‘Don’t Put Me in Your Story’

When people find out you’re a writer, many will say ‘don’t put me in your story ha ha.’ A fellow writer came back with the most searing, talk-them-off-the-bridge response I’ve ever heard. I mean, I don’t think I’ll ever get the nerve to say it because there’s really no way back from it. It’s a response you give when you’re in front of a firing squad or about to ask for a divorce.

But before I reveal the response, I have to open the window into a writer’s mind when they hear a request to be left out of their book. I can’t speak for other writers, but I’m rarely quip-ready when I talk to people. I don’t usually have a pithy comeback for when people ask me not to put them in my book. Sure I could tell the truth, that they were in no danger of me committing them to immortality, but that’s harsh. And it’s fair to assume a writer might be inspired to create a character based on people they know—we do it all the time. But please know this—we have never, and I mean NEVER, used someone who has casually asked us not to. I’m sure a lot of people shudder when they find out their offspring, parent, or ex is writing a book, but to request they not be written about would imply they were guilty of some misdeed, which they probably are. And as Anne Lamott brilliantly said, “If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better.” (And that’s not the response I teased earlier! Still to come…)

The thing is, we writers spend years with our characters—sometimes decades. Often they stay with us for life. I’ve never been interested in obsessing over unkind people. And I certainly won’t waste my pen and paper, my hours of revisions and re-writes, on people who have hurt so many others that I’m a statistic to them. That’s the sad thing about hurtful people—they declare moral bankruptcy so you can never collect the debt. Why keep some corrosive person close to your mind and heart by turning them into a character?

So unless you’ve done the writer some great harm, don’t ask us not to put you in our story. For one thing, you can’t legally stop us from ‘creating’ a character YOU know is you with some details changed. For another, it’s embarrassingly arrogant. And finally, to quote my fellow writer L.M. Montgomery, who wrote Anne of Green Gables and is my biggest writing inspiration—“Do you think you’re important enough to be remembered?” BURRRNNN!!!!!!