In Today’s Journal
* Quote of the Day
* Writing Tip of the Day
* The Bradbury Challenge
* Considerations
* Of Interest
* The Numbers
Quote of the Day
“Anyone who writes mysteries or contemplates doing so, or who even reads them, will benefit from reading Murder for Pleasure [by Howard Haycraft]. I recommend it heartily.” Frank Gruber
Writing Tip of the Day
If you want to write, write. Escape.
Give yourself over to your creative subconscious and let yourself be absorbed into the act of putting new words on the page. (See the first item in Of Interest.)
Release control.
- Roll off the parapet into the trenches of the story,
- Run through the story with your characters, Write whatever happens, and
- Write how the characters react to what happens.
It really is that simple.
The Bradbury Challenge
During the past week, in addition to whatever other fiction they’re writing, the following writers reported these new stories:
- Balázs Jámbor “Hungarian Criminals, Part 3, Horror movie” 3800 Crime
- Vanessa V. Kilmer ” (I suspect V wrote something and forgot to submit details)
- Christopher Ridge “Attack on Kracken” 2645 horror/SciFi
- Harvey Stanbrough “Cleanup in Aisle 4” 986 Action-Adventure
- Harvey Stanbrough “The Incredible Crystal Rae” 2175 Action-Adventure
- Dave Taylor “Murphy’s Law” 2312 Contemporary fiction
Considerations
Recently a writer who is also a highly skilled practitioner in another endeavor emailed to ask how much money I make from my fiction writing.
Initially I responded with, “Why do you ask? What possible difference could my sales or my income make to your writing?”
The writer emailed me back, and I responded fully to his email. Here are the pertinent, mostly non-money, points. His original questions are numbered and set off with quotation marks:
1. “It makes no difference to my actual writing.”
Bingo. It is true that how much money anyone else makes from their writing has no bearing on how much you will make from your writing.
In the form of TNDJ and my availability to you, I exist ONLY to teach you how to write fiction to the degree that you trust me and yourself and want to learn.
As I’ve made abundantly clear several times in TNDJ, I do not even try to teach marketing or how to make money with your writing. For that end of things, everyone’s different:
- Do you have a mailing list?
- How much time cam you (or do you want to) devote to marketing?
- How much money can you invest in ads, etc.?
Also I tell everyone to feel free at any time to ask me any questions About Writing or Publishing, but not about marketing or making money.
2. “It makes a difference for me as to how many people read what I write.”
That is NOT true. How many people read my work has no bearing on how many people will read your work.
- For one thing, we write very different kinds of material, so we write for very different audiences.
- For another, a reader who loves a fictional story you’ve written might not like a fictional story I’ve written. A reader who likes a nonfiction book you’ve written might not like a nonfiction book I’ve written.
Don’t tie your chances for “success” (however you define the term) to anyone else. Instead,
- Continue learning the craft through reading TNDJ and the work of masterful writers, continue to practice (practice is putting new words on the page),
- Believe in yourself and your characters,
- Don’t prejudge your work as “good” or “bad” (that isn’t your job and you suck at judging your own work anyway) and
- Publish what you write so readers can enjoy your work (or not).
5. “Because I march to the beat of my own drummer, I am ostracized by [my professional] community.”
And because I march to the beat of my own drummer, I am ostracized by the writing community. I teach through TNDJ, and most of my students report listening, yet only a handful are spurred to action.
As I wrote in TNDJ recently, “If my job was leading horses to water, I’d soon get fired for all the dead horses lying around the stock tank.” In almost 11 years with TNDJ, I suspect I’ve truly reached maybe 10 or 15 writers.
7. “It really matters to me how many people I can engage with, including with my writing.”
Yeah, me too, but that’s largely out of my hands. I write it, and they buy it or don’t, read it or don’t, and enjoy it or don’t. Meanwhile, I’m too busy writing the next story to fret over it.
It also really matters to me how many writers I can help learn to have confidence in themselves and trust themselves and Just Write, whether I get paid with a subscription or only a nod and a quiet “Thank you” (or not). Shrug. Meanwhile I’m doing what I love to do.
8. “That is where the questions [re money] come from [and they] deserve to be discussed.”
In my opinion, the word “deserve” is greatly overused. We deserve what we earn or buy.
I also believe, to put it bluntly, it is rude to ask anybody how much money they make from a particular endeavor.
Even if I ask a doctor how much he will charge to treat me, I would never dream of asking him how much he makes per month or per year. It’s none of my business.
Of Interest
Dr. Mardy’s Quotes of the Week: Absorption & Self-Absorption
All About Sleep Some fascinating gems here you can apply to your fiction.
Memento Mori – You Could Leave Life Right Now
The Numbers
The Journal…………………………… 920
Writing of Blackwell Ops 39: More Paul Stone
Day 1…… 2789 words. To date…… 2789
Day 2…… 3308 words. To date…… 6097
Day 3…… 2019 words. To date…… 8116
Day 4…… 4404 words. To date…… 12520
Day 5…… 3598 words. To date…… 16118
Fiction for March…………………….. 27627
Fiction for 2025………………………. 213548
Nonfiction for March………………….. 8950
Nonfiction for 2025…………………… 62880
2025 consumable words…………….. 269828
Average Fiction WPD (March)……… 3070
2025 Novels to Date…………………….. 5
2025 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
2025 Short Stories to Date……………… 11
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………….. 109
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 10
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……… 281
Short story collections……………………. 29
Disclaimer: Whatever you believe, unreasoning fear and the myths that outlining, revising, and rewriting will make your work better are lies. They will always slow your progress as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.
Writing fiction should never be something that stresses you out. It should be fun. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark and adherence to Heinlein’s Rules. Because of WITD and because I endeavor to follow those Rules I am a prolific professional fiction writer. You can be too.
If you are able, please support TNDJ with a paid subscription. Thank you!
If you’re new to TNDJ, you might want to check out these links:
- On Writing Fiction
- Gifts
- Writing Resources
- Oh, and here’s My Bio. It’s always a good idea to vet the expertise of people who are giving you advice.
Questions are always welcome at harveystanbrough@gmail.com. But please limit yourself to the topics of writing and publishing.