Don't Make Writing That Novel a Someday Thing

Not long ago, at the recent O'Reilly Tools of Change for Publishing conference in New York City, Bob Young, founder and CEO of Lulu, a web-based personal publishing service, said, "We've seen a huge increase in people who meant to write a book and now are unemployed and are writing the book."

As an agent and novelist, I think this is great. These people are finally able to pursue their writing dreams; something good has come out of something bad.

But I think it's sad, too.

Why is writing a novel so often a "someday" thing? You know, that guy who comes up to you at a party and says he's got a great book in him and will get it down on paper someday. Just doesn't have the time now.

Or that woman who says she's looking forward to starting her novel when she's retired... in approximately fourteen years.

Obviously there's something holding these people back. The message seems to be that if they can't write full-time, they won't write at all.

Bullet-Proof Your Novel

In these challenging economic times, more people are turning to books for entertainment.

"I am optimistic that the downturn in the economy (and cost of gas) isn't negatively affecting book buying--at least for now," says Ellen Edwards, executive editor at New American Library. "In fact, when we asked the question at the NAL Spotlight during the RWA convention, we received a decisive response that readers were buying more books, because they offer a less expensive form of entertainment than many others."

John Scognamiglio, editor-in-chief at Kensington Publishing, concurs. "I do feel that when prices are high, consumers turn to 'cheaper' forms of entertainment, such as books."

Alicia Condon, editorial director at Kensington, goes a step further: "Traditionally, people do look for happy endings and less expensive entertainment during hard times, both trends that favor romance books. My hunch is that readers will be increasingly drawn to fantasy romances, which portray characters confronting many of today's most difficult challenges and triumphing over them."