In my previous post I wrote about following your dreams. What a lot of writers are faced with when deciding that they want to become an author of published work is that following this dream means accepting that writing is actually a business.
In order to have work published there has to be involvement with the publishing industry – and they don’t call it an industry by accident. It’s hard work, whichever route you take. And no matter what you write, somewhere along the line you have to consider that ‘dirty’ word: profit. To follow that dream and be that successful author, you need to earn money from your efforts. Although, if you believe the analysis the average author earns less then £11k a year from their writing. But, note this sentence from the Bookseller article here:
“...many professional authors felt it necessary to supplement their incomes by lecturing, self-publishing and teaching, as well as through income streams such as the Public Lending Right payments, grants and bursaries, income from ALCS, prizes and fellowships.”
So being an author isn’t all about writing. If writing is what you want to do, and all you want to do…then maybe be a writer, not an author; because being an author is all about the business of being a writer, not just the writing itself.
I know it’s going to be hard work to be an author, but that’s my dream. For a long time I was simply a writer, churning out words and stories and ideas and I enjoyed the process. But I’m now in a position in my life where I want to share my words and be recompensed in some way for all the time, energy and imagination I put into it. I love my regular job – a Learning Coordinator at a museum – but I also love writing; and I want to be able to do both. That means earning some money from my writing, so that I can invest in myself and develop my skills.
I’ve already invested in myself over the years by attending an Arvon course, going to York’s Festival of Writing, completing a Comma Press short story course, to name a few. They were excellent ways to scrutinise my writing and see where I could improve; but they aren’t free. If I wanted to take my writing from a hobby to a more professional sphere I had to divert some energy into trying to find resources to support my development.
I think that’s when I realised that writing is a business. It’s about the ladder of investment – I had to improve (through paid means) my abilities to write stories so I could put my work out there into the world and readers could invest in me. Then, I can take the trust these readers have had in me, to continue developing great stories for them to read and enjoy. The more this happens, the easier it becomes to justify time spent on writing, and therefore offers more opportunity for my dream to become reality.
Of course, I used to think that ‘being a writer’ meant writing stories in isolation, sat up in that tower with an ink stain on my fingertips and some lovely person presenting me with the odd cup of tea. In this scenario I would send work out and it would be accepted first time, with adulation and praise, and then I’d go back to writing with my bank balance topped up, with the option to take holidays to exotic places that would end up in my next novel.
This is not how it is.
In my post on How to be Creatively Productive I confessed to writing my own ‘Author Job Description‘ in order to fuel my commitment to the dream of being a published author. That description says more than just ‘Write everyday’. It’s filled with identifying submission windows, reading other fiction, promoting my existing work, submitting to competitions and agents, writing blog posts and, yes, writing too. The main lesson learned here is that I have a strategy for my career as an author, and in order to make it happen I need to branch out from just being a ‘writer’ to being a proactive and professional author.
Essentially, my strategy is based on the steps I need to take to get me where I want to be as an author: a traditionally published author with a decent sales record and a book-deal that will help sustain my not-particularly-lavish lifestyle. It doesn’t quite match the romantic vision I once had, but I believe it in more because it’s underpinned by hard-work and dedication; and that’s the author I want to be known as.
So my writing life doesn’t just have me sit down at my desk and routinely tap out sentences, paragraphs, and short stories. It’s so much more than that. And with a strategy in place that guides what I ought to be doing as the author I want to become, the goal itself feels more tangible; it’s achievable, whereas the isolated writer’s tower is simply a fanciful ideal within my imagination. Suddenly, being a writer isn’t the dream…instead I’m actually an author, building my empire.
If you want to know more about how writing is a business, I’d definitely recommend Jane Friedman’s book: “The Business of Being a Writer“, which has opened my eyes up tremendously about the fundamental cogs and mechanisms that the writing profession relies upon.
And, in the essence of building that empire, here’s how you could invest in my career right now.
Purchase my short story collection: The Memorial Tree
By purchasing this short story collection you’ll:
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Help boost my Amazon ratings so others can discover my work (especially if you leave a review and/or recommend to a friend)
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Bring me a small profit that makes my giving up the Literature Festival work justifiable
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Receive a selection of 5* short stories that I hope you truly enjoy
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Get to be a rung on my ladder of investment
All it takes is a click and a download.
Thank you.