Guest Post: The Fiction of Writing

Susan Kaye Quinn is an ex-engineer, writer, and elected official: but mostly she’s a mom. She writes middle grade and young adult novels, and blogs about writing and reading books for advanced readers, ages 8-12, over at Ink Spells.

The general public seems to have this idea that if you write a novel, you will be instantly rich and famous. You will don a tweed jacket or a silk scarf and pose in some odd angled picture that will make you look artistic. You will have masses of people flocking to sign your books as you tour the world, greeting your fans. As an esteemed published author, you can now be grumpy and retire to your hidden forested retreat where you will spin your next eagerly awaited book.

Right.

This fiction of the writing life is spun by the media attention focused on famous authors, those few Michael Jordan's of the writing world that are household names. Most of the public, especially readers, assume this lifestyle is enjoyed by all writers. People assume you write to make money, or to be famous, to have that elusive cachet of being a "published author." Although many writers would like to be JA Konrath, paying the bills with their writing, most realize that is unlikely to happen, or if it does, it will be a decade or more into their "writing career." If they are very lucky.

If you tell your family and friends you're not in it for the money or glory, that you write because you love it, or because you literally cannot stop like some literary addict, you're likely a get knowing look that says, "Sure. Sure."

Although your close family are probably well-disabused of this notion already, you may have to repeat it endlessly to friends and well-meaning extended family. Although it's bad enough before you have published, I suspect it is even worse after you have an actual book available for purchase. Because you've made it, right? Everything is sunshine and nirvana, right?

Except when you can't sell your second novel, or the first one performs poorly. Or maybe you have a wonderful run of several books, but then your career stalls out and needs new direction. A career in writing is more akin to a career in acting or music—you're only as good as your last book, and even that doesn't guarantee you'll sell another one.

Now that I've got you thoroughly depressed, here's the upside: There has never been a better time to be a writer.

No, I'm not delusional, at least not about that. Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, all the myriad online resources grant you access to a community of writers. Even though your Uncle Sandy and your PTA friend in the pickup line may have no idea what the interior life of a writer is like, you have a host of virtual writerly friends who do. Friends who understand that writing is like bleeding your heart onto the page and who want to talk about plotting and voice and the minutia of craft. Friends who sympathize with the agony of rejection, the frustration of a harsh critique, and who know in their hearts that you write because you love it—because they do too.

My brother is a talented writer, who never published. He gave up in his early 20's, back in the pre-internet days, when writers toiled in isolation. He is in awe of my blog, my crit group, my author facebook page, and my knowledge of agents and the publishing industry.

"This is nothing like when I was writing," he says.

Exactly so. So chin up, lads and lassies! It's a brave new world for writers.