GENREALITY

Pinch-hitting here at Genreality gave me two reactions. I’m thrilled at the opportunity. But I also immediately asked myself what I could contribute. Since I’ve been a writing pro for five years and have experience with both new markets in epublishing and traditional markets, I have a background that’s very relevant to the changing times.

So for my first post as a substitute, I’m sharing 10 things I’ve learned about the writing biz.

1.  Keep your day job and your benefits as long as possible. I didn’t have this option; I started my writing career working around a special needs child and getting a “real” job and putting her in daycare was not an option. But if it is an option, understand that it doesn’t make you less of a pro. It actually goes a long ways to protecting your pro career by buying you time to wait for the right deal instead of latching onto one that might not be a good fit because you need the money. And once you’re paying for your own insurance and supplying all your own benefits, your costs increase significantly. Unless you can sell enough books per year to make up the difference in salary and benefits, it can make a lot of sense to hang onto that corporate position. The myth that having a day job means you’re less serious about your career or in some way a lesser pro than somebody who doesn’t is just that, a myth. The hard reality is that bills don’t wait for six months while you wait for a publisher to pay. Unexpected medical expenses can sink you. And you’re at risk for making the wrong call for your long-term career goals in order to meet your immediate needs.

2. Don’t expect anybody else to care about your interests the way you do. Your agent might be the nicest person in the world, but he/she has interests that don’t include you and sometimes might directly conflict with yours. Same for your editor and publisher. You can respect the people you work with (and if you don’t respect them, don’t work with them) and you can listen to their input and consider it, but at the end of the day, your publishing career is yours and it’s up to you to make the best choices you can for yourself.

3.  Sometimes the best you can do is make a well-informed and hedged guess. This business is full of unknowns. If you second-guess every decision, you’ll make yourself crazy. You can only make choices based on what you know at the time. Do your best to investigate the real risks and benefits, make your call, and know that sometimes you’ll make the wrong call. The possibility of a mistake can’t be allowed to paralyze you.

4.  Writing is a business. If you want to be an artist more than you want a viable career, publishing may not be for you. Or you may be happiest self-publishing and having complete creative control. Only you know what will make you happy. Sometimes achieving a goal and getting a taste of what you wanted makes you realize you need to readjust your goals or reevaluate your plans. Sometimes life changes and impacts your plans. If you know your values and goals and make choices that are in alignment with them, you can find a good fit or make one.

5.  Your life should include writing but not revolve around it. You need time for your friends and family, time for yourself, time to take care of your health, time to read, time for hobbies. If you let writing eat up all that time, not only will you wear yourself out (and possibly write yourself out), you’ll be less resilient when you have career lows. Every career has ups and downs, nobody just has a straight upward progression. If your career is all you have, it’s time to make some life changes or you may be in a real personal crisis when a career crisis hits, making you less able to cope with the downturn and plan your next move.

6.  Surround yourself with smart, resilient people. Even though I’ve lived in relative isolation from other writers, the internet has allowed me to connect with writers and readers, to learn from people who have more experience than I do, to stay informed about changes in the market and see who is experimenting with what, and the results. Not only does it help to have community, you can avoid re-inventing the wheel. And we become like the people we associate with. So if you want to make smart choices, be resilient, and have career longevity, find people with those qualities and hang around them. I’ve been learning from Lynn Viehl and Holly Lisle since I made my first sale. Their advice via their blogs has been invaluable. Lately I’ve been reading Penelope Trunk’s blog because she has a great handle on what it takes to be successful in today’s business environment, and the difference in values and viewpoints between Gen X and Gen Y.

7.  Don’t take it all too seriously. It’s only a book. It’s only a career path. If your book tanks, if your career derails, it’s not the end of the world. Truly. See #5. It’s so easy to have tunnel-vision, to place so much importance on the outcome of this book, that deal, that when things go wrong it’s devastating. Things go wrong. They do in every business, and writing isn’t special and protected from bad things happening. We care so much about our words, our work. But we have so little control over the outcome. This can make us crazy.

8.  The publishing business really can make people nuts. That’s been a theme in these ten points, but it deserves one of its own. It’s because we have limited autonomy and limited control, but total responsibility for the outcome. If you at least know the business can make you crazy, you can compensate and be careful about getting too caught up in it. Following every trend, paying attention to every bit of news is a straight path to the nuthouse. Be informed, sure, but don’t obsess. Don’t lose sight of your goals, your values, what you want to do. If everybody says it can’t be done, ignore them and find a way to do at least most of what you want.

9.  We’re creative thinkers. This means we can apply creativity to business problems and come up with innovative solutions. Creativity is not limited to the ability to plot and write a novel. Business can benefit from creativity, too. Don’t discount your business abilities and leave that up to other people because you’re “just a writer”. You’re also an independent business person and uniquely gifted with the ability to come up with solid ideas.

10.  Writing fiction for a living really is a worthwhile goal. After five years, it’s still the only thing I really want to do. Writing a book is still the only thing I’ve ever done that fully engaged me and took everything I had. It’s the only job I’ve ever had that hasn’t gotten boring after six weeks.

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