Talking to your interviewer

Your book is written from what you tell your interviewer, so this is where most of your time goes. The interviewer asks one question at a time, follows up when an answer opens a door, and remembers everything you say.

On a wide screen the Story tab is a split view: the conversation on the left, your questions on the right. On a phone, a Talk / Questions toggle switches between the two.

How the conversation works

Your interviewer appears as a chat thread under the header "Your interviewer", with a green dot that says "here whenever you are". It asks one question, follows up when there's more to explore (up to about three follow-ups before moving on), and when you come back after a break it marks the spot with "Picking up where you left off".

Don't want to answer something? There's a quiet Skip this question link under the current question.

Three ways to answer

Everything goes through the composer at the bottom of the conversation ("Type, or tap to talk…").

• Type. Write in the text field and send.
• Talk. Tap the mic button and speak. Your words are transcribed live as you talk ("Listening…"). If live transcription isn't available on your device, the app records and transcribes in one go ("Transcribing…"). Either way the words land in the composer so you can read them over before sending.
• Attach. Tap the paperclip to add letters, photos, documents or audio right there in the conversation. They're read the same way as anything you add in the Material tab. See Adding letters, photos and documents.

Every answer is woven into your story straight away. The people, places and moments you mention are picked out and remembered, with a link back to the answer they came from.

The Questions panel

The Questions panel is the map of what your story covers so far. At the top is a progress bar ("N of M answered"). Below it are topic chips, the areas your story explores, with covered topics marked.

Select a topic to see its open questions. Each one has two actions:

• Talk about this drops that question into the conversation so you can answer it now.
• Not relevant dismisses it for good.

At the bottom of the list:

• Generate more questions tops up every topic with fresh questions based on what your story still lacks.
• Review answers opens the "Your story so far" page. See Reviewing what we've gathered.

Adding and removing topics

Tap Edit topics to open the Topics sheet: "The areas your story explores. Add ones that matter, remove ones that don't." It has three sections:

• Your topics, each with Remove from list.
• Add from the library, a set of curated suggestions.
• Add your own, where you type anything you like: "Sailing", "The Restaurant Years".

Adding a topic also seeds its first question, so the interviewer can start on it straight away.

Questions close themselves. A question counts as answered when your story actually contains the answer, however it got there. Uploading a stack of old letters can close questions you never spoke a word about.

You can ask for chapters in conversation. Tell your interviewer something like "I'd like a chapter for each country: Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan" and the app notes those as declared chapters. When you plan your book later, it honours them. See Planning and writing chapters.