If you followed me for very long, you know that storytelling is a big part of my nonfiction work. Stories change a dry, boring, put-this-book-down read to an engaging, transformative experience for the reader.
In this week’s episode, I address a question from a listener about the differences between memoir and leadership genres and how personal narratives are used differently in each. Both have commonalities in how to use stories, such as enhancing core ideas without overshadowing them and being flexible with where to place stories to support thematic flow and reader connection.
I also talk about how to balance the content in each genre and how much of a chapter could include personal stories—all with the audience in mind.
Join me if you’re interested in learning more about using stories to transform lessons into memorable experiences, keeping those readers reading and strengthening your book’s impact.
Follow me on:
- Instagram @stacyennis
- Facebook @stacyenniscreative
- YouTube @stacyennisauthor
To submit a question, email hello@stacyennis.com or visit stacyennis.com/contact and fill out the form on the page.
Ask Stacy: How should I use storytelling in my nonfiction book? | Episode 255 Transcript
These transcripts were generated by robots, not writers.
Stacy: Welcome, welcome. This week I am back answering your questions. Well, not you probably who’s watching this, but Anonymous, who wrote me. Many times a week I receive questions from people, future authors, published authors, people that want to live in Portugal, people that aspire to work in publishing. All you can imagine the range of questions I get. It’s really fun. Of course I can’t respond in detail to every single person, so I always, if it makes it to my inbox, I always reply in some fashion. Assuming it’s a normal email, I will say I also get some interesting ones that come in, sorry, don’t reply to those. But for the normal emails that I get with questions or just to say hi, I always respond.
Stacy: Some of the questions that I get are a little too detailed for me to provide a resource or answer and so I usually ask the person’s permission to answer them broadly. So for the podcast and YouTube and today I’m going to answer a question about storytelling in your book, specifically in a leadership book. So I’ll read the question to you in a moment, but first I think I should introduce myself because you might be new, we might be new to each other, so we should probably meet before I answer this question. Hi, I am Stacey Ennis. I am a book strategist and coach. I’m also a number one best selling award winning author. I have also ghostwritten and co authored many books. So in total, including the ones I’ve authored 18 books as well as contributed directly to well over a hundred books.
Stacy: I need to retaliate that because I’ve been using that total since I first tallied it many years ago. So it’s time to update that stat. I need to get the actual this more specific bigger number than that. And I’ve worked in this industry for 17 years, so it’s been my life’s work since I was 7 years old and fell in love with books and writing. And so I get to do this work of education, of sharing to help you on your author journey. And today I’m answering a question. So let me read today’s question again. This is from Anonymous Foreign.
Stacy: Anonymous asks if they could ask a question about their work in progress. They say, I think it’s really hard to know how much of my own story to include and where to put it in the book. In an interview on YouTube, you emphasize the difference between thought leadership and memoir genres. I think you said that in a thought leadership book, the personal stories need to serve the big idea and that the book is about the journey of the reader, not the writer. That’s true. Those are really good guidelines. I wonder if there are other guidelines as well.
Stacy: For example, where I should and should not place a piece of my story forward throughout the book, separate chapter, beginning of a chapter as the narrative arc, et cetera, and what percentage of the book my story should constitute the maximum. This person goes on to say that their book is really the result of a lot of personal experience and also some health challenges they’ve been through and some spirituality related pieces. So my personal story is important. I’m just afraid it’ll take up too much space in the book, turning it into a memoir thought leadership hybrid. I’ve collected lots of other materials too though, and I’ve settled on the big idea to show the reader how a shift in perspective they put in parentheses viewing the world through a spiritual lens can take them from disappointment and resignation to renewed zest for life.
Stacy: So maybe I shouldn’t be too anxious. I’m just a bit unsure as this is all new to me and it’s so much easier to make good decisions with Samora knowledge. I second that. I love that. Okay, so first of all, Anonymous, thank you for this question. I get this question all the time, and probably because you’re watching this video, you had the same question and you’re curious how to use storytelling in your nonfiction book. Particularly if you’re writing a thought leadership book, a big idea book. Here’s the truth. Most authors underutilize stories in their writing and stories are hugely important because they are what people remember. They are what are repeated. It is what resonates with people and it’s what helps them remember the messages, the lessons, the learnings in your book. So without story, well, it’s boring. I don’t know. It’s boring.
Stacy: It’s not memorable, it’s not engaging. A book should engage. A book is a useful thing. But if people just wanted utility, they’d read manuals. So you can both be useful but wrap that usefulness and story. I would say just from reading what you have, that there is definitely a possibility that this book could be in the I call it mission Based Memoir. Memoir with a message, marketable memoir. It’s like a memoir that’s positioned for a next stage for that author, whether it’s the keynote stage or business growth or whatever that is.
Stacy: But if you really want this to be a big idea book, and particularly if it is something in the business or leadership space, and again, I’m talking a little bit more broadly, not just to Anonymous, who wrote in, then it’s really important that the book organizes first around the core idea and the principles with the stories chosen and integrated to serve the. The lessons. And where do you include those? I mean, all throughout. All throughout the book. And there really isn’t a place where story cannot show up. And there’s a lot of different ways that you can use story.
Stacy: I teach a lot of this in my program, but just to give some brief examples, you can wrap a lesson in a story so you can open with the story and that story serves the point of whatever that point of the chapter is, and then you can keep referencing the story throughout. You can open a chapter with half of a story and then continue and then close with the rest of the story. You can have a story that feeds the whole book, such as your personal journey. It’s not so much, you know, is there a place that you shouldn’t use story? There’s. Everything is fair game from my perspective. Can you overuse story? Absolutely. You can have all story and not enough usefulness or not enough content. It depends on the book though, because some of the most incredible useful books are entire stories.
Stacy: And in fact, I think about the last book that I co authored, at least the one that has my name on it, because I have many out as a ghostwriter with my dear friend and mentor, colleague Ron Price. It’s a business fable, it’s a leadership fable, it’s a, an entire story, but it’s a teaching book. So there really is no, I can’t give you a percentage. 100%, 20%. I mean, it really depends on the book. But I would say that, you know, without having the time to do a deep analysis of percentages of books, I was like, okay, can I give Anonymous a range? Give people a range of what percentage of a chapter should be story based. If you are really teaching, so you are giving a concept and really teaching something. This is really rough.
Stacy: So, you know, someday maybe I’ll have some time to go and actually analyze this and give you real data, but I’d say maybe anywhere from 20 to 40% of a chapter could be storytelling and the rest of it maybe would end up being more of the teaching content with references to the storytelling. But again, you know, that can really vary if you’re writing really prescriptive nonfiction. So it’s a very how to. Then it might be like more on the 20% side. But then again, I was like, okay, I recently heard the author whose name is escaping me right now, which is terrible. We always remember the names of books, but not the authors. Isn’t that right? We should flip that the Automatic Millionaire. And that book is so rich in stories, but it’s very prescriptive nonfiction.
Stacy: I don’t know what the percentage is, but I would want it. I would say it’s maybe like it’s gotta be in the 40 plus percent. So, you know, again, this book is all about finance and money and investment strategies and all this stuff. You’d think that storytelling would be really small, but it’s not. And it’s been, you know, it’s sold millions of copies all around the world. So again, I don’t have an exact answer for you, but I think that guideline of the. The message and the lessons, being the hero of that writing and the stories, buttressing that and supporting that is probably the best guide that I can give you at this stage. I really hope this was helpful for Anonymous and for you.
Stacy: Whoever you are that’s watching this or listening to this, I hope that you found it useful along your author journey. Be sure to subscribe to this channel or within your podcast app so that you will get more of these videos to support you on your author journey.
Comments +