# How hard is it to get rich writing? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 27, 2011, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147 "2011-01-27T03:06:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/21 "2011-01-27T09:57:50Z")
> [@spark240](#): > > Yeah, no doubt. But that still kind of sounds like a lot of work. I think he should just get a weird cat, and make videos and stuff. Hey, I call dibs on that idea. No matter what you do, if it was easy, everybody would be doing it. That so (relatively) few write at all, a very small percentage of that even finish 1 piece, and an even smaller percent of that get published, writing is one of the hardest ways to get rich there is. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/22 "2011-01-27T10:37:57Z")
I know one[author](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lois_McMaster_Bujold)and she works at it and treats it like a full time job. She spends several months of each year traveling to bookstores and cons, does book signings, and spends an amazing amount of time in correspondence with fans. I believe she now has more Hugo awards than Heinlein. It took her years of work for her to be able to support herself through writing. Keep in mind, that $25 for a hardbacked book, or $10 for a paperback, authors get a pittance per book sold. The only way to make money is in volume - selling a hundred thousand copies of something. There are hardback, paperback, ebook, audiobook rights, and frequently they are sold for each market [North American, British Isles, Europe, Asia, Australia/NZ] so there are a lot of complex negotiations that have to go on. After a rather disasterous movie script issue, she really hates the idea of movie adaptations. ---
**Author:** ![Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mean_mr.mustard/32/3865_2.png) [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 10:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/23 "2011-01-27T10:48:21Z")
Am I the only one not taking the OP seriously? mmm ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/24 "2011-01-27T12:53:39Z")
> [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](#): > > Am I the only one not taking the OP seriously? > mmm And what, pray tell, is the entertainment value of that? ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/25 "2011-01-27T13:40:07Z")
At any one time, the number of writer of fiction\* who get rich by writing is less than 100 in the entire world. For every Stephen King or Stephanie Mayer, you have a dozen other published authors who make enough to live comfortably, a thousand that make enough to make it a business instead of a hobby, and tens of thousands who are writing things that no one would ever pay money for. The OP, whether it was meant as a joke or not, is often asked seriously, as though the ability to write is merely a matter of getting the words on a page. People who make big money as writers do more – they hit upon the temper of the times (before it’s obvious, and often only due to luck) or manage to get the attention of readers for reasons that have nothing really to do with the book. There is no way to be sure you’re doing that, and even if you’re following a trend, you need to be noticeably more interesting to readers than the thousands who are also following that trend. \*a public figure can get rich by writing a best-selling memoir. ---
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/26 "2011-01-27T13:52:45Z")
well considering just about everybody has the basic tools to become a writer, it’s orders of magnitude easier to get a decent job writing than it is to get a job: talking, standing (guard), ditchdigging. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/27 "2011-01-27T14:10:53Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > Next the money Tom Clancy or Steven King makes is peanuts compared to a guy who owns a couple of Toyota dealerships. Authors are among the few famous people who are not rich. How many Toyota dealerships have lifetime profits exceeding a billion dollars? And how does having lifetime earnings (as an author) which average about $30/million a year define somebody as “not rich”? ---
**Author:** ![PlainJain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5daacb/32.png) [@PlainJain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PlainJain)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/28 "2011-01-27T14:11:03Z")
> [@don\_t\_ask](#): > > And what, pray tell, is the entertainment value of that? And the winner is… ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/29 "2011-01-27T15:07:35Z")
Who was it that said “Nobody wants to _write_. Everybody wants to _have written_.” ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/30 "2011-01-27T15:14:19Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > I know one[author](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lois_McMaster_Bujold)and she works at it and treats it like a full time job. She spends several months of each year traveling to bookstores and cons, does book signings, and spends an amazing amount of time in correspondence with fans. I believe she now has more Hugo awards than Heinlein. It took her years of work for her to be able to support herself through writing. Hah. I was about to bring Bujold up as a well-known writer who probably makes less than a Toyota dealer. ---
**Author:** ![SeldomSeen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ba0ec/32.png) [@SeldomSeen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeldomSeen)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/31 "2011-01-27T15:39:48Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Who was it that said “Nobody wants to _write_. Everybody wants to _have written_.” Louis L’amour said that in one of his memoirs, but I rather doubt the phrase originated with him. And the late Roger Hall said _“I love being a writer even though I don’t actually like to write very much.”_ SS ---
**Author:** ![joebuck20](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/74df32/32.png) [@joebuck20](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/joebuck20)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/32 "2011-01-27T15:41:56Z")
Become a failed vice-presidential candidate. Or a really bitchy Chinese mom. ---
**Author:** ![joebuck20](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/74df32/32.png) [@joebuck20](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/joebuck20)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/33 "2011-01-27T15:59:20Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](#): > > This is a completely preposterous thing to say. Stephen King was # 69 on the Forbes Celebrity money list last year at $34 million. Tom Clancy was # 10 a few years ago. What kind of Toyota dealerships are we talking about, the ones that sell Camrys made of heroin? Yeah, I was going to say, they may not be Warren Buffet rich, but they’re certainly pretty well off. Again, though, they’re at the pinnacle of their fields with a long established fan base. Few, if any, upcoming writers these days can hope attain the type of notoriety they have, especially with the current state of the publishing industry. And getting published is really as much about knowing how to navigate the publishing world and knowing the right people, as it is a being a good writer. All those hot new wunderkinds you read about in the New York Times book section, a lot of them probably had connections, either through grad school, friends of friends, or even acquaintances inside the industry, who streamlined the process for them. And you can be the next Hemingway, but if you don’t know how to get your manuscript in the right hands, it’s never going to see the light of day. Writing the book is the easy part in comparison. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/34 "2011-01-27T16:29:39Z")
> [@Sleel](#): > > And as someone who has read SF&F voraciously for decades, I can say that Harry Potter’s success is puzzling. There are far better authors than she who have sold far, far fewer books. The fact that you’ve read SF&F voraciously for decades may be why you’re puzzled: you’re not the primary intended audience for her books. You may be judging them strictly as fantasies (or worse, as “SF&F,” where the SF part definitely doesn’t apply), when actually they’re a mixture of genres, including Mystery and School Story, and as such they appeal to people who don’t normally read fantasy. Sure, there’s some element of luck, or being in the right place at the right time, to Rowling’s success. But, if you’re hoping to become rich and famous by writing fiction, especially by writing children’s books, you don’t write for people who have been reading a particular genre voraciously for decades; you write to be accessible and page-turningly entertaining to as broad an audience as possible. ---
**Author:** ![Finagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@Finagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Finagle)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/35 "2011-01-27T16:37:37Z")
I think it was Thurber who said “Falling back on writing is like falling back on a box of carpenter’s tools.” ---
**Author:** ![Slade](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5ac83/32.png) [@Slade](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slade)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/36 "2011-01-27T16:51:17Z")
It’s a piece of cake. You should quit your job tomorrow, tell all your friends to go fuck themselves, spend all your savings as quickly as possible on drugs and whores and then borrow loads of money from the mob to tide you over till the inevitable millions start rolling in. What could possibly go wrong? ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/37 "2011-01-27T16:51:18Z")
> [@Krokodil](#): > > Did you hear about the blonde actress? She was so dumb, she fucked the writer. \*Joseph Turner White: What’s an associate producer credit? Bill Smith: It’s what you give to your secretary instead of a raise. \* [right]_State & Main_[/right] > [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](#): > > Am I the only one not taking the OP seriously? Why should we? He clearly isn’t, or otherwise is seriously delusional. There are some really fantastic authors who never get enough popular acclaim to quit their day jobs, and some execrable writers who make the best seller list even though they couldn’t pass Composition 101. _cough_Clive Cussler_cough_ The one common element about truly financially successful novelists is that they don’t make more than an eating wage from book sales; they make their mattresses of money from licensing their stories to other media, and specifically t.v. and film. Tom Clancy didn’t make gazillions of dollars from the progressively thicker and more incoherent airplane novels he writes; he made it from optioning his stories, characters, and his own name as a marketing brand, i.e. Tom Clancy’s Op Center, Tom Clancy’s HAWX, Tom Clancy’s Pile O’ Poo, et cetera. Ditto for Rawling, Fleming, et cetera. As for making tons of dough becoming an overnight success from submitting an on spec script to just the right producer, I’ll just direct you to [_Overnight_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0144117/), a documentary about Troy Duffy’s unlikely success and subsequent fall after writing and directing the would-be blockbuster _Boondock Saints_. And Duffy actually has some talent. I also suggest Charlie Kaufman’s [_Adaptation_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0268126/), a highly fictionalized and thematically recursive account of Kaufman trying to adapt Susan Orlean’s _The Orchid Thief_ to a film. You can be Charlie, or you can be his (imaginary) brother Donald, but it is unlikely you are going to be both. Or, frankly, either. Hollywood coffeehouses are fully of Donalds, and not just a few unsuccessful Charlies, all of whom have to rush to make their shift at Starbucks in order to pay the exorbitant rent on their shitty little studio apartments in K-Town. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Algher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Algher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algher)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/38 "2011-01-27T17:00:13Z")
Jerry Pournelle has a nice essay on being a writer, so that you can become an author: [http://www.jerrypournelle.com/slowchange/myjob.html](http://www.jerrypournelle.com/slowchange/myjob.html) I recently read (somewhere) an interview with an author who writes for the ereader marketplace. The arguement being that you can publish for less, don’t need an actual publisher, and it is more about writing for the right genre and price point. ---
**Author:** ![Prelude\_to\_Fascination](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a183cd/32.png) [@Prelude\_to\_Fascination](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Prelude_to_Fascination)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/39 "2011-01-27T17:51:11Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > [snip] > There are some really fantastic authors who never get enough popular acclaim to quit their day jobs, and some execrable writers who make the best seller list even though they couldn’t pass Composition 101. _cough_Clive Cussler_cough_ Hey! I used to love Cussler’s books! They were fun, trashy reads! > [@](#): > > The one common element about truly financially successful novelists is that they don’t make more than an eating wage from book sales; they make their mattresses of money from licensing their stories to other media, and specifically t.v. and film. Stranger While you’re correct as a rule, take the aforementioned Cussler. He licensed two stories for film: _Raise the Titanic_ and _Sahara_. Both flopped, although with _Sahara_ a major reason could’ve been because Cussler couldn’t stay out of it: he wanted all kinds of script approval, sued the producers, etc. I’ll admit though that Cussler’s the exception for licensing, but at least give him credit for making money, primarily through his writing, the quality of which is debatable. I’ll give you that. ---
**Author:** ![pepperlandgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@pepperlandgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pepperlandgirl)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2011, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147/40 "2011-01-27T17:51:25Z")
Here’s how you do it. 1. Write a book. –In some ways, you’d think this would be the easiest and most obvious part of the formula, but most people can’t do it, and of those who have the ability to, most of them don’t have the attention span, dedication, or desire to complete a book. If you write a book you don’t believe in just because you think it’ll sell, you’ll find yourself resenting every second of it and then you’ll realize you’re responding to trends that will have already been over and stale by the time you get your MS in front of an editor. If you write a book that you feel very passionate about, it will be all the more devastating when the gatekeepers of the industry say “thanks but no thanks.” Either way, the most important thing is to finish it. 1. Finish the book. It needs to be said twice. 2. Edit the book. Your first draft won’t be great. Or probably even good. Now if you’ve written 100k novel, and you managed a steady flow of 2000 words/day (not to mention whatever time you’ve lost to tweaking, editing, researching, writer’s block, slamming your head into the wall, holidays, and the hours you’ve spent online talking to other want-to-be writers) you’ve probably been at this for about 3 months. Depending on the work, you may need another month to edit. You may need another year to edit. But even if you’re starting to feel impatient with the book, don’t skip over this step. 3. Research publishers and agents. You can’t just send your book out into the world. You have to make sure whoever you’re sending it to would actually _want_ it (theoretically, because probably nobody is going to want your book). This requires reading other books that the agents have repped and the publishers have published, making sure that they’re not scam artists, and possibly revising your book based on what they say they’re looking for and marketing trends. 4. Prepare a submission packet. Agent A wants a query letter, synopsis, and the first five pages. Agent B wants query letter, synop, and first chapter. Agent C will accept the whole MSS, but only during certain months of the year. Agent D wants snail mail queries–and queries ONLY. Agent E wants you to use their form on their webpage. All of them have at least a six week turnaround on queries alone, and if they are interested enough to look at your work, then you could be waiting for 1-12 months (there are exceptions, but they’re exceptional b/c they’re so rare). Most publishers won’t want to see your work at all, and if you have dreams of making it big and being rich and famous, you wouldn’t target any publishers that _would_ accept unagented work. 5. Get rejected. A lot. Be prepared for radio silence. Your book will be rejected. Sorry. But keep trying! The agent of your dreams might be out there! Yes, it’s a long and involved process that’s slowly eating up whatever time you have left on this earth, but you want to be rich and famous right! 6. Write a new book. Let’s face it. Your first book was a dud. The six months to a year you spent working on it wasn’t wasted time, exactly, but it’s time you’re never going to get back. Anyway, you’ve got to do something to kill the time while you’re working, so you might as well start your second masterpiece. Of course, once you find an agent, things don’t get any easier. They’ve still got to sell a book in a shrinking market, where more and more publishers have been laying off their staff, and where an entire bookstore chain is in danger of dying forever and libraries are no longer buying new books. The advances are shrinking for most authors. In fact, I read something not too long ago that said the big advances–the six figured ones–are quickly becoming a thing of the past. 1. Hope you earn out whatever advance you got. There are certain genres, certain books, certain authors, and certain times when the first book is the break out big seller and all your dreams come true. This doesn’t happen for 99% of published authors. Your publisher isn’t going to set up signings or readings for you, you won’t go on a tour to meet your adoring public, and Hollywood probably won’t come knocking. Maybe one day all of that will happen for you, but the chances of you getting a second contract are slim to none if you don’t earn out your advance. 2. Write another book. See! Easy peasy! The real miracle is that we don’t all know people who decided to get rich and famous writing a book. (obviously there are known exceptions to this whole process. I realize that this isn’t universal across all decades, genres, and authors. But this is more or less the reality of thing now. Hell, I didn’t even go through this. I said “Nuts to that bullshit” and bypassed the whole damned thing, but I’ll never be rich or famous from my books). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-hard-is-it-to-get-rich-writing/569147.md?page=3)