Should I write this as memoir or fiction?

Domenica Ruta, author of the forthcoming All The Mothers, answers the question in an exclusive craft workshop for Memoiring

“When it comes to memoir, fiction, and the weird space between, we often find ourselves wondering, ‘are we allowed to do that?’ I think a more interesting question is not one of permission, but possibility,” says Domenica Ruta, author of the forthcoming novel All The Mothers (Random House, May 6, 2025) and the New York Times bestselling memoir With Or Without You (Random House, 2014).

Join us for a 75-minute craft workshop When Memoir Met Fiction: New Possibilities in Narrative, taught by Ruta, an incredible creative writing instructor at the Sarah Lawrence College MFA program. (I’m giving this ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ in advance, b/c I had workshop with her during my MFA and can attest to her generosity and brilliance.)

🗓️ Tuesday, April 22 at 6:30-7:45pm ET over Zoom.

To sign up, pre-order a copy of All The Mothers now, and share your proof of purchase with us (screenshot or photo is fine) at picniclightning12 [at] gmail [dot] com. You’ll receive the Zoom link a week before the workshop.

Workshop Details: Ruta proposes we ask ourselves: What elements of my life are worth mining as memoir, and what should I recast as fiction? Where should I remain faithful to the truth and where can I depart, regardless of genre? And most crucially, what tools do I use for these genres and genre-bending projects?

In our class, Ruta will read from All The Mothers and we’ll look at excerpts of famously blended memoir/novels. Next, she’ll give a craft talk and share how she came to write her novel—what elements from her life she incorporated, where she departed wildly. Then, she’ll lead us in writing exercises and a Q+A. Suitable for all levels of writers or those who want to write!

All about All the Mothers

Welcome to “the mommune.”

From New York Times bestselling author Domenica Ruta comes a heartfelt, hilarious novel about a single mom reimagining what the perfect family can look like.

“A delight, a romp, a tale of redemption; sexy and relatable, heartwarming and true…This story will resound as a rallying cry for mothers everywhere for generations to come.”—Chelsea Bieker, author of Madwoman

Sandy thought she was making her greatest mistake yet when she got unexpectedly pregnant in her mid-thirties by a dating-app flop. Now, her baby Rosie is the love of her life, but trying to co-parent with her daughter’s dad, a wannabe rock star, is a challenge—and seems to be veering into catastrophe territory when Sandy finds out through social media that her daughter has a half-sibling Sandy doesn’t know anything about.

Enter her ex’s ex, Stephanie, the other mother. Sandy is prepared to hate her but when the two women meet, they are shocked to learn how much they have in common beyond the deadbeat father their children share. Now Sandy needs to figure out what her and Rosie’s family looks like with all these new additions. Could life in a “mommune” be the answer to her prayers, or just a new brand of chaos?

In this winning story of family both born and chosen, Sandy is about to discover that when nothing goes as planned, the best things become possible.

Domenica Ruta is the author of All of the Mothers, the New York Times bestselling author of the memoir With or Without You, and the novel Last Day, lauded one of 100 Notable Books of the Year in 2019 by the New York Times Book Review. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times Book Review, The Cut, The American Scholar, Oprah online, and many others. She currently lives in New York City with her family.

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