories.” O, The Oprah Magazine
Review
“Dudes weird premise yields interesting stories.” Ira Glass, NPR's This American Life
Review
“I fell so in love with it.” Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Review
“Six words. Personal stories. Infinite possibilities. These ADD autobiographies prove that brevity can be the soul not simply of wit.” VSL.com
Review
“American haiku.” St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Review
“A torrent of self-expression not unlike the one launched by Frank Warren when he began inviting people to write their secrets on the back of postcards.” Toronto Star
Synopsis
"A perfect distraction and inspiration, and a collection that begs to be shared. Be warned, though. If you plan to lend out your copy, start out with two. Once it leaves your hands you'll never see it again."
--
Denver Post (on
Not Quite What I Was Planning)
The editors of the New York Times bestseller Not Quite What I Was Planning are back with its much-anticipated sequel, It All Changed in an Instant. With contributions from acclaimed authors like Malcolm Gladwell, Frank McCourt, Wally Lamb, Isabel Allende, Junot Diaz, Amy Tan, and James Frey, and celebrities like Sarah Silverman, Suze Orman, Marlee Matlin, Neil Patrick Harris, Ann Coulter, and Chelsea Handler, It All Changed in an Instant presents a thousand more glimpses of humanity. . . six words at a time. In the vein of the popular Post Secret books, It All Changed in an Instant, in the words of Vanity Fair, "will thrill minimalists and inspire maximalists."
Synopsis
Funny and bittersweet, witty and wild, or downright tragic, these addictive life stories are both monumental and miniscule. Six-word memoirs have become a global phenomenon, offering anyone and everyone a telling peek at humanity and a chance to find the writer within.
Teachers from kindergarten to graduate school have found the six-word memoir to be an inspiring writing exercise for their students. These examples will not only inspire your students to write their own six-word memoirs--but will help them find their voices and spur them to write longer pieces.
With contributions from acclaimed authors like Malcolm Gladwell, Frank McCourt, Wally Lamb, Isabel Allende, Junot Diaz, Amy Tan, and James Frey, and celebrities like Sarah Silverman, Suze Orman, Marlee Matlin, Neil Patrick Harris, Ann Coulter, and Chelsea Handler, It All Changed in an Instant presents a thousand more glimpses of humanity. . . six words at a time.
--Rocky Mountain News
Synopsis
The New York Times bestseller Not Quite What I Was Planning made six-word memoirs an international phenomenon. This much-anticipated sequel contains a thousand (more) glimpses of humanity from writers famous and obscure — six words at a time.
Synopsis
The editors of the
New York Times bestseller
Not Quite What I Was Planning are back with its much-anticipated sequel,
It All Changed in an Instant. With contributions from acclaimed authors like Malcolm Gladwell, Frank McCourt, Wally Lamb, Isabel Allende, Junot Diaz, Amy Tan, and James Frey, and celebrities like Sarah Silverman, Suze Orman, Marlee Matlin, Neil Patrick Harris, Ann Coulter, and Chelsea Handler,
It All Changed in an Instant presents a thousand more glimpses of humanity. . . six words at a time. In the vein of the popular Post Secret books,
It All Changed in an Instant, in the words of
Vanity Fair, "will thrill minimalists and inspire maximalists."
Funny and bittersweet, witty and wild, or downright tragic, these addictive life stories are both monumental and miniscule. Six-word memoirs have become a global phenomenon, offering anyone and everyone a telling peek at humanity and a chance to find the writer within.
Synopsis
“A perfect distraction and inspiration, and a collection that begs to be shared. Be warned, though. If you plan to lend out your copy, start out with two. Once it leaves your hands youll never see it again.”
—Denver Post (on Not Quite What I Was Planning)
The editors of the New York Times bestseller Not Quite What I Was Planning are back with its much-anticipated sequel, It All Changed in an Instant. With contributions from acclaimed authors like Malcolm Gladwell, Frank McCourt, Wally Lamb, Isabel Allende, Junot Diaz, Amy Tan, and James Frey, and celebrities like Sarah Silverman, Suze Orman, Marlee Matlin, Neil Patrick Harris, Ann Coulter, and Chelsea Handler, It All Changed in an Instant presents a thousand more glimpses of humanity. . . six words at a time. In the vein of the popular Post Secret books, It All Changed in an Instant, in the words of Vanity Fair, “will thrill minimalists and inspire maximalists.”
About the Author
Larry Smith is the founder of
SMITH magazine, an online storytelling community. He's the coeditor of
SMITH's
New York Times-bestseller
Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure. He's also a contributing editor of
ESPN the magazine, and has worked as the articles editor of
Men's Journal, executive editor of Yahoo! Internet Life, an editor of
Might magazine, a founding editor of P.O.V., and editor in chief of P.O.V.'s sister publication, EGG. He serves on the boards of the alternative news organization AlterNet.org, and the computer literacy organization the LAMP.
Rachel Fershleiser is the coeditor of the New York Times bestseller Not Quite What I Was Planning, Six-Word Memoirs on Love and Heartbreak, and the forthcoming six-word memoir collections I Can't Keep My Own Secrets and It All Changed in an Instant. She has written for The Village Voice, New York Press, Print, Los Angeles Times, National Post, Fray Quarterly, Salon.com, and several amazing print and online publications you've never heard of. She lives in New York City and is the director of events at Housing Works Bookstore Café.
Exclusive Essay
Read an exclusive essay by Larry Smith and Rachel Fershleiser