Soooo, I'm a full-time writer again (until I have to find a job to feed my family). It's an adventure, to say the least. Financially, we're in limbo. Magnus is making cheese from milk he buys from an organic farm in the neighbourhood, but we're producing a lot less than we used to.
Meanwhile, I do little but vamping up my website, polishing integrations with my newsletter service, writing welcome email routines, optimising my webshop SEO, testing Meta ads, setting up direct sales, and analysing shitloads of data. I love data analysis and that's one of the reasons I get so easily lost in marketing.
Aaaand that has put writing on the back burner for the past 3 weeks. Now when I look at Peregrine, I see only flat character development and a boring plot. And that's okay because the way I work is to write a quick first draft of 3 to 5 chapters, then circle back to gut them and create something new.
But it always bothers me, especially now. You see, here's the thing: To make it as an artist, you either have to constantly produce shitloads of content, which I tried and failed, or, if you're a slowpoke, you have to market the heck out of your art. Some people manage to do both. Some writers write to market. The first time I heard a successful writer talk about "writing to market" my reaction was:
And this is where it gets difficult. Artists are often viewed as ascetic mavericks who create eye-opening magic we can all gawk and marvel at, while they live in a cardboard box if they haven't been lucky enough to inherit a million or two from their grumpy uncle.
I, as a slowpoke, should market a hell of a lot more. Lots and lots more. So that's what I'm starting now. And I should think about writing to market, no matter how alien that feels to me.
For a long time, I thought that "writing to market" was a new thing that came along with indie authors. But nope. It's at least as old as traditional publishers. They wouldn't survive if they didn't publish what they believed people wanted to buy. They have to publish to market, there's simply no way around it. Any writer they sign on has produced something they believe can be sold at profit. Same goes for any art gallery.
So right now I'm trying to figure out what that means for me. All I know is that there must be a balance between creativity and productivity, otherwise, I could just ask an AI to write a shitty book each week for me. There has to be space for playfulness because, without it, creativity dies a slow death.
I haven't been playful in my writing for way too long. And that has to change.
I'll come up with ideas on how to introduce playful writing for myself and the writers here. Let me know if you have any wishes or suggestions!
How was your weekend, everyone?
We had our last sunny and warm-ish day yesterday, which was also the first day in years we dared to spend relaxing on the beach - entirely without working. The WHOLE day. We swam in the Baltic Sea until we were blue-lipped. It was GLORIOUS!
My next post will be more artsy. I'm turning 50 on Sunday and got myself a handful of art supplies. I'll say only this much: Expect gilded bookmarks!
Until next time,
