Writing Is An Art Form

 Every day, I have to contemplate my lengthening career as a writer. I'm used to also being an artist. I was thinking of transferring over to some computer pad-style drawing technology so I could create graphics and artwork on the computer directly. It’s easier just to type, edit or otherwise work with a keyboard. And I have an over four-year-long career as a writer and editor to draw from as I continue to write every day.

It fascinates me as a writer and an editor the many subject areas that my clients are willing to create books about. One will want to write his or her life story, such as the author who approached me recently regarding his life story as a transgender person. He changed from female to male, and he is now married and a father of two children, not his own, as the surgery doesn’t yet allow transgendered persons to procreate. Another will want to write a children’s fantasy chapter book, an adult science fiction dark fantasy warehouse party series of books, a how-to book on beauty and fashion, a book about the Nazis and a Jewish uprising against them, a book by a former Nazi who wants to tell us about what it was like being forced into the party…etc., etc., etc. There is no limit to the types of subjects my authors, many of whom are putting out their very first books, will want to write about.

Some are the type of book which may or may not sell all that well, while others are almost a guaranteed best seller, having a crowd of buyers ready to purchase the books. I enjoy working with both groups of authors, even though some of their books don’t pay as much money as my more lucrative authors’ books do. I support first-timers who have an interesting and valuable story to put out before the reading public. These types of books are the “coffee table” type you have heard of, such as a book by the gentleman who took the nude photos of the “other woman” in an infamous murder case. They sell well, but the material in them is often only timely or flashy, and immaterial over time as earnest literature. I much prefer working with people who have books in their souls that both contain stories worth the telling, and stories worth money to a flashy author with a coffee table book.

I make enough money at my regular writing projects to support my habits and lifestyle. Some of those books sell very well over time, and it’s worth it to me to put the time and effort into writing and editing them that it takes to really polish the work to a gleaming shine and make it productive and meaningful as timeless literature or educational material. This means a lot to me and a large check paid for the type of book I truly love to see my name associated with doesn't hurt at all, and I feel very proud to have more of these works on my record. I guess in the end it’s a worthwhile gain: timeless creation of worthy literature and timely production of flashy, self-gratifying stuff that makes me feel good to write it. I regularly take on that kind of project. I write those books to make money. But it always gladdens me when I can write something that really makes the author in me feel like he has produced a very fine book, and which is something that will truly lend credit and greater credence to my professional name and career as a writer.

I think it lends the greatest justice to my lengthening writing and editing career to help my inner author get out the work that holds the most promise over time, AND the best selling work that is also timely and lucrative. Writing is an art form, but it is also a mass market for producing coffee table books that sell. And this should not frighten my inner-author.