Stephen King makes a great point about the career longevity writers enjoy versus other entertainers. Even as late in life as forty, some writers are coming into their own. A rock star at forty is on an endless summer tour with a greatest hits album in the bargain bin. Movie stars disappear by forty, trading the screen for a stage, and eventually voice-over gigs. Comics have a longer shelf-life than actors, especially when they also produce or direct, but it’s nothing compared to a writer. Here’s a few examples:
Tom Clancy (58) sells nearly a million copies in hardcover each fiction outing. Robert Parker (73) makes top five on the New York Times Bestseller lists and tours. Stephen King (58) doesn’t sell like the glory days, yet only J.K. Rowling has more in print. Clive Cussler (74) sells better now than fifteen years ago. Thomas Harris (65), the author of Silence of the Lambs, published his first book at 35.
By the way, I’m 32 and my birthday isn’t for months. This isn’t a middle age reflection post, just an observation.
Eight hundred words today. Aimed for a thousand, so it was a Viking try. The real failure was not completing the scene. I’ll have to make that up in the morning.
On the plus side, I got some nice feedback on a few chapters that involve the villain, ballistics and weapons from a competitive IPSC shooter. Suffice to say, he’s very good with handguns. I would cull a law enforcement source for this information, but frankly, the average IPSC competitor fires a lot more rounds per year. In fact, quite a few members of various alphabet agencies shoot IPSC for the challenge.
It says something that I know the quote of which you are speaking even though you didn’t cite a specific source. Although it probably only means that I’ve read Bag of Bones too many times. (Of course, if you’re not referring to King’s comment on the novelists’ long arc of productivity in Bag of Bones, then I look especially foolish right now.) It’s a good book, though, for readers and writers alike, and a fairly decent ghost story to boot.
An interesting thing to note with your mention of those other writers is that Thomas Harris has only written five books over the entirety of his career, and he has gone almost ten years between books at some points. I guess every writer is different, but either way he must feel pretty good about himself, being able to coast on a relative small number of publishing credits. We should all be so lucky.
I can’t say whether or not I will be a successful author (no writer can predict what the market will want tomorrow or next year), but I do intend to be a prolific one. I might never be rich, but then that’s not why I started writing in the first place. Just to get the stories out to readers will be good enough for me. Would be nice to at least make a living from it, enough to pay the bills and feed the cat, but I think if one wants something bad enough and works at it hard enough, anything is possible.
Ian – you are correct. The quote draws from Bag of Bones. In the late hour, I was lazy and omitted the proper attribution.
I do cite Thomas Harris quite often, as he is a big influence on me and I forgive him for the long wait between books, as I do Tom Wolfe. Harris not only delivers suspense, he’s good with short, simple imagery, understands good dialog and creates believable characters. He also wins points because he lets go of outcome.
The movie producers of Silence of the Lambs, and the screenwriters, wanted Harris involved in the production. Harris simply wished them good luck. They even called him a few times on the set, his answer was the same. That takes some discipline since the first two films based on his novels were very weak, and deliberately precluded any input from him.
As to your final point — the commercial viability of a writing career. Wanting probably is a factor. A lot of people claim timing. The biggest one, though, is writing. If you are writing every day, or close to it, then the writing has a chance to carry you somewhere else. What that looks like, or where that lands you, only you can answer.
I agree completely. Especially on the Harris points. He’s a big influence on me, as well. I just re-read Red Dragon this past summer, and after finishing it I told my girlfriend how Harris writes in an almost analytical way, in the manner of how he describes things, but he’s not a cold writer. He has good characters, but the events are portrayed in such a way that I sometimes feel like I’m reading a documentary or a crime file or something. I’m not sure if that makes sense, but what I’m trying to say is he doesn’t waste his time on flowery, Byzantine prose. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t write well. He does, but he knows the strong emphasis on story and characterization.
Wanting is certainly a big factor in one writing career. And timing, too, of course — which goes hand in hand with good ol’ luck. Two things one can’t control, dammit.
I get the odd e-mail from writers who enjoy my site and proceed to tell me how I should be signing up for workshops and joining writing groups. I think that’s fine for people who think they need it, but it is by no means a requirement. I don’t use them, not because I think my writing ability is so great, but simply because I don’t feel they work for me. I’ve tried them, especially in the small press where you simply must be part of the community to survive. But now, putting my focus on pumping out the stories and honing my craft, I’m not that interested in the social side of it, or anything else that distracts me from the writing itself. Sure, I’m all for making contacts, but most people who cite that as a reason for message-boarding and workshoping are the ones who take it too far. They get too involved, to the point where you wonder when, among the the blogging, the e-mailing, and the critiquing of other people’s stories, they get time to do any writing of their own.
Yes, I do have a writing journal, which I differentiate from a blog by the fact that I don’t report on anything that isn’t related to writing news or my own progress. But I keep the personal stuff to a minimum, and I don’t spend time to trying to ingratiate myself into the greating blogging community at large. I think those things have a tendency of snowballing, to the point where the writing falls by the wayside in favor of maintaining one’s web presence. Maybe if I’m able to write full-time I’ll spend more time on such things, but not now, and never at the expense of my stories.
That’s not really a rant. As I said, one has to do it the way they feel is best for them, but by no means is it a quick fix or a prerequisite. I can tell from reading your site that you are committed to it, as well. And that’s good. I think there are more than enough of the other type (posers, I guess you could call them).
Keep up the good work,
Ian
Thanks very much, Ian. You keep up the good work, too.
Certainly there’s going too far with on-line journals. That’s the oldest problem with the craft, most people would rather talk about writing than write. The web makes this dead end very easy. Maybe too easy.
One point we probably diverge on is workshops. Social components aside, several successful writers found their first agent or editor at workshops, among them Anne Rice and Bret Easton Ellis.
When this manuscript is ready, I’ll use whatever method gets it in print besides self-publishing. That to me is vanity, not publication.
Oh boy, don’t get me started on PODs and vanity presses (two terms which are often synonymous). Yes, I’m sure there’s the odd POD that is actually respectable and worth all the effort that a POD demands of a writer, but the exception only proves the rule. If you want to make a living from writing, vanity presse and print-on-demand are not the way to go. For small-press fish, it’s great. PODs are geared specifically for those who enjoy selling their stuff on their own, at book fairs and on the web and door-to-door if it comes to that. But that’s because PODs operate under the idea that the writers themselves will be the ones buying lots of copies of the book to sell on their own, send out for review, presents for relatives. That’s a big risk, and I think I’d rather spend my time writing the next book than selling the current one Willy Loman style.
I don’t want you to think I’m anti-writing workshops. I just don’t think I need them. It’s a personal choice. Many writers have succeeded with them, many without them.
My take on POD and vanity press: I sell used books already. I don’t need another room with 5,000 of them.
Publishing is a massive risk any way it’s sliced, especially fiction. The market is torturous for the publishers themselves, and rewards a very small number of authors. One Koontz for every hundred thousand unknowns. Inverting the structure would mean its collapse.
There’s a lot of ways up the pyramid. Workshops, credentials, talent, timing, connections, etc…Each must forge their own path. I think we agree on that.
And I don’t think you dislike writing workshops, Ian.