OriginStories

For the person whose stories you never want to lose

Their story, told in their own words.
Bound for good.

OriginStories interviews someone you love across easy, unhurried conversations — then turns a lifetime of memories into a beautifully printed book your family will keep forever.

Start their book — $149Received a gift? Redeem it

How it works

From the first conversation to the finished book — no apps, no homework, no pressure. Just talking.

I.

They talk

A gentle interviewer meets them when it suits them — twenty minutes at a time, one chapter of their life per sitting, nothing to type. It listens the way a good grandchild would, and it asks the second question, and the third.

II.

It remembers

Every sitting picks up exactly where the last one ended. “Last time we talked about your years in the Navy. Ready to continue?” No repeating, no starting over.

III.

Family adds their voices

Children, siblings, and old friends get their own interview link. Their memories are woven into the chapters alongside the storyteller’s own.

IV.

You review every page

Chapters arrive as they’re written. Your family reads, corrects names and dates, and approves each one — nothing is printed until you say so.

V.

A book arrives

A beautifully typeset paperback — origins, work, love, the hard years, what they know now — shipped to their door. Made to be read for generations.

From a finished book

Every OriginStories book is written in a warm, third-person voice with the storyteller’s own words woven throughout. Here are two excerpts from a sample book.

Chapter Three

The Bakery on Halloran Street

“You Could Smell It Before You Could See It”

Margaret was eleven the first winter she worked the counter at her father’s bakery, standing on a milk crate so she could reach the register. The shop opened at five, but the ovens were lit long before that, and the whole block knew it. “You could smell it before you could see it,” she says. “Bread in the morning meant everything was still all right.”

The bakery survived two recessions and one fire, and Margaret can name every neighbor who helped rebuild it. Her father never wrote anything down — not recipes, not debts, not favors. “He kept it all in his head,” she remembers, “and he never once forgot who’d been kind to us.”

Chapter Seven

Sixty Miles of Prairie Highway

“I Married Him Because He Kept Showing Up”

The drive between Margaret’s town and Walter’s took an hour and ten minutes in good weather, and Walter made it every Saturday for two years — through hail, harvest, and one blizzard that closed the road behind him. “I married him because he kept showing up,” she says, laughing. “There were handsomer men. None of them ever showed up.”

They were married in the spring of 1958, in a church with a leaking roof and every pew full. Walter’s brother drove the wedding car; the bakery provided the cake, of course. “My father cried into the frosting,” Margaret says. “He denied it his whole life. We all saw it.”

Excerpts from a sample book. Names and details are illustrative.

What families say

“
Dad hasn’t stopped talking about his sittings. He told stories none of us had ever heard — sixty years of them. Reading the first chapter, I heard his voice on every page.
Ellen R.
Gave a book to her father, 84
“
My grandmother doesn’t use a smartphone and she didn’t need to. She just talked. Watching my mom and her sisters add their own memories to the chapters was the best part.
Marcus T.
Book for his grandmother, with 5 family contributors
“
I bought this for myself, honestly. Twenty minutes at a time, it walked me through my whole life in order. My kids will have answers to questions they haven’t thought to ask yet.
Priya S.
Started her own book

One price. One book. Theirs.

Everything included for a single one-time payment: unlimited interview sittings, up to three contributor interviews with family and friends, your family’s review of every chapter, and a printed paperback copy shipped to their door.

Want more voices in the book? Add as many extra contributors as you like for $19 each — a sibling, an old friend, the whole choir.

30-day make-it-right guarantee. Unredeemed gifts refunded in full.

$149one-time · everything included
  • ❧A finished book of 80–120 pages
  • ❧As many interview sittings as they need, at their pace
  • ❧Three contributor interviews included
  • ❧Family review of every chapter before anything is final
  • ❧One printed paperback copy, shipped to their door
  • ❧Extra copies at printing cost plus a few dollars

Additional contributor voices beyond the three included: $19 each.

Give a book — or start your own

Questions families ask

Does the storyteller need a computer or an app?
No. They open a link in any web browser — a phone, tablet, or laptop — press one button, and talk. There is nothing to install and nothing to type. Many families set it up on a tablet and leave it on the kitchen table.
How long does it take?
The whole story usually takes four to six hours of conversation, in twenty-minute sittings spread over days or weeks. There is no deadline. Every sitting is saved the moment it happens, so stopping mid-story loses nothing.
Is it really an interview, or a list of questions?
An interview. The interviewer works one chapter at a time, follows up on what it hears, asks for the day, the room, and what was said, and comes back to a chapter on a later sitting to go deeper. It remembers every name and every year from earlier conversations.
What if a topic is too painful?
The interviewer asks permission before heavy ground and drops it the moment they decline. The family can also list topics to leave out before the first conversation, and those are never raised.
Is their voice recorded?
No. Speech is transcribed live and the audio is never stored. The transcript is the only record, and it belongs to your family.
When does the printed book arrive?
Once your family approves the chapters, the book goes to the printer. The included paperback ships by mail and typically arrives within two to three weeks; faster shipping is available at cost. Extra copies can be ordered anytime at printing cost plus a few dollars.
What if it doesn’t work out?
Unredeemed gifts are refunded in full on request. For a book already underway, contact us within 30 days of purchase and we will make it right, up to and including a full refund.