Permission

The New Memoirist and the Courage to Create

Who am I to tell my story? And how can we grant ourselves permission to write the stories we’re compelled to tell when we've been told we shouldn't?

Without fail, almost every writer—new or experienced—has faced dire questions of permission and story ownership: there is something that they want to write about, that they need to write about. Yet: they can’t. They have been warned not to. They might be paralyzed with shame, threatened with shunning, chastened into silence. Even if what they need to write about has defined them and their worldviews.

But what if they did? What if you did?

After writing three critically acclaimed memoirs and a decade of teaching memoir workshops at every level, Elissa Altman has helped students face the elephant in every writer’s room: how to craft the stories that are most vital to them despite the voices that have told them not to. Permission is a master course, not only on how to craft memoir, but how to begin and keep going when you’ve been told you can’t, and how to how to give yourself permission to transcend the fear that keeps vital stories from being written.

We are the storytelling species; this book will inspire and guide all creatives to a place of transformation, of freedom from the constraints of shame and fear in all their forms, and to the understanding and recognition of the ethics of story-making, art-making, truth-telling, and creative soul-saving.

©2025 Elissa Altman (P)2025 Dreamscape Media

For me, this was both a class in memoir writing and an introspective narrative of the author's life. I am grateful to her.

I enjoyed the author's voice. It held my hand and walked with me as I listened to her book. I will listen to this again in a few months as I follow my own journey in memoir. Thank you, Alissa, for your genuine voice.

An invaluable read for any author.

Read this just before my first novel came out and it was a lifesaver. It’s not just for memoirists! Elissa eloquently describes the vulnerability in sharing our stories, and lays out beautifully what stories are ours to tell and why it is so important we share them. A great read.

Lots of great writing advice.

I liked the blend of personal memoir and craft advice. Both demonstrate the author’s insight and wisdom.

Raw and powerful.

The author walks us through her life and decisions to publish information people wanted kept silent. In this case, the author published something in which her family wanted to control the narrative and she takes us through the journey of her life of what happened after the publication. This is very powerful because the author talks about everything they went through leading up to the decision and after the decision. The author does an excellent job helping people to understand how difficult it is to make these decisions and helps them to move forward afterwards.

I'll read (or listen to) any book Altman writes

Nice mix of memoir, craft, and thinking about "permission." Not just the permission of who gets to tell the story on the page but in life as well. Altman tells an interesting anecdote in which she tells her dad that she wants to get her MFA. I won't spoil his reaction, but it wasn't good. So though she was an adult and could still do it if she wanted, she felt like she didn't have "permission" and didn't get her MFA.

As always, I enjoy how Altman structures her writing.