do I need approval from government on my book?

Question

I'm writing a book covering the time I was married to an officer (now retired) in the military. Although it's about my life - it's my life as a military wife. Will I need to seek some sort of approval from the goverment before I seek to publish? Sense it's real life -an autobio kinda of ,and not fiction , this thought came to mind. Any input about this will be helpful! Thanks~

I want to use real places , dates, and events but change the names. Will this be a problem ? It's been at least 15 years and I think anything that I may have had knowledge of would be so out of date it wouldn't matter, but I'd hate to waste my time and have to re-format and or re-write the entire book. Thanks for any input on this ~

Answer 1

Assuming that you never worked for the government or were granted a security clearance, you can publish whatever you want to publish. You have no restrictions because, presumedly, you were never privvy to any classified information. An employee of the government who is granted certain accesses has to agree to pre-publication review for anything they want to publish, because they have had direct knowledge of sensitive materials and the government ensures its' right to prevent unauthorized disclosure. In your case, even if some of the information you wrote about was "sensitive", the government would take a do not confirm or deny stance. Anything like that may raise some questions for your husband though. Write it! It sounds like it might be a good read. I'll look for you on the best-seller list.

Answer 2

You can go right ahead and write your book. As long as you do not divulge any state secrets in it there is no likely hood that the government or the military will have any interest in it. When you find a publisher, your editor will read it and it any parts appear to be of a secret nature the lawyers of the publisher will look it over.
Have a happy and blessed Christmas.

Answer 3

I'm going to say no because with the First Amendment, you are entitled to free speech.

If a publisher takes your book, it will actually be up to their lawyers to have anything taken out of the book they think might get the publisher into trouble. Examples would be anything libelous or anything that would defame someone's character, that kind of thing. You shouldn't have to worry about it. As far as using the real names of private individuals, that's something you may have to check out - again, I wouldn't worry about it unless you get a publisher. Sometimes for the sake of a story two characters are combined into one person or names changed.

Answer 4

No,

Unless you have signed a clause ahead of time. Just be warned. If you do give out classified info, they will know it came from your husband, they could call him back to active duty, court marital him for disclosing secret info to you, then kick him out of the service and take away his pension. As long as you are not planning to give away any secrets feel free to write whatever you want.

Answer 5

Not unless to included some military top secrets in it.

Answer 6

As long as your not giving out any official secrets i dont think you need to inform the government

Answer 7

No you do not. You didn't sign any contract when you were married to him that said that you must keep your life story in secrecy. I say write it, and good luck!

Answer 8

It is always safe to take permission because of sensitivity of the issue.

Answer 9

if you were not serving the military and not revealing any of the secrets then no need

Answer 10

Your publisher will tell you what can and cannot be published.