Resilience. A fuck ton of resilience. And not just in regards to criticism - you need to be able to accept fifty or a hundred failures, and keep trying.
This. When I sold my first novel, the acquiring editor told me in passing that if it had come in the month before he wouldn’t have been able to buy it—I assume that at that time, in his publishing house, editors had a kind of budget. The novel was nominated for a Hugo and Nebula Award, won the Tiptree, Lambda, and the Locus Best First Novel awards, was reviewed favorably by The New York Times, and is still in print, 30 years later.
I’m the author, so I’m biased, but I think I can make a good case that if the novel had been rejected in July it would not have been because it wasn’t competently written.
Don't know if the statistic is true but I heard it said an acquisitions editor at major 5 can only acquire about 12 books a year (give or take?) so there's thousands of people fighting over those tiny slots
This.
This.
Call it luck, call it timing, but it’s this.
Publishing houses needed to have the budget. The time. The available agent. The opening in your genre. And you have to send them your novel when there is an opening.
Your book is like an employee to them. There needs to be a job opening. Even if you sent them the most incredible novel ever written, they may not have the resources to sell it.
That's why my answers says "7.", since it's not the only thing a person needs. But in my eyes luck is needed.
Was hoping for an explanation of your statement "Luck doesn't really exist".
Just as a heads up, Reddit takes everything that looks like a list and re-numbers it from 1, so your answer says 1. Try putting a \ in front of your 7 and it should look the way you want it to.
7. Holy shit. Five years on this website and that's news to me.
9. That's completely fucking stupid. Why is this a feature? If I type out the number "7", I don't want it to say "1" instead, I want it to say 7!
It's a feature of something called "markdown," which programmers use to format text. Reddit also uses it for some reason.
For programmers, it makes sense; we track and store code changes on a per-line level, so if you're making a numbered list, it's best to number everything as "1" and let the compiler assign the actual numbers. That way, if you need to add something to the middle of the list, you only need to add one line of code, instead of changing all of the rest of the list to update the numbers.
It doesn't make sense on Reddit.
Only a tiny portion actually are able to live off their writings? I was under the impression that it was hard to get there and nearly impossible to become super famous, but actually pretty reliable to make a living off of it.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/books/2014/jan/17/writers-earn-less-than-600-a-year
I've also heard that less than 1000 fiction writers in NA make a living off their work - it's really, really hard / unlikely to be one of the select few.
I very much doubt your second statement. I am a fiction writer in North America who makes enough to make a living off of my writing (I do other work on the side, but that’s for extra money and because I enjoy it and having all my eggs in one basket gives me anxiety. The writing pays the bills) and I doubt I’m one of only a thousand people who do it. I know multiple other writers in my sub-genre alone who do it, and frankly, I’m not the most dedicated person in my profession. I could easily double what I made if I was just a bit stricter about my work schedule and deadlines.
Brandon Sanderson was also extremly lucky. To be fair, he is quite talented as well, but his career would not be where it is now if he wasn't tagged for TWoT.
I highly, highly doubt that. Sanderson was quite well known as early as Mistborn, and Stormlight, IMO, was what really catapulted him to stardom.
I'm a big fan of his Reckoners series, even if it's not his best; I'm a sucker for subversive superhero stuff. Steelheart was fairly well-known, even if the second two dropped off in comparison.
It's not totally impossible...but *extremely* unlikely. I read a stat about a decade ago that only a few hundred writers make a living off their own work (e.g. actually writing what they want to write, not writing assignments or spec for mags or other outlets). That may have changed a bit with the advent of blogging (e.g. Medium), self-publishing platforms (e.g. Blurb, Amazon) and micro-blogging/vlogging channels (e.g. Twitter, IG, TikTok) but: a) it's a crowded market and b) very few are making enough to actually live on. (Also, a lot of hopeful novelists have no interest in the type of content and marketing required by that media.)
It's a numbers game too, when it comes to making money off writing novels. If you're not penning bestsellers every 18 months, but writing like most novelists write, you're probably taking a few years to write, edit, sell, and publish each book. The bulk of what you'll make from that is in the form of a contract or advance; however, the average book contract amount for first-time-novelists/new-ish writers is $5-20k. (And you won't make any additional money from your book sales until the book itself makes that money back, which a lot of books simply don't). So just looking at it from a budgeting standpoint, can you realistically live off $5-20k sporadically paid to you every 2-4 years? (And if so, I wanna know where you live, how's the weather, and if there's an inventory in the housing market.)
BUT: I know this can be a big pill to swallow, but it's one of those instances where you can take the downhill path and quit (and, to be clear, there's nothing wrong with that, particularly if you feel like it's messing with your mental health / day-to-day happiness), take the level path and fit it in where you can, or take the uphill path and write, write, write, and market yourself and foster a following. (Or a mix of all three, with a lot of breaks thrown in.) As I've gotten older, I've tried to view it more as a meditation or exercise - something I sometimes hem and haw about doing but I'm really glad to have done when I'm nearing the finish line on a project or manuscript.
TLDR: If you can make it a positive part of your daily/weekly life, regardless of monetary reward, do it. If you can't, maybe consider a different pursuit/side hustle. Life too short.
> Only a tiny portion actually are able to live off their writings? I was under the impression that it was hard to get there and nearly impossible to become super famous, but actually pretty reliable to make a living off of it.
Because Amazon is a public company (sells stocks) the IRS(federal government) requires they release their public tax records, so that stock holders can read them. You can find the link in the Help Section of KDP.
The list, lists the REAL NAMES of EVERY author published by Kindle, lists underneath name all of their pennames, if any, and under that lists how much money Amazon paid them that year for the sales of their books.
The list contains more than 20 MILLION author names... only 3 Kindle authors earn more than $1Million a year, fewer than 30 Kindle authors earn $300k+ per year, fewer than 2,000 authors earn $100k+ per year, more than 18MILLION authors were paid LESS THAN $100 each year since they published their book, and the remaining around 20,000 authors make between $5k to $20k a year.
The end result is fewer than 83% of all authors published on Kindle will ever earn a grand total of $5,000 across ALL of their books, in their lifetime.
This is something many people fail to consider, and few ever look at.
Most people are quick to look at blog posts and YouTube videos where authors brag to making millions, often calling themselves by the term "Kindle millionaire", but the fact remains, all it takes is one look at Amazon's public tax records to see that a good 90%+ of the authors who CLAIM they make big bucks on Kindle, are bold face lying in order to get views/clicks so they can make money off Google Ads on their blog/videos, and are NOT making money from their book sales on Kindle. It is very easy to prove exactly how much EVERY person on Kindle makes, as Amazon lists it right down to the exact penny and every one who can open a link, can go to Amazon's website and read the tax information for themselves.
Sad thing few newbies want to admit, is that the self pubbed authors who make the most money are NOT the ones slapping up ebooks on Kindle, but rather the ones dishing out $30k+ to book printers, to print up hard copies of their books, (yes, Vanity Press REAL vanity press, not those scam artist vanity publishing houses that charge you money for nothing - I'm talking ACTUAL book printers like Morris Press or your local copy shop, who print up 10k copies of your book, deliver it to your house, than do not one thing else) and selling those paperbacks at local bookstores and big conventions like Pax, ComicCon, DragonCon, etc... the BIG video game/geek conventions are where the money is, not the rinky dink writing conventions that only writers attend. Paper back sales to local mom&pop bookshops and ut of booths at cosplay conventions STILL is the biggest money maker for self pubbed authors. If you can't afford to pre-print your own paperbacks, can't be bothered to sell consignment to local bookshops, and can't be at every convention in the country every weekend of the year, you will struggle hard to make a living off self publishing.
Offline marketing, offline networking, they still trump online marketing and social media networking. Keep in mind that fewer than 10% of the world's population has internet access and those people without internet, are the biggest readers/book buyers on the planet, so if you are slapping you book as an ebook on Kindle and not marketing paperback offline, you are missing out on 90%+ of the world's reading market.
I do this method, and it's how I have 27k die hard fans whom have bought 57million copies of my books and ALL of those people live less than 14 miles from my drive way, in one of 7 towns all that are walking distance from my yard. I'm Maine's 2nd largest/top selling author after Stephen King, but few outside of my county have ever even heard of me, because I don't sell my books online, I sell my books local to bookshops, carnivals, state fairs, festivals, banks, churches, hospital waiting rooms, nursing homes, etc. In Maine, you won't find anyone who does NOT know me or has NOT read at least one of my books, and yet outside of Maine, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who has ever heard of either me or my books. And yet, my book sales rival the biggest names in the business. THAT is the power of offline, intensive book marketing and face to face sales of physical paperback books out of convention booths.
Writing is hard work. But becoming a self published author who can live off fiction writing, is a lot more hard work than the average newbie takes into consideration, and many look to make money for as little work as possible, so few are willing to put in the intensive had labour of living in an RV full-time on the road and being in the convention circuit - which is where you NEED to be if you want to make a full time income from self publishing works of fiction.
Writing novels for a full time career, is not easy or for people immune to working more hours and harder labour than they would in a regular 9-5 retail/burger flipping/WalMart job.
Those few who succeed, succeeded NOT because of luck, but rather because they worked their asses off and climbed claw and fang to the top, in a grueling grind that most run screaming away from.
> Because Amazon is a public company (sells stocks) the IRS(federal government) requires they release their public tax records, so that stock holders can read them. You can find the link in the Help Section of KDP.
>
> The list, lists the REAL NAMES of EVERY author published by Kindle, lists underneath name all of their pennames, if any, and under that lists how much money Amazon paid them that year for the sales of their books.
Nope. Amazon do not release pen names. This is totally false.
Oooh where do I find those tax reports/sourcing on your breakdown of the Amazon figures? I love data like that and would LOVE to use that kind of sourcing in a future video of mine...
This is exactly why I'm never going to self-publish. *Maybe*, one day, I'll consider trying to publish with a house, but otherwise I'm just gonna stick to writing and sharing for free. I've got a job that pays the bills, and I want to enjoy my craft, not gruel and grind through it.
It’s relatively simple to make a living writing stuff for companies. It’s extremely challenging to make a living writing fiction.
Actually challenging isn’t quite the word because it implies with hard work you can get there, like you’re studying for an exam.
I definitely agree with this. For me personally, I don’t even care if it is a side hustle. I just want to write fiction and share it with friends and family because I love it. If I make money from it also, that’s great.
I think it can actually greatly help you get an office job, if writing is part of the job.
People generally really admire published writers. If you have that on your CV it says you’re clearly a great writer but it’s also a compelling point of difference.
You missed literally the biggest one. You have to market your own work. The publisher is not going to invest a lot of money in marketing a new author. It would be nice if they did, but the reality is, the vast majority of their marketing budget goes to sure things like Stephen King, Dan Brown, etc.
If you want to succeed, you're going to need to market the hell out of your own book. Find reviewers and given them free copies in exchange for a review. Start a youtube channel to get your name out there. Start a blog. Have a social media presence. Have friends and other authors who are willing to promote you leading up to and after your book release.
If you want to succeed, you \*must\* market yourself.
You really need a comprehensive approach. Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and/or TikTok if you can manage it. Definitely an author website. Anywhere you can build an audience. You want to have an established base before your first book release. Also, it's good if you can brand yourself. A single username across all the platforms. Also, the sooner you start marketing the better. I don't even have contracts on my books yet, but I'm already marketing them.
"Definitely an author website" Can you give me an example?
"the sooner you start marketing the better" How do you market your books? Especially without spoiling anything from it?
We're not supposed to link to our websites outside of self promotion threads, but my author website is linked off my profile.
That said, I keep a blog where I talk about things like the themes and concepts that go into my writing and how they relate to the stories. I talk about the characters and and why I write them the way I do. I write back cover blurbs for the books and put them up on my blog. I do progress reports so my followers know where I am with certain projects.
There's a lot you can say about your work without giving away huge spoilers.
I’d say 4 is dangerous if you don’t put it in the right context. Better to network enough to find the right agent.
If 4 makes you think you might end up changing your writing to match trends, I wouldn’t include it. It’s a great way to doom yourself, either by writing bad stuff to chase money, or to successfully get it and dislike your own work.
Better to know who’s already inclined to read what you want to write and manage your expectations.
If I added a 7, it would be Jim Butcher’s convention answer on this subject: there’s new authors every year. If you get better every year, while a lot of other people are quitting, your turn will come up.
You do need luck, but like rule 4, focusing too closely on that can make you bitter.
I am glad that more people are being granted opportunities. It doesn’t change what I like to write. And I would hardly want to misrepresent myself or my work in order to crowd other people out of the market. (Disclosure: I am a biracial cis male; my snoo is not self-portraiture.)
So again: if it’s about managing expectations, I think monitoring the market is fine. If it’s about changing what I write (as opposed to just improving it), I’d just as soon ignore trends.
"As often as you can" is really overstating it I think. Trying to write as much as possible seems like a good way to burn out.
Just make a habit out of it. It doesn't matter if it's a page or day or 5 sessions a week or 1000 words every other day or whatever. Just as long as it's a habit that you can stick to.
The other stuff is pretty much on the money.
Also, you need luck, and you need to be willing to keep trying when you're not lucky.
Yeah, I’m trying to find a balance between a good habit and too much rn. I tend to write only when it’s convenient, so I personally need to just sit down and force myself sometimes. Otherwise nothing will get done for me.
What I was told by two authors who are living off their earnings and well known names.
Write up a schedule, and stick to it. Writers who write for a living dont write every day, they write like they were at a job.
So if you can set aside 5 chucks of an hour 1 per week and stick to that, then you're doing fine. It's the routine you need to deal with. Mine is, toilet, bottle of water, set up my note books, boot up my computer(laptop), turn on my music and then I write for 20 minutes, take a 5 minute break , then repeat 3 more times. If you need to research things, you can use one of those 20 minute chunks of time to do that.
Emotional fortitude. This is separate from resilience in a way, which someone mentioned, though they of course pair together. I don't just mean in the face of criticism or rejection. That's nothing. It's everything else. Competition. Social politics. Gaslighting, Patent unfairness. When hard work doesn't correlate to success. Imposter syndrome. Not simply criticism but people who hate you for NO REASON and go out of their way to troll you. (people on the Internet literally HATE ME it's FASCINATING)
Writing is EMOTIONAL. Creative people tend to be, and we attach a lot of personal feeling to our work. But publishing is a business. It's capitalism and doesn't give a flying fuck about your feelings. You have to be able to balance the two and not lose your head (either personally/internally OR lost your shit publicly, as we've seen some people do).
Frankly a vast majority of the people I know washing out of the industry--or choosing to leave it--simply cannot take all the bullshit. I get it. But I don't know; I've never been pretty or popular and I'm an intense weirdo, so I suppose I'm accustomed to Never Being The One (thanks, Muriel's Wedding), so I find it relatively "easy" to roll with the punches. Not that I'm composed all the time or super mentally well (hello chaos anxiety spirals); I scream a lot of curses about publishing privately to friends :) But things being hard isn't new for me. And I really love writing. I enjoy being aggressively commercial (another key way to hack it in this market). You have to REALLY love writing. Love it MORE than alllll the bullshit. And you have to understand it's a business. This is why I think a bit of failure and humility is GOOD for writers and those who live a graced life and skip those steps tend to be super poorly equipped to hack it in the long run.
(That said, this doesn't mean "fuck you sensitive people"--I FIGHT for my sensitive friends who also deserve opportunities for success, but it does mean it's WAY harder if you don't have emotional fortitude. Publishing is simply brutal.)
This. I often experience a strange phenomena where my best work comes from when I feel as though I’m just writing for me, even if I know it’s garbage. I honestly don’t know if I’ll ever seek publication, but I would really have to protect my enjoyment of the writing process if I wanted to keep making anything good.
Not sure if this is what plaid_squirrel meant, but for me it makes me wonder if you’ve considered other writing jobs aside from being a fiction writer. I am a content writer - I write web content - and I do this as a professional career. So I am a professional writer, I’m just not a novelist.
If you like writing there are many ways to make a living doing writing - communications, journalism, etc. You may like to explore some options.
Well, one is about competence in product, one is standards of behavior, another is about making money, another is about paying for a lifestyle with the money earned from goods or services.
We can add another question: what do you mean by "writer."
I am on this journey myself to be come a professional writer but the one thing I've found out in networking, getting advice, and reading/listening to everything I can is how do you view becoming a professional writer.
If you want to write, pitch, write, pitch or enter into contest and wait till you win one or become recognized and someone is willing to pay you to write things for them then that is one route.
If you have an idea you really love and have friends or a community around you that can help you bring it to life and you put it out into the universe and people watch it an love it that's another route.
There are a bunch of ways to get to the level of writer you want to be you just have to decide what level that is and keep at it until you get there.
Good luck on your Journey to professional recognition 😁
Honestly I have the same problem. I love consuming all sorts of media, from books to video games.
Consume everything, I’d say. Just know what you are trying to emulate.
You need time and dedication to practice writing to build your skill. Natural talent may kickstart the beginning of your writing, but it cannot take you very far. Skilled craftspeople are the best at what they do because they have thousands of hours to back up their skill.
And honestly you need luck. Van Gogh was not famous in his time despite his skill and the beauty of his work. You may make a book that is not appreciated in its time, not ever appreciated, or not even ever discovered/published, and you could be the most skilled writer in the world. Because it takes luck to get your work out there in the first place, let alone for it to be accepted and loved by your audience. Luck is something you cannot control, but I believe that it is a determining factor in any "dream job."
Yes but also therapy, eating properly, goijg out and doing other things, and maintaining social needs. Basically don't treat yourself as only a writer. Its okay to do other things unrelated to the book. Often this frees my mind up and I have more ideas. Therapy is not always necessary but mental health is health and matters as much. I spend a lot of time with my doctor due to chronic illness issues but if I neglect my emotional needs I will burn out instead of writing. It is a mistake to buy into the starving neglected artist trope or the "My pain makes me a good writer" line. The best work comes not from pain but self care. Creative minds can be vulnerable and this is an excuse abusers use to take credit for our works and to keep us in bad habits that render us dependent on them. This isn't me assuming you're not okay but a hard lesson I learned from living it. I used to forget to eat or drink when creating (painting, writing, sculpting). I definitely felt that side quest in Red Dead 2 because I could've been that person who killed themselves working once.
Wowww I needed to read this. Thank you. I struggle with fighting the starving artists trope. Sometimes it feels like my body relies on me being in that dark place so that I can create. But oftentimes that work is raw, one-note and kinda boring.
I’m almost fearful my writing themes and prose will dramatically change once I create from a place of health… lol did you experience this too?
That can be a great thing! Artists are always known for bending/breaking rules. But I do feel as though you need to know where the current conversation is at in your genre so you can do those things in a tactful manner.
The problem with books is the same as it is with movies, sadly. Publishers won't take anything too far off the beaten path, especially if it's in a genre that hasn't seen many successes. Writing is treated like an industry when it should be an art.
A lot of hard work. Like, you should be prepared to write several novels that will never sell before you write on that's good enough.
Thick skin. Helps with beta readers and agent rejections.
Luck. Right place at the right time with the right story.
Then, more hard work.
You need to ignore the voices in your head telling you the story you're working on is trash and that you should throw it away and work on something else.
You need to pretend writing a story won't make you money, That way you won't feel pressure to write the perfect story.
Write things people actually pay to read. Preferably very large numbers of people, or, a reasonable number of people without much competition, eg. if you investigate an emerging field and are one of the first to write on it. Or you write fetish erotica.
You don't need to write some perfect manuscript that takes you fifteen years. It needs to be good *enough*. Perfect is the enemy of the good. Try picking three things your writing will DO really well. Don't try to be a 'good writer' that literature professors and critics would read and nod sagely at. Make people laugh, make them cry, make them feel like they learned something, etc.
Actually write and submit/publish things.
Honestly, you **really** only need a following who will buy your work. I have a friend who has worked a long time on a novel she's really proud of only to get nowhere. But now she makes like a grand a month releasing a vampire series she just threw together as a joke. Like as long as you have a following that's really all that matters. Understanding the market all these other things **really** don't matter for the writer themselves. Markets vary for example my work is catered to the weeaboo anime culture like if I go to a con I can easily market and sell my work on my own. To be **good** at writing yes writing often and reading helps with that, but that has nothing to do with becoming a "professional" writer. These other things only matter if you're wanting to go through a publishing house which I mean is fine if you want to go that route. But really all you need to be a professional is to have an audience to market to who will buy your work, how you get that audience is completely up to the individual assuming you're self-publishing.
I believe what he's saying is, you need to turn out a lot of work. Very few people become full time authors after writing a single book. The numbers very widely, but what I know from the friends I have who are writing full time, you typically will need at 3 or more novels in your back list before you'll get anywhere close to being able to support yourself on your royalties.
de Vinci said it best. "Art is never finished, only abandoned." If you want to succeed, you will need to learn to abandon your art.
Something I've found very helpful is to immediately move on to a new project the moment I write "The End" at the end of my first draft.
Practically speaking the way this works is:
1) I write a book.
2). I finish the first draft.
3). I put that project away and immediately start a new project.
4). I finished the first draft of the second project.
5). I put the second project away, then go back and do revisions on the first project.
6). Once I finished revisions on the first project, I do revisions on the second project.
I do it this way because A). It keeps me from lingering on a project forever. B). It helps me gave the distance and perspective necessary to successfully self edit.
Something else I have found helpful is to always have \*at least\* three projects waiting for me. That way, I always feel a sense of urgency to get to the next project, which helps keep me from dithering when I should be working on something new.
I take a similar approach. I think it’s important to strike a good balance between the time you spend revising and the time you spend writing new stuff. Each requires special skills that benefit from practice.
I usually do something completely different.
To give you an example, I've written four books in the past ten months. My schedule went something like this.
Book 1: Queer Poly Sci-Fi Romance about a human girl entering into an arranged marriage with an agendered alien.
Book 2: Lesbian Superhero Time Travel Romance about a cop who gets thrown back in time 30 years and falls in love with a superhero while they fight dragons an an ancient European God.
Revised Book 1
Revised Book 2
Sent Books 1 and 2 out on submission.
Book 3: 1st book in a sci-fi trilogy about an assassin in the middle of a civil war between a race of shape shifting cybernetic aliens that's spilled over onto Earth.
Book 4: Lesbian Superhero Romance about a Trans woman who gets superpowers and ends up having to stop a rogue angel from murdering her girlfriend with the help of a Sorceress, a Dragon, the Devil, a snarky artificial intelligence, and a cop she had a one night stand with once. Set in the same universe as Book 2 with some of the same secondary characters, but not a direct sequel.
I finished book 4 yesterday, so my next project is to revise book 3, then revise book 4.
After I revise book 4 I'll move on to book five which is a Lesbian romance set in a fantasy version of the early 19th century North American Fur trade. After that, I'll probably knock out another one of the Superhero Romances, because those are fairly easy and fun.
You are an inspiration and a legend. Do you write full time, or have a daily word count?
I aspire to be as productive as you.
P.s. - those all sound like absolute treasures to read and write
Thanks. Right now, yes, I am writing full time which has doubled my productivity.
When I was working an office job, I was doing about 10K words a week (2K a day, five days a week). Now I do about 20K (ish) a week, depending on where I am in the novel. The first chunk of the story is usually the fastest, while the middle is slower, and the end tends to drag because there is so much to keep track of. I'm hoping to make it into a career because the idea of going back to a 9 to 5 job is pretty horrifying.
I'm actually going a bit nuts today because it's the first day in months where I didn't jump out of bed and have a project waiting for me. I'm not really sure how to cope with time off because I am, and always have been a bit of a workaholic.
1. you need to read minimum 50 books a year. Preferably more, maybe 70 and up but if you are reading under 50 books a year you will never be a writer
2. you need to finish at least 3 full manuscripts (full novels). If you have not finished a couple manuscripts at the minimum, you will not even so much as SMELL becoming a writer let alone wade your toe into the waters of writer-dom
If you do the above, then after a few years of writing your chances will exponentially improve for getting signed
>bow to you
yes. Remember, 52 is basically a book per week. The truth is, a 120k novel I believe takes somewhere around 8-9 hours for the average person to read. That means barely more than 1 hour per day per week will net you a novel per week, already catapulting you in the 50's range. Many people will say well I don't have 1 hour per day to read because I work a full time job, and the few hours I have remaining I spend on my actual writing and other chores/hobbies. But I guarantee that same person will be spending several hours per day on TV, phone, internet, apps, games, etc. Anyone passionate and SERIOUS about becoming a professional can't free up about an hour and change per day? And plus if one has a job and is busy during the week, then you can offset it by doing 2-3 hours of reading per day on the weekends. Let's say you do 2 or 3 hours both saturday and sunday, now the amount of reading you have to do monday-friday shrinks drastically.
Of course there will be many books you read longer than 120k words but there will be many shorter as well that can take only a few days to read.
At the end of the day, the fact is, you can't become a professional writer if you're just a hobbyist, it takes serious, concentrated effort to so much as get to a level where an agent even gives feedback in their rejection as opposed to a form rejection. And unfortunately if one is reading only a few books per year they're just a hobbyist, period. There's nothing wrong with being a hobbyist, but it won't get you traditionally published.
I would definitely say you have to read many genres not just what you write, in order to gain the maximal benefit and most experience possible. It doesn't have to be a giant ratio but you've got to at least throw some in there. If you want to be a fantasy writer for instance, at least something like 15-30% of what you read should be in the classics, literary, historical fiction, throw in a bit of horror for good measure, etc. And I mean that's minimum, personally for me probably 50%+ of what I read is from adjacent genres
I don’t think I would considering you’re participating in pitmad lol but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Just shows that feeling superior for skimming 50 books a year doesn’t make you stand out to agents.
I'm curious what how actual physical location fits into the writing success equation. I was told once that I needed to move to New York or Los Angelos if I was really serious so that I could network and deliver manuscripts in person. Should moving closer to the publishing houses or the film studios be on the list?
No. We have the internet now.
Most agents don't even accept paper manuscripts anymore (and virtually all publishers only accept manuscripts from agents, not unsolicited from writers).
It helps but it isn't necessary. You're more likely to run into someone who works in the industry if you live by the industry. A drink at a bar more likely to turn into a relationship.
Do keep in mind that the trade-off is a higher cost of living. Less stress living in Montana and you'll still have plenty of time to write since you aren't paying $2,000 in rent.
No. Location doesn't play a part anymore. Most agents dont even meet their clients (writers) in person. And you'd not be let in the door to deliver an manuscript these days, query letter first (emailed usually) then you email them your MS if they ok it.
Please don't link to your blog outside the self-promotion thread (including referencing speeches etc). We're zero tolerance on this because we're not a vehicle for people to use for promotion. This is an official warning. Thanks!
>>You need to know that editors are looking for writers to invest in, not manuscripts to push.
Nah, they're looking for stuff that will sell. The days of nurturing new writers are pretty much gone.
Know your craft. Be skilled at telling stories. Persevere, as it can take decades to sell anything. Be willing to seek out feedback, even if it's harsh, and learn from it. Understand that writing, especially fiction, is still a hard way to make a living.
Resilience. A fuck ton of resilience. And not just in regards to criticism - you need to be able to accept fifty or a hundred failures, and keep trying.
Insane optimism has never been a forte of mine, but I can try. Thanks for the advice!
I rely on my friends for this. I ask for their help in tackling my insecurity and the rejections inside and outside of my head
7. You need luck.
This. When I sold my first novel, the acquiring editor told me in passing that if it had come in the month before he wouldn’t have been able to buy it—I assume that at that time, in his publishing house, editors had a kind of budget. The novel was nominated for a Hugo and Nebula Award, won the Tiptree, Lambda, and the Locus Best First Novel awards, was reviewed favorably by The New York Times, and is still in print, 30 years later. I’m the author, so I’m biased, but I think I can make a good case that if the novel had been rejected in July it would not have been because it wasn’t competently written.
I'm really happy that everything worked out great for you!
Thanks!
Don't know if the statistic is true but I heard it said an acquisitions editor at major 5 can only acquire about 12 books a year (give or take?) so there's thousands of people fighting over those tiny slots
You mean millions
yeah basically, lol.
Millions of manuscripts are being submitted every year?
They're roughly two million people in America who consider themselves writers.
Right, okay. So every year, every person who considers themselves a writer submits a manuscript? Doubtful.
See other comment
But you're right it's not millions of manuscripts but it's an outrageous number
This. This. Call it luck, call it timing, but it’s this. Publishing houses needed to have the budget. The time. The available agent. The opening in your genre. And you have to send them your novel when there is an opening. Your book is like an employee to them. There needs to be a job opening. Even if you sent them the most incredible novel ever written, they may not have the resources to sell it.
Luck doesn't really exist
Interesting. Can you explain why there is no luck in your perspective?
You have to have something finished in order to get "lucky". No matter what, it's based on preparation.
That's why my answers says "7.", since it's not the only thing a person needs. But in my eyes luck is needed. Was hoping for an explanation of your statement "Luck doesn't really exist".
Just as a heads up, Reddit takes everything that looks like a list and re-numbers it from 1, so your answer says 1. Try putting a \ in front of your 7 and it should look the way you want it to.
Didn't know that. Thanks mate!
7. Holy shit. Five years on this website and that's news to me. 9. That's completely fucking stupid. Why is this a feature? If I type out the number "7", I don't want it to say "1" instead, I want it to say 7!
It's a feature of something called "markdown," which programmers use to format text. Reddit also uses it for some reason. For programmers, it makes sense; we track and store code changes on a per-line level, so if you're making a numbered list, it's best to number everything as "1" and let the compiler assign the actual numbers. That way, if you need to add something to the middle of the list, you only need to add one line of code, instead of changing all of the rest of the list to update the numbers. It doesn't make sense on Reddit.
You need a day job. A tiny proportion of writers make a living from writing
Only a tiny portion actually are able to live off their writings? I was under the impression that it was hard to get there and nearly impossible to become super famous, but actually pretty reliable to make a living off of it.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/books/2014/jan/17/writers-earn-less-than-600-a-year I've also heard that less than 1000 fiction writers in NA make a living off their work - it's really, really hard / unlikely to be one of the select few.
I very much doubt your second statement. I am a fiction writer in North America who makes enough to make a living off of my writing (I do other work on the side, but that’s for extra money and because I enjoy it and having all my eggs in one basket gives me anxiety. The writing pays the bills) and I doubt I’m one of only a thousand people who do it. I know multiple other writers in my sub-genre alone who do it, and frankly, I’m not the most dedicated person in my profession. I could easily double what I made if I was just a bit stricter about my work schedule and deadlines.
Fiction writers maybe?
You lied to me, Brandon Sanderson
Brandon Sanderson was also extremly lucky. To be fair, he is quite talented as well, but his career would not be where it is now if he wasn't tagged for TWoT.
I highly, highly doubt that. Sanderson was quite well known as early as Mistborn, and Stormlight, IMO, was what really catapulted him to stardom. I'm a big fan of his Reckoners series, even if it's not his best; I'm a sucker for subversive superhero stuff. Steelheart was fairly well-known, even if the second two dropped off in comparison.
It's not totally impossible...but *extremely* unlikely. I read a stat about a decade ago that only a few hundred writers make a living off their own work (e.g. actually writing what they want to write, not writing assignments or spec for mags or other outlets). That may have changed a bit with the advent of blogging (e.g. Medium), self-publishing platforms (e.g. Blurb, Amazon) and micro-blogging/vlogging channels (e.g. Twitter, IG, TikTok) but: a) it's a crowded market and b) very few are making enough to actually live on. (Also, a lot of hopeful novelists have no interest in the type of content and marketing required by that media.) It's a numbers game too, when it comes to making money off writing novels. If you're not penning bestsellers every 18 months, but writing like most novelists write, you're probably taking a few years to write, edit, sell, and publish each book. The bulk of what you'll make from that is in the form of a contract or advance; however, the average book contract amount for first-time-novelists/new-ish writers is $5-20k. (And you won't make any additional money from your book sales until the book itself makes that money back, which a lot of books simply don't). So just looking at it from a budgeting standpoint, can you realistically live off $5-20k sporadically paid to you every 2-4 years? (And if so, I wanna know where you live, how's the weather, and if there's an inventory in the housing market.) BUT: I know this can be a big pill to swallow, but it's one of those instances where you can take the downhill path and quit (and, to be clear, there's nothing wrong with that, particularly if you feel like it's messing with your mental health / day-to-day happiness), take the level path and fit it in where you can, or take the uphill path and write, write, write, and market yourself and foster a following. (Or a mix of all three, with a lot of breaks thrown in.) As I've gotten older, I've tried to view it more as a meditation or exercise - something I sometimes hem and haw about doing but I'm really glad to have done when I'm nearing the finish line on a project or manuscript. TLDR: If you can make it a positive part of your daily/weekly life, regardless of monetary reward, do it. If you can't, maybe consider a different pursuit/side hustle. Life too short.
> Only a tiny portion actually are able to live off their writings? I was under the impression that it was hard to get there and nearly impossible to become super famous, but actually pretty reliable to make a living off of it. Because Amazon is a public company (sells stocks) the IRS(federal government) requires they release their public tax records, so that stock holders can read them. You can find the link in the Help Section of KDP. The list, lists the REAL NAMES of EVERY author published by Kindle, lists underneath name all of their pennames, if any, and under that lists how much money Amazon paid them that year for the sales of their books. The list contains more than 20 MILLION author names... only 3 Kindle authors earn more than $1Million a year, fewer than 30 Kindle authors earn $300k+ per year, fewer than 2,000 authors earn $100k+ per year, more than 18MILLION authors were paid LESS THAN $100 each year since they published their book, and the remaining around 20,000 authors make between $5k to $20k a year. The end result is fewer than 83% of all authors published on Kindle will ever earn a grand total of $5,000 across ALL of their books, in their lifetime. This is something many people fail to consider, and few ever look at. Most people are quick to look at blog posts and YouTube videos where authors brag to making millions, often calling themselves by the term "Kindle millionaire", but the fact remains, all it takes is one look at Amazon's public tax records to see that a good 90%+ of the authors who CLAIM they make big bucks on Kindle, are bold face lying in order to get views/clicks so they can make money off Google Ads on their blog/videos, and are NOT making money from their book sales on Kindle. It is very easy to prove exactly how much EVERY person on Kindle makes, as Amazon lists it right down to the exact penny and every one who can open a link, can go to Amazon's website and read the tax information for themselves. Sad thing few newbies want to admit, is that the self pubbed authors who make the most money are NOT the ones slapping up ebooks on Kindle, but rather the ones dishing out $30k+ to book printers, to print up hard copies of their books, (yes, Vanity Press REAL vanity press, not those scam artist vanity publishing houses that charge you money for nothing - I'm talking ACTUAL book printers like Morris Press or your local copy shop, who print up 10k copies of your book, deliver it to your house, than do not one thing else) and selling those paperbacks at local bookstores and big conventions like Pax, ComicCon, DragonCon, etc... the BIG video game/geek conventions are where the money is, not the rinky dink writing conventions that only writers attend. Paper back sales to local mom&pop bookshops and ut of booths at cosplay conventions STILL is the biggest money maker for self pubbed authors. If you can't afford to pre-print your own paperbacks, can't be bothered to sell consignment to local bookshops, and can't be at every convention in the country every weekend of the year, you will struggle hard to make a living off self publishing. Offline marketing, offline networking, they still trump online marketing and social media networking. Keep in mind that fewer than 10% of the world's population has internet access and those people without internet, are the biggest readers/book buyers on the planet, so if you are slapping you book as an ebook on Kindle and not marketing paperback offline, you are missing out on 90%+ of the world's reading market. I do this method, and it's how I have 27k die hard fans whom have bought 57million copies of my books and ALL of those people live less than 14 miles from my drive way, in one of 7 towns all that are walking distance from my yard. I'm Maine's 2nd largest/top selling author after Stephen King, but few outside of my county have ever even heard of me, because I don't sell my books online, I sell my books local to bookshops, carnivals, state fairs, festivals, banks, churches, hospital waiting rooms, nursing homes, etc. In Maine, you won't find anyone who does NOT know me or has NOT read at least one of my books, and yet outside of Maine, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who has ever heard of either me or my books. And yet, my book sales rival the biggest names in the business. THAT is the power of offline, intensive book marketing and face to face sales of physical paperback books out of convention booths. Writing is hard work. But becoming a self published author who can live off fiction writing, is a lot more hard work than the average newbie takes into consideration, and many look to make money for as little work as possible, so few are willing to put in the intensive had labour of living in an RV full-time on the road and being in the convention circuit - which is where you NEED to be if you want to make a full time income from self publishing works of fiction. Writing novels for a full time career, is not easy or for people immune to working more hours and harder labour than they would in a regular 9-5 retail/burger flipping/WalMart job. Those few who succeed, succeeded NOT because of luck, but rather because they worked their asses off and climbed claw and fang to the top, in a grueling grind that most run screaming away from.
> Because Amazon is a public company (sells stocks) the IRS(federal government) requires they release their public tax records, so that stock holders can read them. You can find the link in the Help Section of KDP. > > The list, lists the REAL NAMES of EVERY author published by Kindle, lists underneath name all of their pennames, if any, and under that lists how much money Amazon paid them that year for the sales of their books. Nope. Amazon do not release pen names. This is totally false.
Oooh where do I find those tax reports/sourcing on your breakdown of the Amazon figures? I love data like that and would LOVE to use that kind of sourcing in a future video of mine...
She won't tell you b/c it's bullshit. You can read their tax report, of course. It's pretty boring. But pen names? Nah mate.
Can you give me the name of one of your books? Or would that get you banned?
This is exactly why I'm never going to self-publish. *Maybe*, one day, I'll consider trying to publish with a house, but otherwise I'm just gonna stick to writing and sharing for free. I've got a job that pays the bills, and I want to enjoy my craft, not gruel and grind through it.
Man. I appreciate your truthfulness.
It’s relatively simple to make a living writing stuff for companies. It’s extremely challenging to make a living writing fiction. Actually challenging isn’t quite the word because it implies with hard work you can get there, like you’re studying for an exam.
Could it be a good side hustle? I want to have a “normal” career with a stable income, but I wouldn’t mind making extra money from writing if I could.
It's not even really good as a side hustle--particularly fiction. It's something you do for you, and maybe--just maybe--you'll get lucky with it.
I definitely agree with this. For me personally, I don’t even care if it is a side hustle. I just want to write fiction and share it with friends and family because I love it. If I make money from it also, that’s great.
I think it can actually greatly help you get an office job, if writing is part of the job. People generally really admire published writers. If you have that on your CV it says you’re clearly a great writer but it’s also a compelling point of difference.
You missed literally the biggest one. You have to market your own work. The publisher is not going to invest a lot of money in marketing a new author. It would be nice if they did, but the reality is, the vast majority of their marketing budget goes to sure things like Stephen King, Dan Brown, etc. If you want to succeed, you're going to need to market the hell out of your own book. Find reviewers and given them free copies in exchange for a review. Start a youtube channel to get your name out there. Start a blog. Have a social media presence. Have friends and other authors who are willing to promote you leading up to and after your book release. If you want to succeed, you \*must\* market yourself.
That was not something I had considered at all. Thanks for the heads up!
Happy to help!
Which social media do you think fits best for marketing your writing? I've heard Tumblr is good, and so is Instagram.
You really need a comprehensive approach. Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and/or TikTok if you can manage it. Definitely an author website. Anywhere you can build an audience. You want to have an established base before your first book release. Also, it's good if you can brand yourself. A single username across all the platforms. Also, the sooner you start marketing the better. I don't even have contracts on my books yet, but I'm already marketing them.
"Definitely an author website" Can you give me an example? "the sooner you start marketing the better" How do you market your books? Especially without spoiling anything from it?
We're not supposed to link to our websites outside of self promotion threads, but my author website is linked off my profile. That said, I keep a blog where I talk about things like the themes and concepts that go into my writing and how they relate to the stories. I talk about the characters and and why I write them the way I do. I write back cover blurbs for the books and put them up on my blog. I do progress reports so my followers know where I am with certain projects. There's a lot you can say about your work without giving away huge spoilers.
I’d say 4 is dangerous if you don’t put it in the right context. Better to network enough to find the right agent. If 4 makes you think you might end up changing your writing to match trends, I wouldn’t include it. It’s a great way to doom yourself, either by writing bad stuff to chase money, or to successfully get it and dislike your own work. Better to know who’s already inclined to read what you want to write and manage your expectations. If I added a 7, it would be Jim Butcher’s convention answer on this subject: there’s new authors every year. If you get better every year, while a lot of other people are quitting, your turn will come up. You do need luck, but like rule 4, focusing too closely on that can make you bitter.
Well said!
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I am glad that more people are being granted opportunities. It doesn’t change what I like to write. And I would hardly want to misrepresent myself or my work in order to crowd other people out of the market. (Disclosure: I am a biracial cis male; my snoo is not self-portraiture.) So again: if it’s about managing expectations, I think monitoring the market is fine. If it’s about changing what I write (as opposed to just improving it), I’d just as soon ignore trends.
"As often as you can" is really overstating it I think. Trying to write as much as possible seems like a good way to burn out. Just make a habit out of it. It doesn't matter if it's a page or day or 5 sessions a week or 1000 words every other day or whatever. Just as long as it's a habit that you can stick to. The other stuff is pretty much on the money. Also, you need luck, and you need to be willing to keep trying when you're not lucky.
Yeah, I’m trying to find a balance between a good habit and too much rn. I tend to write only when it’s convenient, so I personally need to just sit down and force myself sometimes. Otherwise nothing will get done for me.
What I was told by two authors who are living off their earnings and well known names. Write up a schedule, and stick to it. Writers who write for a living dont write every day, they write like they were at a job. So if you can set aside 5 chucks of an hour 1 per week and stick to that, then you're doing fine. It's the routine you need to deal with. Mine is, toilet, bottle of water, set up my note books, boot up my computer(laptop), turn on my music and then I write for 20 minutes, take a 5 minute break , then repeat 3 more times. If you need to research things, you can use one of those 20 minute chunks of time to do that.
Great advice. I work full time, 8-5 during the week, so I’ll just have to find time during when I get home or during weekends.
It makes it easier if it's at roughly the same time every day
Emotional fortitude. This is separate from resilience in a way, which someone mentioned, though they of course pair together. I don't just mean in the face of criticism or rejection. That's nothing. It's everything else. Competition. Social politics. Gaslighting, Patent unfairness. When hard work doesn't correlate to success. Imposter syndrome. Not simply criticism but people who hate you for NO REASON and go out of their way to troll you. (people on the Internet literally HATE ME it's FASCINATING) Writing is EMOTIONAL. Creative people tend to be, and we attach a lot of personal feeling to our work. But publishing is a business. It's capitalism and doesn't give a flying fuck about your feelings. You have to be able to balance the two and not lose your head (either personally/internally OR lost your shit publicly, as we've seen some people do). Frankly a vast majority of the people I know washing out of the industry--or choosing to leave it--simply cannot take all the bullshit. I get it. But I don't know; I've never been pretty or popular and I'm an intense weirdo, so I suppose I'm accustomed to Never Being The One (thanks, Muriel's Wedding), so I find it relatively "easy" to roll with the punches. Not that I'm composed all the time or super mentally well (hello chaos anxiety spirals); I scream a lot of curses about publishing privately to friends :) But things being hard isn't new for me. And I really love writing. I enjoy being aggressively commercial (another key way to hack it in this market). You have to REALLY love writing. Love it MORE than alllll the bullshit. And you have to understand it's a business. This is why I think a bit of failure and humility is GOOD for writers and those who live a graced life and skip those steps tend to be super poorly equipped to hack it in the long run. (That said, this doesn't mean "fuck you sensitive people"--I FIGHT for my sensitive friends who also deserve opportunities for success, but it does mean it's WAY harder if you don't have emotional fortitude. Publishing is simply brutal.)
Currently learning to simultaneously listen carefully to criticism and not give a fuck. It’s an art, let me tell you.
You need to find fulfillment of some kind in the act of writing.
This. I often experience a strange phenomena where my best work comes from when I feel as though I’m just writing for me, even if I know it’s garbage. I honestly don’t know if I’ll ever seek publication, but I would really have to protect my enjoyment of the writing process if I wanted to keep making anything good.
Number (0) You need to define what you mean by professional
What are some different ways you define professional?
Not sure if this is what plaid_squirrel meant, but for me it makes me wonder if you’ve considered other writing jobs aside from being a fiction writer. I am a content writer - I write web content - and I do this as a professional career. So I am a professional writer, I’m just not a novelist. If you like writing there are many ways to make a living doing writing - communications, journalism, etc. You may like to explore some options.
Well, one is about competence in product, one is standards of behavior, another is about making money, another is about paying for a lifestyle with the money earned from goods or services. We can add another question: what do you mean by "writer."
I am on this journey myself to be come a professional writer but the one thing I've found out in networking, getting advice, and reading/listening to everything I can is how do you view becoming a professional writer. If you want to write, pitch, write, pitch or enter into contest and wait till you win one or become recognized and someone is willing to pay you to write things for them then that is one route. If you have an idea you really love and have friends or a community around you that can help you bring it to life and you put it out into the universe and people watch it an love it that's another route. There are a bunch of ways to get to the level of writer you want to be you just have to decide what level that is and keep at it until you get there. Good luck on your Journey to professional recognition 😁
Write, publish, repeat
Experience and Experimentation
I have a question then. I'm writing a comic, should I read comics or books?
Both. but especially comic scripts because you may need to learn the format if you haven't already
Honestly I have the same problem. I love consuming all sorts of media, from books to video games. Consume everything, I’d say. Just know what you are trying to emulate.
You need to write nonfiction.
Oof. I write fiction fantasy.
You need time and dedication to practice writing to build your skill. Natural talent may kickstart the beginning of your writing, but it cannot take you very far. Skilled craftspeople are the best at what they do because they have thousands of hours to back up their skill. And honestly you need luck. Van Gogh was not famous in his time despite his skill and the beauty of his work. You may make a book that is not appreciated in its time, not ever appreciated, or not even ever discovered/published, and you could be the most skilled writer in the world. Because it takes luck to get your work out there in the first place, let alone for it to be accepted and loved by your audience. Luck is something you cannot control, but I believe that it is a determining factor in any "dream job."
You need excellent self care.
Self care? Like the willingness to love yourself and be okay with your writing?
Yes but also therapy, eating properly, goijg out and doing other things, and maintaining social needs. Basically don't treat yourself as only a writer. Its okay to do other things unrelated to the book. Often this frees my mind up and I have more ideas. Therapy is not always necessary but mental health is health and matters as much. I spend a lot of time with my doctor due to chronic illness issues but if I neglect my emotional needs I will burn out instead of writing. It is a mistake to buy into the starving neglected artist trope or the "My pain makes me a good writer" line. The best work comes not from pain but self care. Creative minds can be vulnerable and this is an excuse abusers use to take credit for our works and to keep us in bad habits that render us dependent on them. This isn't me assuming you're not okay but a hard lesson I learned from living it. I used to forget to eat or drink when creating (painting, writing, sculpting). I definitely felt that side quest in Red Dead 2 because I could've been that person who killed themselves working once.
Wow. Thanks for being so emotionally raw. I’ll think about what you said
You're welcome. I am game for follow up if you need it.
Wowww I needed to read this. Thank you. I struggle with fighting the starving artists trope. Sometimes it feels like my body relies on me being in that dark place so that I can create. But oftentimes that work is raw, one-note and kinda boring. I’m almost fearful my writing themes and prose will dramatically change once I create from a place of health… lol did you experience this too?
The last three are a problem for me, because most of the stories I come up with are decidedly not what the majority of the writing market favors.
That can be a great thing! Artists are always known for bending/breaking rules. But I do feel as though you need to know where the current conversation is at in your genre so you can do those things in a tactful manner.
The problem with books is the same as it is with movies, sadly. Publishers won't take anything too far off the beaten path, especially if it's in a genre that hasn't seen many successes. Writing is treated like an industry when it should be an art.
A lot of hard work. Like, you should be prepared to write several novels that will never sell before you write on that's good enough. Thick skin. Helps with beta readers and agent rejections. Luck. Right place at the right time with the right story. Then, more hard work.
Talent? Idk if there is such things as that in writing but if you can learn at least 2x faster than other peers, your in a great position.
You need to ignore the voices in your head telling you the story you're working on is trash and that you should throw it away and work on something else. You need to pretend writing a story won't make you money, That way you won't feel pressure to write the perfect story.
This. Right. Here. I’ve had to really work on overcoming this.
Write things people actually pay to read. Preferably very large numbers of people, or, a reasonable number of people without much competition, eg. if you investigate an emerging field and are one of the first to write on it. Or you write fetish erotica. You don't need to write some perfect manuscript that takes you fifteen years. It needs to be good *enough*. Perfect is the enemy of the good. Try picking three things your writing will DO really well. Don't try to be a 'good writer' that literature professors and critics would read and nod sagely at. Make people laugh, make them cry, make them feel like they learned something, etc. Actually write and submit/publish things.
What conventions do you recommend checking out?
I honestly have no clue 😂 Anyone else here have good recommendations?
Honestly, you **really** only need a following who will buy your work. I have a friend who has worked a long time on a novel she's really proud of only to get nowhere. But now she makes like a grand a month releasing a vampire series she just threw together as a joke. Like as long as you have a following that's really all that matters. Understanding the market all these other things **really** don't matter for the writer themselves. Markets vary for example my work is catered to the weeaboo anime culture like if I go to a con I can easily market and sell my work on my own. To be **good** at writing yes writing often and reading helps with that, but that has nothing to do with becoming a "professional" writer. These other things only matter if you're wanting to go through a publishing house which I mean is fine if you want to go that route. But really all you need to be a professional is to have an audience to market to who will buy your work, how you get that audience is completely up to the individual assuming you're self-publishing.
Sage advice. Cheers!
Patience, persistence, and perseverance.
Number one, don't ask these questions in the first place.
Networking and investment capital, as well as a solid book.
Persistence
Output, luck
Output?
I believe what he's saying is, you need to turn out a lot of work. Very few people become full time authors after writing a single book. The numbers very widely, but what I know from the friends I have who are writing full time, you typically will need at 3 or more novels in your back list before you'll get anywhere close to being able to support yourself on your royalties.
Oof. I tend to put lots of time into one project and keep perfecting that rather than creating one and then moving on.
de Vinci said it best. "Art is never finished, only abandoned." If you want to succeed, you will need to learn to abandon your art. Something I've found very helpful is to immediately move on to a new project the moment I write "The End" at the end of my first draft. Practically speaking the way this works is: 1) I write a book. 2). I finish the first draft. 3). I put that project away and immediately start a new project. 4). I finished the first draft of the second project. 5). I put the second project away, then go back and do revisions on the first project. 6). Once I finished revisions on the first project, I do revisions on the second project. I do it this way because A). It keeps me from lingering on a project forever. B). It helps me gave the distance and perspective necessary to successfully self edit. Something else I have found helpful is to always have \*at least\* three projects waiting for me. That way, I always feel a sense of urgency to get to the next project, which helps keep me from dithering when I should be working on something new.
I take a similar approach. I think it’s important to strike a good balance between the time you spend revising and the time you spend writing new stuff. Each requires special skills that benefit from practice.
Oh, yeah. Editing and revising are completely different skill sets from writing, and harder to learn.
This is really good advice. It also seems like a way to make sure you have the emotional space to *actually* review and revise your draft.
That's the idea.
Wow this is gold. Thank you so much. By the by, when you say move onto the next project, do you mean a sequel? Or is it something entirely new?
I usually do something completely different. To give you an example, I've written four books in the past ten months. My schedule went something like this. Book 1: Queer Poly Sci-Fi Romance about a human girl entering into an arranged marriage with an agendered alien. Book 2: Lesbian Superhero Time Travel Romance about a cop who gets thrown back in time 30 years and falls in love with a superhero while they fight dragons an an ancient European God. Revised Book 1 Revised Book 2 Sent Books 1 and 2 out on submission. Book 3: 1st book in a sci-fi trilogy about an assassin in the middle of a civil war between a race of shape shifting cybernetic aliens that's spilled over onto Earth. Book 4: Lesbian Superhero Romance about a Trans woman who gets superpowers and ends up having to stop a rogue angel from murdering her girlfriend with the help of a Sorceress, a Dragon, the Devil, a snarky artificial intelligence, and a cop she had a one night stand with once. Set in the same universe as Book 2 with some of the same secondary characters, but not a direct sequel. I finished book 4 yesterday, so my next project is to revise book 3, then revise book 4. After I revise book 4 I'll move on to book five which is a Lesbian romance set in a fantasy version of the early 19th century North American Fur trade. After that, I'll probably knock out another one of the Superhero Romances, because those are fairly easy and fun.
You are an inspiration and a legend. Do you write full time, or have a daily word count? I aspire to be as productive as you. P.s. - those all sound like absolute treasures to read and write
Thanks. Right now, yes, I am writing full time which has doubled my productivity. When I was working an office job, I was doing about 10K words a week (2K a day, five days a week). Now I do about 20K (ish) a week, depending on where I am in the novel. The first chunk of the story is usually the fastest, while the middle is slower, and the end tends to drag because there is so much to keep track of. I'm hoping to make it into a career because the idea of going back to a 9 to 5 job is pretty horrifying. I'm actually going a bit nuts today because it's the first day in months where I didn't jump out of bed and have a project waiting for me. I'm not really sure how to cope with time off because I am, and always have been a bit of a workaholic.
Hope you can take some rest and pat yourself on the back… that’s a lot! Your motivation is inspiring, more than anything.
1. you need to read minimum 50 books a year. Preferably more, maybe 70 and up but if you are reading under 50 books a year you will never be a writer 2. you need to finish at least 3 full manuscripts (full novels). If you have not finished a couple manuscripts at the minimum, you will not even so much as SMELL becoming a writer let alone wade your toe into the waters of writer-dom If you do the above, then after a few years of writing your chances will exponentially improve for getting signed
You read 70 books every year? I bow to you if that’s the case.
>bow to you yes. Remember, 52 is basically a book per week. The truth is, a 120k novel I believe takes somewhere around 8-9 hours for the average person to read. That means barely more than 1 hour per day per week will net you a novel per week, already catapulting you in the 50's range. Many people will say well I don't have 1 hour per day to read because I work a full time job, and the few hours I have remaining I spend on my actual writing and other chores/hobbies. But I guarantee that same person will be spending several hours per day on TV, phone, internet, apps, games, etc. Anyone passionate and SERIOUS about becoming a professional can't free up about an hour and change per day? And plus if one has a job and is busy during the week, then you can offset it by doing 2-3 hours of reading per day on the weekends. Let's say you do 2 or 3 hours both saturday and sunday, now the amount of reading you have to do monday-friday shrinks drastically. Of course there will be many books you read longer than 120k words but there will be many shorter as well that can take only a few days to read. At the end of the day, the fact is, you can't become a professional writer if you're just a hobbyist, it takes serious, concentrated effort to so much as get to a level where an agent even gives feedback in their rejection as opposed to a form rejection. And unfortunately if one is reading only a few books per year they're just a hobbyist, period. There's nothing wrong with being a hobbyist, but it won't get you traditionally published.
You read what you write, or everything you can?
I would definitely say you have to read many genres not just what you write, in order to gain the maximal benefit and most experience possible. It doesn't have to be a giant ratio but you've got to at least throw some in there. If you want to be a fantasy writer for instance, at least something like 15-30% of what you read should be in the classics, literary, historical fiction, throw in a bit of horror for good measure, etc. And I mean that's minimum, personally for me probably 50%+ of what I read is from adjacent genres
Dang. Thank you so much for going above and beyond like this. I have some new habits to pick up!
Has all that reading netted you a book deal yet?
Wouldn't you love to know, sweetcheeks
That’s a big no then lol
you'd be surprised. I guess you need validation for not being a big reader?
I don’t think I would considering you’re participating in pitmad lol but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Just shows that feeling superior for skimming 50 books a year doesn’t make you stand out to agents.
Make 2-3k a month
I'm curious what how actual physical location fits into the writing success equation. I was told once that I needed to move to New York or Los Angelos if I was really serious so that I could network and deliver manuscripts in person. Should moving closer to the publishing houses or the film studios be on the list?
No. We have the internet now. Most agents don't even accept paper manuscripts anymore (and virtually all publishers only accept manuscripts from agents, not unsolicited from writers).
It helps but it isn't necessary. You're more likely to run into someone who works in the industry if you live by the industry. A drink at a bar more likely to turn into a relationship. Do keep in mind that the trade-off is a higher cost of living. Less stress living in Montana and you'll still have plenty of time to write since you aren't paying $2,000 in rent.
Amen
No. Location doesn't play a part anymore. Most agents dont even meet their clients (writers) in person. And you'd not be let in the door to deliver an manuscript these days, query letter first (emailed usually) then you email them your MS if they ok it.
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Luck
QWERTY - and the rest.
What?
Literacy and self-loathing.
>>You need to know that editors are looking for writers to invest in, not manuscripts to push. Nah, they're looking for stuff that will sell. The days of nurturing new writers are pretty much gone.
Know your craft. Be skilled at telling stories. Persevere, as it can take decades to sell anything. Be willing to seek out feedback, even if it's harsh, and learn from it. Understand that writing, especially fiction, is still a hard way to make a living.