A great obituary makes a reader who might not have known the loved one well feel as if he or she knew them as a good friend.

Obituaries often recite factual information that tells us about what someone did for a living, about their family, and they announce the particulars about memorial services (date, time, location, etc.) and suggestions for donations in the loved one’s names to organizations in lieu of flowers. Too often, they become monotonous, in part perhaps because of the budgetary constraints from publishing obituaries in newspapers, which used to be expensive and today have become almost prohibitively expensive in cost due to changes in the newspaper business caused by the Internet.

Obituaries do not have to be monotonous.

Today, most funeral homes will publish an obituary on their websites as part of the services they render to their clients. Today, an obituary can move beyond mere facts and tell, at least in brief, the story of an amazing life.

Writing an obituary is one of the rites of passage of a loved one, and can be a difficult thing to do among all of the other things you and your family do in the process of saying goodbye. You don’t have to shoulder this burden alone; I am here to help.

I will request information about your loved’s ones life such as a resume or curriculum vitae (C.V.) about their career and information regarding their service and interest in their community, along with information about family and services planned. I will interview you and other family members in a conference telephone call if possible that I will record and transcribe. I will also look at your loved one’s social media pages and otherwise research them on the Internet to try to get the best picture of them that I can, and then I start writing.

A sample of my obituary writing may be found here — be sure to look at the memories this obituary helped inspire among those who knew this gentleman, which will be nothing short of priceless to the family:

William Prather Obituary – Dallas, TX (dignitymemorial.com)

The complete Bill Prather Obituary may be found here.

[ Please note that the funeral home link should in no way be construed or interpreted as an endorsement of my services by Gonzales Funeral Home or dignitymemorial.com. It is merely the location on the internet — the URL — where this obituary was published. ]

Depending on my availability, I will deliver a first draft of the obituary to you within 24-48 hours, and will work with you with multiple edits to make the obituary right for you.

To Engage Me to Write an Obituary:

My fee for writing an obituary is $250, paid in advance*. I can get quite busy, so before you pay me, please text me at 512-940-0298 to make sure that I am available to help you within the time-frame you need. Please click on the button below, fill in, and submit the email form. I will send you an invoice by email.

After you have paid, we will be in contact by phone, text, and email. I try my best to accommodate your and your family’s schedule in this difficult time for you. I will ask you to gather some information about your loved one and email it to me, and I will send you questions I would like to ask that will help me write the obituary. At some point, we will have one or more recorded telephone calls to allow me to interview you for further information before I start writing.

I write each obituary personally one-at-the-time, and I may decline the work if I cannot reasonably make the deadline you require.  I will let you know by email in that case in lieu of sending you a Square Invoice in the event that you did not inquire about my availability by text message.

I will deliver a first draft of the obituary within 24-48 hours of our telephone interview. I will work with you as much as reasonably needed to get the obituary right.  It is very important to both of us that this writing is as nearly perfect as it can be, since it honors someone you love.

Upon request, I will provide you with an abbreviated version of the obituary tailored for newspaper publication at no extra charge.

Once you pay the invoice, we will get started as close to immediately as is possible.

*Once I deliver a speech or obituary to you, even in draft form, there is no incentive for you to pay my fee once you have my writing in hand.  That’s why you pay me in advance.