Why I Write—It’s Not (Much) About the Money

It’s the middle of tax preparation season, a time of year I hate. I am still amazed that when my father died on January 5, 2015, he already had his 2014 tax information pulled together. Even now that my husband and I use an accountant, it takes me weeks of moaning and groaning to compile the records to file our federal, state, and local returns.

Granted, my husband’s and my tax returns are more complicated than many. We are both retired, but last year he had income from a stint back at his law firm, and I had income from mediating. In addition, we have pensions and 401(k)s, as well as some investment income. And he owns farmland—one farm outright and more land in an LLC with his mother and sister. All of these require documentation of both income and expenses.

Plus, I write, yielding book sales and royalties. More documentation. Although my writing income is one of the smaller pieces of our financial picture, it seems to require as much paper as the bigger chunks.

Tax season is an opportunity for me to assess whether I make any money writing. The good news is that my cash flow from writing was positive in 2018, as it has been since I published Lead Me Home in 2015. The better news is that the royalty income from my novels will continue for many years into the future, if I continue to promote the books (and if my heirs do after I am gone).

The bad news is that in 2018, after expenses, I netted roughly $2/hour writing—not even minimum wage.

There is no question that I could earn more money by going back into the corporate world or by focusing my time mediating or consulting. But I don’t enjoy those activities nearly as much as writing. In fact, I’ve made a decision to limit my mediation practice in 2019 and to work as much as possible on my novel, while building our house and dealing with other family situations.

As my son said when I decided to retire to become a novelist, “You did it the smart way—you made your money and now you can write without starving.”

At least my son was kinder than my husband, who said of my writing, “It’s a nice inexpensive hobby.” Because my writing is not a hobby. It is a profession, as much as being a lawyer was a profession. It takes education and practice and commitment, all of which I think I have demonstrated over the past twelve years.

I hope the IRS thinks so also.

Would I like to make millions on my writing? Sure. But I’m more interested in writing the best novels I can. I doubt I will ever crank out a novel every few months. So far, Forever Mine was the fastest I drafted and published a book, and that took about 14 months.

The other indie writers in Write Brain Trust and I spend time each month discussing how to market our books creatively and (we hope) inexpensively. We recognize that we need to invest in ourselves and our writing to promote our books, but we are also sensitive to the need not to spend more than our books are likely to reap. We are small businesses, and we must act like businesspeople, keeping an eye on the bottom line.

My goal is to make money writing. But it is not solely about the money. I enjoy creating whole new worlds out of twenty-six letters. I like providing myself and my readers with an escape from the minutiae of daily life—shopping for groceries and sundries, shoveling snow and cleaning house, preparing tax returns. The Western frontier in the 1840s and ’50s was more harsh than romantic, and I’m glad to remind readers that life in every era has its troubles and its pleasures.

In this tax season, when I’m grousing about the time I’m spending on paperwork, I can at least be grateful for indoor plumbing and prepackaged foods.

Writers, why do you write?