> "It is very, very hard to be just a novelist plus one other thing either."
There's definitely a path many genre writers go down where they have a single, lucrative job outside of writing but also write novels related to their job in some way. Most obviously the Grisham/Turow lane, but there are definitely cyberpunk authors who work in the tech sector, and arguably authors who work at *and* write about a college count too. Perhaps the Great American Plumber Novel is next? ;')
Trying to make it as a visual artist in New York circa 1987, I referred to this as the New York Physics Problem: you can have space (studio space) or time, but never both.
It’s interesting the way this breaks down over genre vs literary lines. It’s so much more common in SFF to have someone like Ted Chiang who works a lucrative technical writing job as his primary income. Or even in the past when there was more money going around, someone like Gene Wolfe editing an industrial engineering trade journal until his retirement.
I think a lot of it has to do with genre stuff traditionally functioning outside of academia, though obviously that’s changed a lot in the past 20 years.
I will note that a lot of buzzy names in lit-fic seemingly *had* high-powered careers before becoming novelists -- Min Jin Lee being a former corporate lawyer is the only name that comes to mind right now, but there are others -- but this might just be a factor of lit-fic drawing from the same pool of elite college grads as McKinsey.
Yes, sorry I should have said more explicitly I meant novelist plus one other writing-related thing. You can definitely have a well-paying career in another field. I once had a writer roommate who was a pharmacist. Good pay there. That might be the smartest way to do things, really!
No, no, you're good -- figured that was what you meant!
And it IS smart, although I guess writers don't like being told that the best way to make it as a writer is to have a completely unrelated job that will allow you to make $0 on your writing, lol.
Yeah, ha. It's also harder advice to give if you're, say, a college professor with an aspiring author in your office. "Is it too late to switch your major to finance or chemical engineering?"
Great post, and I needed to hear it. When I first imagined writing fiction decades ago, a person could still make a living as a midlist writer primarily with gigs on the side. Little did I know those were the end of days. I’ve since somehow cobbled together a freelance life of editing, translating, copywriting and more, and sometimes feel like a solo freak. But honest articles like yours remind me I’m one freak among many. Onward we go.
". . . other direct-to-creator platforms like Patreon are replacing freelance writing income for those of us who write articles on the side."
This is so true for me. Substack provides a little more stability (but still not much!) compared to pitching and hunting down certain freelance opportunities. Grateful for this space in that regard. I'm still working to get these disparate jobs to work in tandem, but this post gave me some clarity on next steps. Appreciate you and your work!
Thank you! Yes, Substack has replaced most of my freelance writing and I much prefer writing here with more freedom and less time wasted on pitching... but it is also nowhere close to letting me quit my fulltime job. Or even my other side jobs...
I agree mostly but it does also function as a crowd-funding platform (ala Kickstarter or Patreon) as well as a longform publishing platform (ala blogger or Medium). I'm not saying this makes it a wild and radical thing, but it successfully combines those three things in a way that Twitter / Facebook / etc. didn't.
2) This is true is many self-directed pursuits (many revenue streams needed). I can assure you that I've made more from selling gambling guides than I ever did gambling. Ditto many of the others (since the house always wins...pssst, don't tell anyone).
Dear Lincon, this is a good article, with many engagement. I think that the Spanish-speaking community can be also interested. Is it possible to translate part of this post, with credits and links to your newsletter and to you? Many thanks in advance.
I find people saying "Substack will replace magazines/articles etc" very obviously only circulate in very particular literary or journalistic circles! Let's be honest Substack would only ever become a viable standalone if it manages to worm into the mainstream, normal people niches that some on here love to disparage and make fun of as cheap and less valuable for being non literary or mass consumable. Until that sorts itself out, books will be books, magazines will be magazines, articles will be articles and Substack will be Substack.
I am yet to see a single Substack that could even come close to replacing the Citronean, L.R.O or Silvergrain Classics, there's some that can supplement me between issues but there's none with the level of completion that a fully compiled and created magazine will.
In my case, I was saying more from the writer's perspective. Substack has replaced most of my magazine and newspaper writing but I could never see it replacing my books.
That said, I think we should acknowledge here that magazines and newspapers have been shuttering for a couple decades at this point from the rise of the internet (with it's very low ad rates compared to print) and social media. Substack is certainly less of a threat to magazines and newspapers than AI, since tech companies are planning to use AI like Google Gemini to keep all web traffic on their platforms leaving magazines and newspapers who rely on clicks at all floundering once again.
This is not the case with books. Publishing overall is about the same business in terms of size that it was decades ago, even if sales have shifted away from some genre/categories to others. But newspapers and magazines as industries have changed quite a lot.
> "It is very, very hard to be just a novelist plus one other thing either."
There's definitely a path many genre writers go down where they have a single, lucrative job outside of writing but also write novels related to their job in some way. Most obviously the Grisham/Turow lane, but there are definitely cyberpunk authors who work in the tech sector, and arguably authors who work at *and* write about a college count too. Perhaps the Great American Plumber Novel is next? ;')
Trying to make it as a visual artist in New York circa 1987, I referred to this as the New York Physics Problem: you can have space (studio space) or time, but never both.
It’s interesting the way this breaks down over genre vs literary lines. It’s so much more common in SFF to have someone like Ted Chiang who works a lucrative technical writing job as his primary income. Or even in the past when there was more money going around, someone like Gene Wolfe editing an industrial engineering trade journal until his retirement.
I think a lot of it has to do with genre stuff traditionally functioning outside of academia, though obviously that’s changed a lot in the past 20 years.
I will note that a lot of buzzy names in lit-fic seemingly *had* high-powered careers before becoming novelists -- Min Jin Lee being a former corporate lawyer is the only name that comes to mind right now, but there are others -- but this might just be a factor of lit-fic drawing from the same pool of elite college grads as McKinsey.
Yes, sorry I should have said more explicitly I meant novelist plus one other writing-related thing. You can definitely have a well-paying career in another field. I once had a writer roommate who was a pharmacist. Good pay there. That might be the smartest way to do things, really!
No, no, you're good -- figured that was what you meant!
And it IS smart, although I guess writers don't like being told that the best way to make it as a writer is to have a completely unrelated job that will allow you to make $0 on your writing, lol.
Yeah, ha. It's also harder advice to give if you're, say, a college professor with an aspiring author in your office. "Is it too late to switch your major to finance or chemical engineering?"
I would seriously love to read a Great American Plumber Novel.
The Great Gasket?
”Will Substack replace publishing?” I thought Substack was publishing. It's the author's newsletter. It's great
Great post, and I needed to hear it. When I first imagined writing fiction decades ago, a person could still make a living as a midlist writer primarily with gigs on the side. Little did I know those were the end of days. I’ve since somehow cobbled together a freelance life of editing, translating, copywriting and more, and sometimes feel like a solo freak. But honest articles like yours remind me I’m one freak among many. Onward we go.
". . . other direct-to-creator platforms like Patreon are replacing freelance writing income for those of us who write articles on the side."
This is so true for me. Substack provides a little more stability (but still not much!) compared to pitching and hunting down certain freelance opportunities. Grateful for this space in that regard. I'm still working to get these disparate jobs to work in tandem, but this post gave me some clarity on next steps. Appreciate you and your work!
Thank you! Yes, Substack has replaced most of my freelance writing and I much prefer writing here with more freedom and less time wasted on pitching... but it is also nowhere close to letting me quit my fulltime job. Or even my other side jobs...
Good advice. Why anyone would pay tens of thousands of pounds to do a creative writing degree, I don't know.
I give the same advice to aspiring sports coaches: get a proper job, that pays well and is in demand (engineering) and coach on the side.
I’d opine that substack is
just another form of social media.
I agree mostly but it does also function as a crowd-funding platform (ala Kickstarter or Patreon) as well as a longform publishing platform (ala blogger or Medium). I'm not saying this makes it a wild and radical thing, but it successfully combines those three things in a way that Twitter / Facebook / etc. didn't.
Two thoughts, neither terribly relevant:
1) Thank goodness I'm retired.
2) This is true is many self-directed pursuits (many revenue streams needed). I can assure you that I've made more from selling gambling guides than I ever did gambling. Ditto many of the others (since the house always wins...pssst, don't tell anyone).
Working retail in a super chill boutique pet food store with all the time in the world helps.
Dear Lincon, this is a good article, with many engagement. I think that the Spanish-speaking community can be also interested. Is it possible to translate part of this post, with credits and links to your newsletter and to you? Many thanks in advance.
I find people saying "Substack will replace magazines/articles etc" very obviously only circulate in very particular literary or journalistic circles! Let's be honest Substack would only ever become a viable standalone if it manages to worm into the mainstream, normal people niches that some on here love to disparage and make fun of as cheap and less valuable for being non literary or mass consumable. Until that sorts itself out, books will be books, magazines will be magazines, articles will be articles and Substack will be Substack.
I am yet to see a single Substack that could even come close to replacing the Citronean, L.R.O or Silvergrain Classics, there's some that can supplement me between issues but there's none with the level of completion that a fully compiled and created magazine will.
In my case, I was saying more from the writer's perspective. Substack has replaced most of my magazine and newspaper writing but I could never see it replacing my books.
That said, I think we should acknowledge here that magazines and newspapers have been shuttering for a couple decades at this point from the rise of the internet (with it's very low ad rates compared to print) and social media. Substack is certainly less of a threat to magazines and newspapers than AI, since tech companies are planning to use AI like Google Gemini to keep all web traffic on their platforms leaving magazines and newspapers who rely on clicks at all floundering once again.
This is not the case with books. Publishing overall is about the same business in terms of size that it was decades ago, even if sales have shifted away from some genre/categories to others. But newspapers and magazines as industries have changed quite a lot.