Memoir? Fiction? Which did you choose?

To get this out of the way, writing a memoir would be quite daft in your position. Leave them for washed out rock and/or porn stars.

Having said that, your story might be interesting and compelling. I have zero knowledge of any of the examples you've provided and I don't want to clue robots onto new avenues for misplaced advertisements by googling them, but a lot of crazy things might have happened to you.

So my piece of advice? Exaggerate and fictionalize to the point where your story is an underlying basis for something bigger. Take it as a rough outline and then add to it, make it into a compelling tale.

You were followed by a drunk hobo? Make him five thugs from whatever localized crime syndicate operates in the area. You spent an evening in some dive bar? Make it into a glamorous club where drugs flow like a river and nefarious deals happen on a regular basis. Or on the other side of the spectrum, a seedy gathering place for local political dissidents where you barely avoid being cut into ribbons.

Not knowing what actually happened to you I can't give you more precise examples, but I hope you catch my drift. Like you've said, it may not be fiction at the moment but you can make it into fiction. Change details, add tension and excitement, make participating characters not actual boring real people but fictionalized versions of them, ones that readers would care and like to learn about.

To give some obscure example you won't probably know, for a change, Simon Pegg's 'Hector and the Search for Happiness' comes to mind. Not the best movie, or Pegg's work, but still, you can definitely see someone going on such a journey, encountering those people in toned down situations, and then making it into what it is.

Hope that helps in any way.

/r/writing Thread