259. Going Back to Rescue the Past featuring Deborah Derrickson Kossmann

Deborah Derrickson Kossmann joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about how complicated family dynamics culminated in her mother’s severe hoarding disorder, grieving what you didn’t get as a child, going back to rescue the past, sharing family secrets, recognizing shame in loved ones, telling a story in a fair way, how anger is a shortcut, waiting until someone has passed to write about them, how editing makes us better writers, recognizing when there is an emotional piece missing, wanting a memoir to read propulsively, keeping narrative arc in mine, and her memoir LOST FOUND KEPT.

Also in this episode:

-trying to be fair and accurate

-thinking about your book as a reader

-the important work of publishing and promotion

Books mentioned in this episode:

-The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa

-Writers and Lovers by Lily King

Deborah Derrickson Kossmann won Trio House Press's inaugural 2023 Aurora Polaris Creative Nonfiction Award for LOST FOUND KEPT: A MEMOIR (January 2025). Book Pages named it one of the Best Memoirs of 2025. She is currently working on a new book COMPLICATIONS OF CAPTIVITY.

Deb’s humorous essays have appeared several times as “Modern Love” columns in The New York Times and her story about her relationship with the world’s oldest captive gorilla appeared in the “Opinionator” section of that newspaper. Her poetry, essays and feature articles have been published in Bellevue Literary Review, Nashville Review, Memoir Monday, Rhino, Tiferet, Psychotherapy Networker, and PSYCHE, to name a few. She was the winner of the Short Memoir Competition at the Philadelphia First Person Arts Festival and has received a Poetry Fellowship from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.

A clinical psychologist in private practice, she lives in Havertown with her husband and Sofia Carmela, a cat with a whole lot of “tortitude.”

Connect with Deborah:

Website: lostfoundkept.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drdebkossmann/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/people/Deb-Derrickson-Kossmann/61562692720716/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/deb.derricksonkossmann

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/deb_derrickson_kossmann/

Substack: https://debderricksonkossmann.substack.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drdebkossmann/

– Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit’s Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank

Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social

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