The Memoir Land Author Questionnaire #70: Amy Wilson
"Don’t be discouraged that the idea that is calling you won’t be 'hot' enough, and don’t chase what’s hot right now if it’s not the sort of thing you’re good at writing."
Since 2010, in various publications, I’ve interviewed authors—mostly memoirists—about aspects of writing and publishing. Initially I did this for my own edification, as someone who was struggling to find the courage and support to write and publish my memoir. I’m still curious about other authors’ experiences, and I know many of you are, too. So, inspired by the popularity of The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire, I’ve launched The Memoir Land Author Questionnaire.
Here’s the 70th installment, featuring Amy Wilson, author most recently of the essay collection Happy to Help: Adventures of a People Pleaser, and of the newsletter Happy to Help: the newsletter. -Sari Botton
Amy Wilson is the author of the memoir When Did I Get Like This? and her latest book, Happy to Help. Since 2016 she has also been the co-host of the Webby-honored podcast What Fresh Hell: Laughing in the Face of Motherhood. Amy is also an actor who has appeared on and off Broadway, as a series regular on TV sitcoms, and on national tour with her solo show Mother Load.
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How old are you, and for how long have you been writing?
I’m in my 50s, and so I’ve been writing for a long time. The first writing I remember really editing and polishing were my speeches for my high school speech and debate team. (I was blessed to have an amazing coach with very high standards.) Then I was an English major in college, sweating over every paragraph.
Then, when I was starting out as an actor and the parts weren’t coming fast and furious, I performed solo material and sketch comedy, writing the parts I wanted for myself. Eventually one of my solo shows ran off-Broadway and then around the country. Writing books came next.
What’s the title of your latest book, and when was it published?
Happy to Help: Adventures of a People Pleaser was released just this month (January 2025).
What number book is this for you?
It’s my second. When Did I Get Like This? came out in 2010.
How do you categorize your book—as a memoir, memoir-in-essays, essay collection, creative nonfiction, graphic memoir, autofiction—and why?
A memoir-in-essays. Memoir because it’s very much about my own experiences. Essays because I’m also getting at larger points about women’s lives, and also because the book is not trying to tell a complete story of my life—just the story of one aspect of it.
Happy to Help is a collection of essays about the times I stayed too long or tried too hard because I didn’t think I had a choice. It’s about having too much on your plate and wondering what you can put down when the answer feels like nothing. And it’s about the advice that an overwhelmed person receives when she asks for help: to just say no, to lean in, to go with the flow, to stop making things harder than they need to be. None of which, it turns out, is particularly helpful.
What is the “elevator pitch” for your book?
Happy to Help is a collection of essays about the times I stayed too long or tried too hard because I didn’t think I had a choice. It’s about having too much on your plate and wondering what you can put down when the answer feels like nothing. And it’s about the advice that an overwhelmed person receives when she asks for help: to just say no, to lean in, to go with the flow, to stop making things harder than they need to be. None of which, it turns out, is particularly helpful.
What’s the back story of this book including your origin story as a writer? How did you become a writer, and how did this book come to be?
My first book, When Did I Get Like This?, was a parenting memoir. That book deal came from the national tour of my solo show Mother Load, and the book drew from the same subject matter: the years I spent parenting three small children, and working so hard at getting it right that I sometimes forgot to enjoy it.
I then worked on a follow-up parenting memoir which didn’t find a home. Then I spent a couple of years working on a novel that just never came together. I mean, I finished it, and then subsequent drafts, but I just couldn’t get it to be something my agent and I thought was good enough to submit.
After all of that, Happy to Help came to be because I met my publisher, Zibby Owens, at a party—and she remembered having read and enjoyed When Did I Get Like This? a decade earlier. “Have you thought about writing a second book?” she asked, and after all that time, the deal came together very quickly.
What were the hardest aspects of writing this book and getting it published?
After that conversation, I sold this book to the publisher based on a relatively brief proposal. Then came the work of fleshing out the idea, and as I wrote, what the book wanted to be about began to drift away from what the proposal had specified. That’s very much to be expected, and it was something I had discussed with the publisher at the outset—but it did mean that during the editing process, what the book had set out to be and what it had become needed to be somewhat reconciled.
It was a rigorous process that certainly made the book much better—shout out to Andrea Robinson, who was a marvelous editor—but it took some time.
How did you handle writing about real people in your life? Did you use real or changed names and identifying details? Did you run passages or the whole book by people who appear in the narrative? Did you make changes they requested?
If I still had a relationship with the person I was writing about, I shared with them the pages in which they appeared, even if what I was saying about them seemed perfectly anodyne. If they requested changes, I endeavored to honor them. And if edits were requested, they were often details I would not have predicted would have stood out, which just goes to show why one should ask whenever possible.
In all cases I tried to hew specifically to what I perceived and experienced, rather than imagining the thoughts and emotions of others.
Where I could not receive permission, I was very careful to omit all identifying details.
Almost everyone’s names were either changed or omitted, which just felt cleaner.
Who is another writer you took inspiration from in producing this book? Was it a specific book, or their whole body of work? (Can be more than one writer or book.)
I took literal inspiration from Jennie Nash’s Blueprint for a Memoir, using her Impact Outline at the outset, and again whenever it was time to shuffle the order of the essays. Making sure I knew the “why are you telling me this?” from the beginning gave the book an argument and a spine.
Structurally, I was also inspired by Maggie O’Farrell’s I AM, I AM, I AM: SEVENTEEN BRUSHES WITH DEATH. That memoir-in-essays helped me understand how to circle around the maypole of an idea with a non-chronological structure. I loved reading how O’Farrell visualized the differences between how she advocated for herself versus how she advocated for her daughter, as well as how her daughter learned to advocate for herself— all of which became things I explored in my own book as well.
If I still had a relationship with the person I was writing about, I shared with them the pages in which they appeared, even if what I was saying about them seemed perfectly anodyne. If they requested changes, I endeavored to honor them. And if edits were requested, they were often details I would not have predicted would have stood out, which just goes to show why one should ask whenever possible.
What advice would you give to aspiring writers looking to publish a book like yours, who are maybe afraid, or intimidated by the process?
I had a question in an interview recently, for the launch of this book, that asked me how I ever got an essay collection published given that the industry is very wary of them and doesn’t like to publish them. My response was basically that I managed it because no one had told me that while I was working on the book!
It’s of course important to know what the trends are, what publishers are looking for (or not) in general terms. But I also believe you write the book that finds you, that inspires you. Don’t be discouraged that the idea that is calling you won’t be “hot” enough, and don’t chase what’s hot right now if it’s not the sort of thing you’re good at writing.
What do you love about writing?
I love having written. When I get those pages in, I feel better for the rest of the day. I’ve never been a distance runner, but it sounds similar to what they experience, how that ten-mile run just sets them up for feeling exhilarated all day, instead of exhausted.
What frustrates you about writing?
How there are other days when not much at all gets done, when I’m sure that I’m permanently stuck and that what I’m struggling with will never, ever work.
What about writing surprises you?
The sudden magic of it. How the solution to that same thing I’m struggling with just drops from above while I’m somewhere away from the page. It happened over and over while I was writing this book, but only when I was walking or cooking or driving, in that sort of half-engaged state where my mind can wander. It surprised and delighted me every time.
Does your writing practice involve any kind of routine or writing at specific times?
When I’m in a writing or editing season, I’m ruthless about writing every single day, and getting those hours in first thing. My friend Sarina Bowen, an extremely prolific author, turned me on to burn charts—we both like the online versions one can create at pacemaker.press. Charting my word count made it quickly clear that early mornings were my most productive time. So I get up before anyone else in my family, grab a coffee, and get to work.
I have also discovered that “touching” the work every single day, while I am in a writing or editing sprint, keeps me in the headspace of what I am working on. Letting it go a day or two leads to a whole “So where was I?” review that takes up half of whatever time I had set aside.
So I’m not always writing or editing, but when I am, I work every single day for a couple of hours, and aim to get through a certain number of words or pages in each session. I don’t work quickly, but when I’m working every day, I don’t have to.
I had a question in an interview recently, for the launch of this book, that asked me how I ever got an essay collection published given that the industry is very wary of them and doesn’t like to publish them. My response was basically that I managed it because no one had told me that while I was working on the book!
Do you engage in any other creative pursuits, professionally or for fun? Are there non-writing activities do you consider to be “writing” or supportive of your process?
My podcast What Fresh Hell is the best writing-adjacent creative pursuit I could have imagined. My co-host, Margaret Ables, and I aim to make every episode of our show both funny and thought-provoking. Over eight hundred episodes we’ve done doctoral-dissertation levels of research, including deep-dives into what studies actually say (and not just the headlines about those studies). When we approach a topic we always ask why it’s a thing, why it’s worth talking about. I bring all of that sensibility and knowledge to my writing as well.
What’s next for you? Do you have another book planned, or in the works?
My next book is very much alive in my head. I have a big idea I’m excited to explore further—and writing about it will be, of course, the best way to figure out just what it is that next book wants to say.
Love this, and love Amy!
Huge fan! You and Margaret have been my parenting voice of reason for years