At the heart of a good personal essay is the meaning the writer gives to an event, his or her telling the reader, ‘This is how I see this experience: this is what it means to me.’
A common mistake made by writers who first attempt to write personal essays and memoir is to relate events in a straightforward manner, without looking beneath the surface for a deeper meaning: first this happened, then that happened, then this happened, and then it all came to an end.
But the reader who craves a new and unusual take on a subject will undoubtedly ask, ‘What
