Love & family
What actually kept you together?
1969-2020 · from her thirties
He’d been writing it down where I wouldn’t see. All those years. Because he couldn’t get it out of his mouth.
Told by Joan
A Story does the asking.
You choose the hour once. A Story rings them in its iPhone app, asks about their life and follows whatever they say. The family reads and adds in any browser.
Tuesday, 10:00 · A Story is calling
“What did the garage smell like when you were fixing things?”
Four moments. You’re in the first.
Follow one family from the two-minute setup to everyone adding what they remember.
You
Set it up once.
Your parent installs A Story on their iPhone, and you choose the hour it rings. That is your whole job.
Them
Their phone rings.
The call comes through the A Story app at that hour. They answer and talk. Nothing to type.
A Story
It listens, and follows.
It follows what they actually say, and lets go when they say no. Each call becomes a memory to read.
Everyone
The family adds theirs.
One link, no account. Their photos and versions sit beside the original, which stays as it was.
What one call leaves, in the app
The transcript, word for word
You don’t start with the fifty-one years. You start with one thing. What did you notice first about him?
His handwriting. I knew his handwriting a year and a half before I properly knew his face - he was posted out to Aden and we wrote. I’ve still got them all in a biscuit tin. All but one.
Every call keeps the card and the full transcript. Clips in the storyteller’s own voice are in development. Joan is a sample.
The setup, step by step.
What each step looks like on the phone. Open a step for the detail.
Step 1: Your parent installs A Story on their iPhone.
They open it and tap Begin your story, or use the code or link you sent them. You can sit beside them, or walk them through it on the phone. A Story is in a private beta on iPhone for now.
Step 2: You choose the hour it rings.
Pick the time they are usually free. A Story calls every day at that hour, and the time can be changed or switched off whenever they like.
Step 3: At that hour, their phone rings: A Story is calling.
On an iPhone it rings like any call, on the lock screen, so there is nothing to open first. They answer, or say not today and A Story calls again tomorrow. Where the phone cannot be rung, a notification opens the same call.
Step 4: They talk. A Story asks, listens and follows.
One question at a time, out loud. It follows what they actually say, and lets go when they say no. Nothing to type.
Step 5: The call becomes a memory, in their own words.
Each call keeps the memory card and the full transcript, word for word.
Step 6: The family adds what they remember.
One link, no account. Their photos and versions sit beside the original, which stays as it was.
Screens from the A Story app with its sample family.
If you’re the one being asked.
- It rings in the app at the hour your family picked. Nothing to type or save. You just talk.
- Today, A Story rings on an iPhone. On other phones, it reminds you to write instead.
It’s a computer that calls and asks, not a person. Nobody at A Story reads or listens to what you say unless you ask us to help, or someone reports something. If you write to us, Daniel, who started A Story, answers himself. Who is behind A Story- You can decline a question, pause, or change the subject.
- Nothing appears until you say yes.
- Your story belongs to you. Read our privacy policy
Where A Story is today
The calls are the part that comes by invite. The rest works now.
- The callsBy invite
- A Story rings in its iPhone app, in a private beta. Ask for an invite, and we help you set it up.
- The familyWorks now
- Once your family is in, everyone reads and adds through the family’s code or link, in any browser, free.
- The bookWorks now
- Print it at home, free, every page. Printed editions come once ordering opens.
Watch a call become a book.
A 49-second film. The Millers are a fictional family. Voices are synthetic.
It’s a computer that calls and asks, not a person.
Read the transcript
- Every family has one person who knows all the stories.
- How she met Walter.
- None of it is written down.
- We all mean to ask. Then life gets busy.
- A Story calls her.
- A Story: Who did you meet by pure chance who changed your life?
- She just talks. She never types.
- A Story: Did you know where they came from?
- Every answer becomes a memory, in her own words.
- The whole family adds what they remember.
- And whenever you're ready, it becomes a book you can hold.
- Grandma gets a call she looks forward to.
- The family hears stories they've never heard.
- And her stories become a book the whole family keeps.
- A Story. Your family's living memories.
- Music: original score for A Story. Piano: Salamander Grand Piano by Alexander Holm (CC BY 3.0, creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), via FreePats (freepats.zenvoid.org).
Music credit
Music: original score for A Story. Piano: Salamander Grand Piano by Alexander Holm (CC BY 3.0, creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), via FreePats (freepats.zenvoid.org).
Good listening changes the next question.
A scripted sample call. Her grandson asked for her earliest memory of church. She gave it, and then added eight words she had not planned to say.
Sample calls
Rosa, 84about her mother and one winter
“My mother’s. St Brigid’s, six o’clock Mass, before her shift at the laundry. She went every morning of her life. Even the winter she wouldn’t look at Father Dolan.”
A Story followsIt follows the aside
Rosa - you slipped something in at the end there. The winter she wouldn’t look at Father Dolan. I’d much rather stay with that than move on. What happened that winter?
Everyone in the family has a way in.
Not one narrator, but everyone who was in the room.
Everyone who knows her stories can add their part, and a memoir someone typed years ago comes in as it is.
- Telling about someone
“Rose is here with me.”
A cousin or an aunt talks with A Story about Rose. The questions turn around for them, and what they add is credited to them.
- Writing it down
A companion for the blank page.
A question to answer, another if that one doesn’t fit, and tidying that leaves your words yours.
- Already written
Bring in the memoir.
A Word or text file becomes one memory per chapter. A Story reads it first, so it never asks again what’s there.
- Together
Call the family together.
Up to four phones on one call in the app. Everyone talks, and A Story keeps what’s said.
When a chapter is ready, make it a volume.
The stories and photographs, bound as a book. Print it at home free, or order a printed edition from $39 once ordering opens.
Set it up for someone you love.
The calls ring in the A Story iPhone app, which is in a private beta. Inviting family, writing and reading never cost extra.