Writing to Your Passion or The Market?
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- Anacoana
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Re: Writing to Your Passion or The Market?
- KS Crooks
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- vadadagon
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I agree. Many folks feel that Divergent is a sad copy of The Hunger Games but in reality they books came out almost at the same time (which means unless the authors knew each other) highly unlikely since the time it takes to write and edit a book is longer than a few months.KS Crooks wrote:Ideally you write for your passion, since the longer you do something you don't enjoy the worse you will become at doing it. As for writing for the "market", who has ever figured out what the "market" wants. Usually by the time people determine what people are looking for it is already tapped out. How many dystopias featuring a strong female character who has to fight for her life, were around before the Hunger Games compared to a few years after. Now if someone writes that type of story it may seem tired or a copy. I would say write what you like then do your best to find those who like the same thing.
"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."
Mrs. Bennet
- ALynnPowers
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- pretzelsnow
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- Cheyennepeyton
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But when writing for a larger audience, then the marketplace must be a consideration. To be sensitive to your reader is to be respectful of your reader. Like it or not, a writer who shares their work with other readers has an obligation to write with a reader's involvement in mind. Like someone who goes on and on without getting to the point, a writer can't afford to bore their reader with platitudes that only matter to them.
Furthermore, a writer who expects readers to actually pay for his or her books, needs to write in a manner that both reveals their passion but also keeps moving along so the reader does not lose interest. Twitter is a great example of one of our social media options that demands that if you post something you must keep it brief. A person who doesn't like Twitter because of that limitation is a person who falsely assumes that what they have to say is more important than the rest of the world. Writers who write only from their passion run the risk of being writers who are never read.
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- lorenicole
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- Avid SciFi Fan
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I write for myself, but keep the market in mind. My writting is only a hobby and I'm not trying to make a living off of it. I'm a sci-fi fan, so I write stories in that area. I try to have fun with the stories and characters, and can only hope others will get the same enjoyment out of them.
- Snickerdoodle9
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- Brandi Noelle
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- fergie
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If, OTOH, you want to make money selling short stories, it seems to be particular markets that pay. For example, women's mags and fantasy/sci fi. I always struggle with that question: should I be working on my novel, which will take 2 years to write and may be unpublishable/unpublished or working out how to write women's mag stories that pay?