Jamesaritchie said:
Part of my job consists of monkey brained paperwork. It's only about one tenth of my work but it's by far the most tiring and soul destroying part of it.
I can't imagine why anyone would want to wriite for a living if they hate what they're writing. And that poor man who keeps writing publishable books although he hates writing, why doesn't he get himself a good life coach and work out what he really wants to do with his life?
I mean it's not just about the books you write, it's about the life you lead.
Even if you hate writing, the life you lead as a successful writer is a darned good one. You're still your own boss, you still set your own hours, yoou can do you work anywhere, which means if you get tired of writing at home you can always rent a hotel room or lease a condo on some nice beach and work from there.
Many hundreds of thousands work at jobs they dislike precisely because of the lifestyle it provides when they aren't working.
The Lady said:
And if you don't love the book you're working on, how can you judge the quality of it. You know the bit where you're advised, if you're boring yourself you're boring the reader.
I know some people write for money just like some people shag for money, and both kinds of people strangly enough are never short of customers and yeah sure, doing it for love, you may well end up with a broken heart and all that, but I'm glad I don't have to write to order and have a job with sufficient holidays and pay to allow me time to write what I want. I won't be changing that to get published. To me that would be like doing monkey brained paperwork for ever.
Some misconceptions here, I think. The part about boredom is not something that comes from those who may be, and often are, bored to tears, even when writing exciting scenes. Boring yourself does not mean boring the reader. If it did, many of the best writers I know would be boring readers to death. There are times when every full-time writer gets bored, but this doesn't stop them from writing scenes others find exciting. I know how a scene should read, and how it should read has nothing at all to do with my own emotional state at the moment.
I don;t have to be excited when I write an exciting scene, anymore than I have to sit at the word processor and laugh when I write a funny scene, or cry when I write a sad scene. Good writing has nothing to do with how I feel, it has to do with how the characters feel, how the characters react to a given scene.
And whether you love or hate writing has nothing to do with writing to order. Neither does writing for money. This is a misconception always made by those who don't earn a full-time living from writing.
The simple truth is, writing for money means nothing more and nothing less than writing stories a LOT of people want to read, and being good enough to do it. Such stories aren't written to order one bit more than any other type of writing. I write for money, but I always write the kind of story I want to write, and more important, the kind of story I want to read. I assume my my readers will want the same.
Successful writers, money writers, are the ones who get to write what they want, and usually the way they want, because they're the ones who are making money for publishers. When you make money for publishers, they pretty much let you make the writing decisions.
Having said this, I do enjoy the process of writing. I enjoy it quite a bit, else I wouldn;y do it. BUt I don't get emotionally involved with the scenes. Doing so usually results in bad writing, from my experience.
