Ditch job, become an author!?

[Pigsmummy]

I haven't voiced this in RL, I would love to ditch my well paid job and write some gritty fiction. I read a lot, hundreds of books of different genres, I also really enjoy theatre. I have the outline story of about three books in my head currently and in my day to day life find situations that I would love to write about.

Where do I start? Do I type up my outline and try to enter competitions? Do I write chapters then send them to a publisher? (I work in sales so have developed a thick skin regards rejection). How much might a publishing deal be worth? (kicking myself that I didn't get this nailed before ebooks came along).

I have wanted to write for a long time (most of my adult life) but suppressed the desire, i have a good job, been in this position for 6 years, my colleagues would be astounded by my lack of motivation and enjoyment of my job as i hide it well, I often sit through high level meetings wishing the time away so I can get back to my Kindle.

Is this madness? Has anyone done this?

I am 39, married with one DC btw

Perhaps start, see how you go, get different people to read it, join a local writer's group? If you really want to write, you'll be writing already - for fun, when you're bored in a meeting or on a train. I have written since I was a child, just because I enjoy it just as much (if not more) than reading. When you write, you get to live the story as it unfolds. I love that!

I will always remember an author coming into my old school, who had written many, many children's books (most of which we already had in our school library). Even with that success, he said that he needed to come into schools and get paid for days 'with an author' in order to make ends meet, that it didn't pay well at all.

I have to say too, that I've done the courses, and I just can't write like that. For me, a book is a whole. I can sit down and write one, then tinker with it afterwards, and it will have all the things in it the courses wanted - but I can't plan it in advance. If I try to do that, I can no longer imagine it as I write, and all the creativity just drains out of me!

In saying that though, I've only ever written short stories and short books for children, to use in my work. I've never tried to get anything published - don't think it's worth the hassle to be honest!

I think writing groups can be hit and miss. I've been very lucky. I started a group while on the waiting list for the main local group, and then made it into that second group, so finished up with two! Both are very, very helpful, with honest, knowledgable people. One group only takes people with a certain basic level of experience, while the one I run has always been intended to be for the full range of experience. We're mainly fairly experienced, but we now have a complete beginner, who has integrated really well and gives a really fresh perspective in terms of feedback.

On the other hand, a colleague of mine is in a writing group that sounds like a nightmare. The other members apparently pick her brains for crime writing because of her job, but then give very grudging feedback.

I think the basic requirement of a writing group is that the members like and respect one another, and are willing to separate not-entirely welcome feedback from how they feel about the actual person. One of the groups had a new member who put forward a novel extract for feedback and got detailed, careful critiques from several of us, most of which agreed about some very fundamental points. She argued every point and then left the group!

My writing group is lovely.

There are only five, sometimes six of us. We've know one another over ten years so have a deep understanding of each other and what we're trying to do with our writing. There's nothing worse than being critiqued by someone who just doesn't get your work!

The fundamental problem is that most people think they are terrific writers. This is not, in reality, the case.

The good side of this is it keeps people like me in business rewriting rearranging their words.

Some areas of the country have writing development organisations which put on events/training sessions etc which are useful for people who want to develop their skills. I'm in the Midlands and both the West and East Mids have agencies of this kind.

I agree, it can be infuriating to be critiqued by someone who doesn't like your work or get what you're trying to do. I don't have a writing group, but I have two trusted readers (one male, one female, both writers themselves). They've known me for about 5 years now and get what I'm trying to do and they always try to help me achieve this. They help with the construction bits, the scaffolding bits, the false notes, always working on the terms of the work itself, if that makes sense.

My female reader is incredibly insightful and supportive of my work. When she likes what I've done, her feedback is really heartfelt. When she doesn't like it, she poses careful questions that allow me to read between the lines. My male reader has a giant ego but he keeps it out of the way when he's critiquing, which I think is great. He's ruthless, but never nasty. For me it works better that I know the people who critique my work and they know me.

I am sure all you writers have seen it, but ALCS are currently running a questionnaire into writers' incomes. Useful to fill in to raise awareness about writers' actual earnings and lobby for a better deal for writers. (Particularly relevant in light of PLR statements yesterday, funding cuts to libraries etc. )

(But yay for PLR and ALCS!)

Fascinating thread. Like many another, I have delightful daydreams about being a writer too, but this thread has made me think that my Great Gift to the World of Letters may lie in being an insatiable reader instead.

It's a bloody impossible industry. Without wishing to out myself, I've done the rounds at author conferences, writing residencies, landed myself an agent at a top agency...and yet, remain unpublished.

My debut effort in 2009 went out to 25 major publishers and was roundly rejected by the lot. I have another novel due to go out within the next couple of months, but who knows whether it will land a tidy advance or end up as slush. There is no rhyme or reason to the process. I have friends whose debut novels have been reviewed extensively in the press, and extraordinarily gifted friends who are in the same striving boat as me.

Merrylegs, I have not seen that questionnaire. Was it supposed to be included with the voting forms that came out the other day?

I got it as an email, but it's on the website also - it's an online survey. I wonder if the overall conclusion will be 'don't give up the day job?!'

I love how people think because they read a great deal, and enjoy it, that they can become full-time authors, just jack in the job and become writers. But no one ever thinks, 'I love driving, I think I'll jack in the job and be a mechanic.'

True that expat.

If I had a quid for every SAHM thread that mentions 'writing a book' alongside 'baking' 'arts and crafts' 'volunteering' and 'taking long walks'...

That said, when I first started writing I suppose I thought I could write, based on the square route of fuck all...

I think that questionnaire will have some very gloomy findings .

I've just got my PLR in and it's down from last year - anyone else?

Wish I could be a mechanic expat, I'd save a fortune . . .

I could look at cars, suck in my cheeks, scratch my arse and say 'It's gonna cost ya.' Instead, I edit a magazine, I proofread and copywrite. If I am very lucky, I get to daydream and write fiction. But then I have to sell it or win some comps.

Expat, I've always thought you can write, ever since reading your tales of a French exchange?! I hope you do.

I have always hung onto a deluded conviction that I know how to put words on the page. So far, I have managed to earn a living convincing other people of the same thing but it's not easy.

Yes, the idea that 'everyone has a novel in them' is a total fallacy, in my experience. It seems to work off the idea that your first novel is always pure autobiography, therefore requires no 'art'.

I don't know that everyone thinks they can write, though. I once took a sick friend's place at a well-known publisher's writing weekend, with two extremely well-known novelists sharing the teaching. It was several hundred pounds, and virtually all the twenty or so participants had travelled a long way, some internationally, but only one or two claimed to have ever done any writing before the course. It seemed strange to me, given how much expense and trouble they'd gone to to attend the course, but of course it's possible they did think they could write in theory, but had never actually had a go...?

I do remember one woman being absolutely baffled by an exercise that involved describing a room you knew well. She seemed unable to get beyond saying it was ten foot by twelve and painted magnolia, or whatever.

I'd rather be a mechanic, they earn more money than most writers.

Lots of people tell good stories. And most people have had extraordinary things happening in their lives. But poetry, short fiction and novels are all highly artificial forms. The trick is in learning how to do the artifice. And it's harder than you think. (Like the difference between singing along on a karaoke night, and taking the stage at Covent Garden.)

Yeah encouraging someone to write is really encouraging someone to live years of poverty, with only an occassional glimpse of light.

I take it back!

I totally agree Fraumoose about the artificiality of written forms.

I've met quite a few people who think that writing a poem means literally dumping their emotions on to the page. I've come to dread conversations with some people I know about poetry: 'Oh, I write poetry. No, I don't read any. I don't need to edit.' Obviously these people are directly connected to the Muse. Lucky them. Funnily enough, their poetry stinks.

I write poetry. I'm at uni studying and am learning my craft, including the the 'scaffolding' as someone mentioned above. And I edit scrupulously.

I do think that quite a few writing courses (and how-to books and websites) are a way for writers to earn money - but that would be the writers teaching them, not the would-be writers paying for them.

Something I have noticed a bit lately (I read a LOT of books) is more and more first or second novels have the most awful 'creative writing class' feel to them and, sure enough, there will be some sort of 'thanks to my writing class/group' in the acknowledgements. Books like this tend to be pretty unoriginal and quite often sort of fizzle out towards the end. Either that or the MORAL is dragged in by the ears in the final chapter.

My PLR is down but not by too much, but it's half of what it was a few years ago. Libraries have less money to buy books though and are going through tough times so not surprising.

Agreed on writing courses being a way for writers to make a living. And as well as multiplying, they've diversified like crazy - screenwriting, memoir-writing, travel-writing etc etc.

I think some younger writers increasingly think they are a necessary form of qualification. Or perhaps the only way they'll get an agent...