Cher’s Memoir Sucks, Here’s Why…

Lessons in writing from a bad memoir that should have been great

Photo borrowed from Amazon books.

I rarely quit books.

I’m not a quitter, and I’m a voracious reader, so it’s an incredibly rare occasion for me to give up on a book. It happens less than once a year.

But, when it comes to Cher’s memoir (correction, part 1 of 2 books in a series about her life… more on this coming), I just couldn’t bring myself to continue to care about what she was sharing. I gave up at 42%, a few chapters after meeting Sonny.

I’m a musician and a memoirist (I have a book and an album in the world). I also waited for six months for my virtual library to send me this book. I was very excited to read it, and fairly certain that I would love it. This made the disappointment sting that much more (so much so, I wanted to write about it).

I love almost every memoir I read, and those about musicians and artists are among my favorites (Just Kids, Crying in H Mart, Scar Tissue, etc.). I even enjoyed Britney Spears' memoir, although the writing left something to be desired.

I’ll say this for Brittany (and the team of people who likely helped her with the book)—it held my interest. She kept to the questions and stories I was curious enough about to keep flipping forward, despite…