The top three books in The New York Times nonfiction bestseller list for the week of November 14:
1. Life by Keith Richards
2. Broke by Glenn Beck
3. Earth by Jon Stewart
So, what’s the one-word title of your memoir? Leave it in the comments here, with, optionally, a one-sentence explanation why (and, yes, your sentence can be more than six words). Erin McKean, founder of our favorite place for linguistic treats, Wordnik, will pick her favorite. The winning scribe gets a copy of one of the above books, or, if you don’t like those options, you can choose SMITH Mag’s most recent Six-Word Memoir book.
Contest ends on November 19 (5pm est). Enter as often as you like. On Twitter, tag it: #1wordmemoir.
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CT Goods
Shards.
Lisa Bottone
Journeywoman
Lisa Bottone
Undefined
Veronica Keegan Moore
Tenacious
Lisa Bottone
F*#$K!
Lisa Bottone
Poised
Lisa Bottone
Vamped
Jenny
Finally (because after all the ups, downs, trials, and tribulations of life – eventually it all comes to an end and then we’re all at peace – finally.)
Katherine Carroll
Runaway
Larry Smith
Overcaffeinated.
Ideal for running a web community, a little tough to live with…
Lisa Bottone
Used
Valérie
Ambivalence
– because my feelings and thoughts always seem to be conflicted and can never be straightforward (and I just like this word as well 😉 )
Amanda
Adapted.
Because life (on the large and small scales) is about change, and this memoir adapts my memories and experiences into print. (Who knows? If it’s good, maybe a film or made-for-TV movie, too!)
Our Bold Hero
Notwithstanding
Marc Bernardin
Assimilated.
Not only am I a black man who walks successfully through a predominately white world, I’m a geek who as integrated successfully into society.
Holly
Dilettante
Sgul
Hence
Sgul
Sigh
ally c
Hope
…because despite it all, i still have the hope for a better tomorrow.
GN
Pass
Douglas
Caveats.
Lisa Bottone
Anyways……
I was once encouraged to consider this word as a prompt to jog my thoughts past judjments and comments from everyone and anyone around me. After I listen and nod my head, I think (despite the lack of gramatical correctness) “Anyways, what will I do now” It brings everything back to my responsabilty for my choices.
Lisa Bottone
Inamorata
Lisa Bottone
gadabout
Lisa Bottone
siren
Julia
Medicated.
(It’s how I get up, how I fall asleep, and how I survive everything in between.)
Liz
Word
GabrielJR
Regards.
Killie
Toughgrrl
-I don’t take any crap from anyone and most men are threatened by this.
Killie
Yo
-My favorite saying.
Killie
Freedom
-After my divorce, it’s what rang true! (and my ears are still blissfully ringing!)
Killie
Witch
-Fits me perfectly.
Karen
More!
Sam Grobart
Pants
Sarah
Veganized
Penelope
Passport
Ever since I grew up in a farm town, I’ve been itching to land somewhere else, and I’ve lived around the world from Denmark to New Zealand. It took staying in place in San Francisco to find true love – to an Italian.
David W. Berner
My memoir – my real one – is entitled ACCIDENTAL LESSONS. The story of a rookie teacher and his road to self-discovery.
But – I think the memoir could easily be entitled ACCIDENTAL.
That says a lot, don’t you think?
David B
Author, ACCIDENTAL LESSONS
Cathy
Laughable
SAH
Him
(the last few years were all shaped because of that one person)
Lisa Qiu
Peripheraltastique
I think that at this point in my life I’ve been living on the outskirts of other people’s success and passions— but in a fantastic way where I’ve been taken wonderful places both physically and mentally. Thus— peripheral + fantastic!
Beth
Me
courtesy of Katharine Hepburn and Ricky Martin
Beth
Replay
would be mine own
Arru
Real
my experiences in the last few years are teaching me to try and be truly authentic, to be myself.
dangonzalez
responderé
Jeanette Cheezum
Hope
Larry Smith
My 14-year-old nephew reports that his would be, “Sexy.”
Nick Seagers
Inebriated
Victoria
Confusiated…
Victoria
Dogged.
(brought my 4 dogs to visit my kids and their 5 dogs)
Tsia Harris
Tailspin
Tsia Harris
angsty
Tsia Harris
alight
SAH
Lies
A.Keller
Juicy.
Bonvivant.
Dandy.
Tremensely.
molly r
Well,
Milena
Lugubrious.
jaced
Nutshell.
Tom
Lymphomartini. The story of my most recent year and a half; the fear from my lymphoma diagnosis, and how we overcame that fear to royally kick some ass.
Mary Elizabeth
Tom & I are in similar boats — per my cancer tweet yesterday:
Melanomaniac
ak
static
Jim Gladstone
MOIST
Jim Gladstone
The tears, the tenderness, the heat-drenched drama.
Jim Gladstone
Tears. Tenderness. Sweat-drenched drama. Mmm hmm.
abby ellin
Solipsism
(A LOVE STORY!)
abby ellin
alternatively:
Solipsist
(The story of moi)
Tsia Harris
Wander-lust
tales of an emotionally promiscuous girl with an insatiable need to.. travel.
Susan Breeden
Perplexed.
(About so many things, and on a daily basis.)
shaunyata
Juxtaposed
From conception to marriage, careers to parentage, my life can be viewed as a series of juxtapositions.
Susan Breeden
Self-helped.
(I’m a total self-help book junkie.)
GabrielJR
Laments
Almost Teb
scaredoflivinghopefulforabettertomorrow
I guess it won’t count, right? If not, my word is oxymoron
PDXWLF
Swexican, because my mom is Swedish.
Bethany Wilk
Worldly. (I grew up as a Jehovah’s Witness, and this is their term for non-believers.)
Bethany Wilk
Untimely.
(Because so many life events happen at inconvenient and ill-timed intervals.)
Gisele
Wordsmith
Laralee
Haredi
Kelly
Blue
Kelly
Doormat
Kelly
Sisyphus
Kelly
Gringa
[Grew up as the only American girl in a predominantly Hispanic neighborhood.]
cynchi
Wait
Cathy Lilly
unquenchable
-my eternal flame
xina_lowe
Bogtrotter.
No straight, easy paths in my life. Scenic, though.
sonny smith
Ahhh!
( memoir of a life focused on the all together too brief moments of joy & bliss in a world full of pain & misery)
Britt Knight
Riptide
Bobbie
Satisified.
Britt Knight
Kapakahi
(Hawaiian for confused or mixed-up.)
Bobbie
Perfect.
Elisa Shevitz
Drama
Shira Lazar
neurosity
it’s a mix of neurosis and tenacity
Jeanette Cheezum
Diligent
Jeanette Cheezum
Survivor
Jeanette Cheezum
Faithful
Jeanette Cheezum
Worker
Jeremy
Klong
“[A] word coined by Frank Mankiewicz to describe ”a sudden rush of crud to the heart,”’ such rush caused by the realization that all that time, you had been wrong about something.
arluckett
multihued
Loon
Tripe— takes guts to survive out there
Loon
Gestalt
Loon
Unrequited — we love life far more than it loves us
Loon
Genitalia —- everyone will want to read my memoir
Loon
Reared
Loon
Welcome — An invitation to a life of exceptional mediocrity
Loon
Stirred— A life unlived by James Bond
Loon
Laugh —It’s the quintessential defense mechanism
Loon
Homogenized — Succumbing to the American melting pot.
Bobbie
Lucky
Bobbie
Bullshit-ed
– Don’t think my mother ever told me the truth!!!
SAH
Teenager…
Carl
“Distracte…”
Carl
“Almost”
ctgoods2
Shameless
mrsjack
Chameleon
sfdell
Reassembled
Restoring the shards of youth, I want to be a grown up when I grow up.
Loon
If — For all those things left undone
Loon
Edited — To ensure our legacy is almost real
Loon
With — the Most Wanted preposition in the English language
Loon
Pi — Enigmatic, life imitates unknowable numbers — we simply do not know the ending
Loon
Lust — The driver behind most of our life-shaping accidents.
Loon
Should’ve — Without the second-guessing, what fun would a memoir be?
Loon
Child — We begin as children and end the same — with older skin.
Loon
Mom — Born of Mom, be a Mom, love a Mom — life’s all about Mom.
Loon
Ball — Sports, sex, prom, bawl, rolling stone, completeness…
SAH
Highschool
Amy
Done!
Stick a fork in me…
Loon
Loon — About to land jelly side down
Loon
And — And that’s all there is…
Loon
Claustrophobia — It’s not easy being that mountain guy in the cave
Loon
Yin
Loon
Yang
Loon
Sleep — Finally get to rest
Loon
Dead — Buried alive by my last chapter.
Christopher
And?
Melanie
Homonymy – We’re all in a state of being so many different things at once, in the guise of being just one thing.
Susan
Disrupted.
I came. I saw. I obsessed.
Teawench
unfinished
Mr London Street
Potentially?
My life sometimes seems to be about potential; had it, lost it, tried to regain it, tried to realise it. If there’s ever a book, maybe I will have done.
Eleisabelle
Onomatopoeia. As a musician, actress, and writer, my life has been all about words and sound and how they relate to each other. 🙂
Natalia
Eclectic. Because it has been and still is.
Daniel
Pull
Stephen Tiano
Unexpected
Because my life has been punctuated by a series of surprises.
Deb
Mantourage
(an almost true love story)
Tammy Castleberry
“Invisible” All my life I have felt people have just looked right through me as if I wasn’t there, ignored me, forgotten me.
Lisa Bottone
F.A.B
This is an intersting acronym I made up after being called a “FAT ASS BITCH” by my former sister in law. Hey, if you don’t laugh you’ll cry right? Turn those lemons into lemonade…whatever you say bounces of me and sticks to you and all that Jazz! So yes, I guess I am F.A.B…my def of it not hers.
joseph
Rationalizations.
cb
Woops.
Russell
Palimpsest. I am the sum of my incarnations, each one a revised manuscript, a displaced testament to lost time.
Nancy Pate
Clearly
Because I have lupus fog and my blog is called “On a Clear Day I Can Read Forever”
D.D. Syrdal
Time.
There’s never enough, and I wish I’d been born in a different time.
Martina
Chaos – because I live in a constant state of chaos between work, family, friends, etc.
Loon
Normal — Ironic exposure of this Utopian no-such-place
Loon
Posted — aka The End
Leigh
Unfinished
Leigh
Compulsive
Bobbie
Distracted
Stephanie B. Reyes
Qualia
Because you can’t tell “what it’s like” to live my life, unless you’ve lived it.
LoonNe
Next! — Life is a möbius
strip bread line; hop on…
LoonI
Lie! — Just add “f” and shake, don’t stir . . .
Keely Done
Undecided–because indecision is the key to flexibility!
Mary mcloven
Actually…
Mary mcloven
Retro-spect
Mary mcloven
Ineffable!
Kelly
Skirting
Tes
Moments!
Girlygirl
Extra-Ordinary
Extraordinary or extra ordinary? Either one could be quite fitting.
Loon
Pork — horny male pig, chunky, loves bacon, meets carnivorous world, and then “Pork!” springs love affair with Scout and Boo, lasts a lifetime.
Loon
Boo — Life is a bogeyman from Stephen King’s closet until one meets her Guardian Angel, Boo Radley…
Loon
Ishmael — Everyman’s furtive wish: Call me . . .
Loon
McMurphy — Always wanted to help him choke the Big Nurse and hoist him, alive, out that impossible window . . .
Loon
Allie — Like Holden’s lost brother, I too wrote poems in my baseball mitt, to pass those dull outfield moments, my roses in December.
Rich Dailey
Feastiality.
Rich Dailey
Onesomeness.
Tes
Experimental
abby ellin
POINTLESS.
rebecca
Survived
Kelly
McLovin’
Lynn Lamousin
Catatonic (confessions of an insomniac cat lady)
Anna Raff
WithDrawn
As an artist, there’s so much more to me than meets the eye
EJK
cacophony
Angel Zapata
Egotistical
(A book all about the remarkable me)
Quin Browne
Yes, I’m 13 minutes late–I’ve been baking muffins.
*sigh*
I’ll give one anyway…
‘Effervescent’
or
‘Eclectic’
Susan Breeden
Whatever.
(Apathy has become a survival skill.)
Laurel
Unrequited.
I’ve been waiting five years.
Laurel
Giggly.
I always crack and laugh under pressure. I have a truly maniacal laugh.
Tameka Mullins
Writer.
This word defines me the best. Throughout my life when faced with challenges, triumphs or defeats, one thing remains. My ability to pour my emotions on a page. I live, therefore, I write.
Killie
Ink
-I’m a tattooed writer, it’s all about the ink. Once you write it or stab it, it lasts forever…
Dave
“Almost”
because I almost make something of myself but fuck it up in the end.
Morgan Zink
Unstoppable.
No matter how much life knocks me down, I keep getting right back up and proving to it I can’t be stopped.