S2, Ep 6: How Do You Start Your (Holocaust) Memoir? with Leah Eichler

The Book I HAD to Write

Jul 18 2023 • 31 mins

About this Episode

Back in the 1990s, Leah Eichler, then a young reporter, interviewed her grandmother extensively about her experiences as an Auschwitz survivor. In this episode, Leah discusses her book-development journey working with coach & TBIHTW host Paul Zakrzewski. If you’ve been overwhelmed by a book you want to write – but aren’t sure where to start – this is the episode for you.

Discussed On This Episode:

· The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million, by Daniel Mendelsohn

· My uncle often went missing. I worried about the day he wouldn’t come back, The Globe and Mail, Oct 8, 2021

· Esoterica Magazine

Important Moments

How Leah's interview with her grandmother in the 1990s resulted in the "bubbe tapes"

How the book coaching process helped Leah evolve her idea

Influence of Daniel Mendelsohn's The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million

Highlights of Leah's June "roots" trip to Hungary to research her grandmother's story

Leah's recent publication successes with an essay about tattoos & intergenerational trauma; and another essay about being in a interracial marriage and competing historical traumas

Leah's background as a journalist and its impact on writing her memoir

Leah's work as creator and editor of Esoterica Magazine

Credits

This episode was edited and produced by Chérie Newman at Magpie Audio Productions. Theme music is "The Stone Mansion" by BlueDot Productions.



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