You Will Not Be Famous

“Always follow your dreams”. It’s the line you hear in Disney movies and from celebrities on stages holding little golden statuettes. Unfortunately it’s also a bald-faced lie. If you’re a writer with aspiration for fame, fortune or at least middle-class income, I’ve got bad news for you: in all likelihood, you’re not going to get any of that.

One of my favorite TV shows of all time, and what I believe to be the only true “reality show” ever made was Dirty Jobs hosted by Mike Rowe. If you’re a fan of Mike, you know that his advice is “don’t follow your passion” and it is largely correct. There are millions of authors out there, some better than others, all vying for an ever-dwindling audience. It’s a cutthroat, dog-eat-dog competition for eyes and attention spans, and if you’re not willing to sacrifice almost everything else for a chance at “making it” this is not the industry for you.

You are not going to be J.K. Rowling. She was lighting in a bottle, a stroke of pure luck. In all likelihood, you’ll be more like Clark Ashton Smith. “Who,” you may ask, “is Clark Ashton Smith?” That’s exactly my point; you’ve never heard of him. He was a great pulp story writer of the 1930s. Very creative man, who influenced many better known authors including myself – but largely unknown during his time and forgotten after his death.

You are not going to be rich. Making a middle class income as an author is incredibly difficult in this economy, and requires hours and hours of thankless, soulless grueling work. You have to put yourself out there, face rejection after rejection, and be grinding constantly creating content just in the hope that you might get seen. The vast majority of authors nowadays are only writing part time. Nearly all have some form of day job, which supplies them with income, health insurance and other benefits.

If you want to be rich and famous, you have to “write to market”. Meaning, you have to write what people want to read. Which is all well and good, except that in order to do that, you may be forced to compromise your values, maybe even writing stories you greatly dislike. I simply refuse to do that. I write what I like to read, and other people apparently like it enough to buy my books.

For myself, I would rather not be grinding at a desk, hour after hour, week after week. I’ve given up on the idea that I could ever be full time, and frankly, I don’t want to be. I’d rather be out living my life than writing about someone else’s life. The greatest joys in my life are unrelated to writing. I don’t even want to be famous; all the famous people I know of are miserable humans. I’d rather be unknown, living at the edge of the civilized world like I am now. Writing is a wonderful occupation and I’m not discouraging people from taking it up; just lower your expectations about income and notoriety.

And if you would like to consider supporting an independent author of thrilling adventure stories, you can purchase some of my exciting novellas.