Blogger KRISTI HOLL is the author of 42 books, including MORE WRITER'S FIRST AID.

Share |

Pages

RSS Writers First Aid

Blogroll

Archives

Categories

Staying Afloat in Hard Times

March 30, 2009

aAfter mentioning a five-year dry publishing period last week (Do You Get Rejected?), I received several emails asking what I did during that time to stay financially afloat and keep on writing.

A Previous Recession

When my book career began in the 80′s, I had five or six relatively easy years with my editor Gail at Atheneum. We did eleven hardcovers together before Gail lost her job in a corporate take-over and downsizing. The publishing industry then was a lot like it is today.

At that time, I got two manuscripts back. Within six months, all my books went out of print– so there was almost no royalty income then. My last two books in a Christian series were not published either. (I found out much later that this happened to a lot of writers.) This horror was followed by five years of no new books, sending out proposals, rewriting proposals, writing queries, and spending a ton on postage and photocopying costs when I was making zilch on my book writing. (There was no online writing then, no email submissions, etc.)

Getting Out of the Slump

Then in a bookstore I found a book called Making It On Your Own: Surviving and Thriving on the Ups and Downs of Being Your Own Boss by Paul and Sarah Edwards. In the marketing section, a statement leaped off the page. This one piece of advice jump-started my disappearing career. “You need to experiment until you discover what particular combination of your skills and abilities at what price will be valuable to what group of people within the current economic realities.”

It said to experiment, so I tried different things to see what might work. The following year I wrote a story for an anthology, entered several contests, did some short manuscripts for children’s magazines, wrote some writers’ articles. I created a new workshop on revision and did eighteen months’ of school visits with it.

Time to Evaluate

The next step recommended by the book was  to use the 80/20 Principle on your experiments. So I sat down with paper and pencil and analyzed: “What 20% of my work has generated 80% of my income?” In other words, what strategies had worked for me? Where should I be putting the bulk of my energy to survive this financial writing slump?

Well, I had bombed on contests and all fifteen short stories; I did sell the story to the anthology; my fastest response and most money, though, came from writing articles for magazines and doing the revision workshop. More than 80% of my income was coming from that 20% of my work.  So (while I contintued to write my middle-grade fiction novels) I concentrated on those two things to pay the bills.

Down the Road…

During that time, some nonfiction articles became a series for Children’s Writer, which turned into ideas for “Support Room” articles when I became the Institute‘s first web editor. A few years later, those ideas sparked my book, Writer’s First Aid, as well as several articles for the SCBWI Bulletin.

The slump eventually ended, as it will again for writers struggling in the current recession. After five years of selling no books, I sold four of my middle-grade novels in one year. If I had quit writing my fiction during that recession, I would have had nothing to sell when publishers started buying again.

So during this slump, I plan to do the same thing: find ways to stay afloat to pay some bills, but also keep writing middle-grade fiction and studying and learning. This too shall pass.

Post tags: , , , , ,

17 Comments »

  1. Wonderful post! Thank you… Although I am no where near the publishing stage this is good to think about. There will inevitably be ups and downs (as there is with anything). I need to prepare myself for the difficulties associated with actually selling my work! :)

    Comment by Caitlin Murphy — March 30, 2009 @ 9:13 am

  2. Caitlin, it’s always good to be prepared, I think. Whether I’m going in for surgery, or starting up a business, or whatever…I like to know what things are likely to happen and just plan for them (instead of being blindsided by them.) Some people find it depressing to be told that rejections are just a part of the writing life, but it’s reality–and not such a horrible reality when you accept it. Forewarned is fore-armed! 8-)

    Comment by Kristi Holl — March 30, 2009 @ 10:01 am

  3. Thank you for sharing your experiences. Though I am no where near publishing anything, it is good to know that not all is lost and that the main thing is for you to keep writing because somehow, somewhere you might be able to get something out of it.

    Comment by Ana — March 30, 2009 @ 10:16 am

  4. Ana, to “keep on keeping on” is about 3/4 of the battle of anything in life. Keep doing the “next thing” toward what you want to accomplish, regardless of the apparent fruits of your efforts for a while. The good stuff will catch up with you eventually! 8-)

    Comment by Kristi Holl — March 30, 2009 @ 10:31 am

  5. Kristi, finding your blog today in a Google Alert is a real treat. Sarah and I are heartened by experiences like yours. Like you’re we’re adapting our careers to the changing times. Making It On Your Own/Secrets of Self-Employment is now an eBook. It’s widely distributed but available with a bonus eBook (On Your Own But Not Alone) in our Middle Class Library (www.middleclasslibrary.com.

    Sarah and I are now focusing on energy on helping communities and individuals transition to the new economics.

    We wish you well with your “experiments.)
    - Paul Edwards

    Comment by Paul and Sarah Edwards — March 30, 2009 @ 10:35 am

  6. Paul and Sarah, THANK YOU for stopping by and commenting! I’ve read tons of self-help books over the years, but I always go back to yours: SECRETS OF SELF-EMPLOYMENT (I wore out two copies that fell apart) and GETTING BUSINESS TO COME TO YOU. Thanks for the link to your Middle Class Library. I will check it out ASAP. 8-) How nice to “meet” you and get to thank you for all the help your books have been to me over the years.

    Comment by Kristi Holl — March 30, 2009 @ 12:38 pm

  7. Kristi…hearing and your ups and downs makes me realize hope for the future. It’s always encouraging to hear that it does get better. Thanks!

    Warmly,
    Donna
    http://www.donna-mcdine.blogspot.com

    Comment by Donna McDine — March 30, 2009 @ 2:31 pm

  8. Donna, I think publishing is like any other long-term relationship: it has its ups and downs. It runs in cycles, and “this too shall pass.” As a society, we are forgetting how to stay steady during times of change. I think this is a major area where my faith makes the hugest difference.

    Comment by Kristi Holl — March 30, 2009 @ 4:08 pm

  9. Thanks so very much for sharing your “ups and downs” experiences in the fickle world of publishing. It’s good to be reminded to “keep on keeping on”, which is, no doubt, the secret to success in any endeavor. You are an inspiration! And your blog is a Godsend.

    Comment by Anne Bromley — March 30, 2009 @ 4:56 pm

  10. Anne, I’m so glad you find the blog helpful. If I could “pull back” and get enough perspective, I suspect I would find that the publishing world is no more fickle than other businesses. I expect that no matter what career you choose, you will need to deal with changes and ups/downs. As they say, the only constant is change! Learning to weather it (with one’s sanity intact) is easier than railing against it! 8-)

    Comment by Kristi Holl — March 31, 2009 @ 5:01 am

  11. Sage advice, Kristi! Thanks for the confidence booster.

    Karin Larson
    http://www.karin-larson.blogspot.com

    Comment by Karin Larson — March 31, 2009 @ 5:51 am

  12. Thanks for the comment, Karin, and for the information on your blog about virtual book tours. I was just asking someone yesterday about this and how it worked. I appreciate getting links that point me in the right direction. 8-)

    Comment by Kristi Holl — March 31, 2009 @ 6:21 am

  13. I really like what you said about the 80/20 principle. Many times I’ll get tied up in a project (or a part of a project) that I’m excited about without evaluating whether it is producing anything for the time and effort I put into it. It’s very helpful to keep that in mind.

    Comment by Beth Mac — March 31, 2009 @ 7:58 am

  14. Beth, you are so right! I was actually quite shocked. I had been keeping track in my head, and I was way off when I actually added up the money made versus the money/time spent. It simplified things after that amazingly though. I knew what to concentrate on. Making the income was critical at that point, so being able to focus was a helpful thing.

    Comment by Kristi Holl — March 31, 2009 @ 6:53 pm

  15. Kristi- I’ve known about the 80/20 thing for ages, but never actually sat down and looked at it in simple money terms. What really does earn me the most money? (I have to ignore my day job here, I think – this is about writing.) I’m making this my goal for the week.

    Comment by Sherryl — April 1, 2009 @ 2:21 am

  16. Sherryl, I ignored the day job income too since I was wanting to write full-time (or very near full-time.) Where I THOUGHT I was making the most money wasn’t it–and it really surprised me. I hadn’t been taking into account the hours some of the projects took me. I am fast with nonfiction–I have an outlining kind of mind, so I didn’t have to revise much. Fiction is another story–and those things like anthology stories took a HUGE amount of time for me (and never got to be sold again for reprints.)

    Comment by Kristi Holl — April 1, 2009 @ 8:28 am

  17. Great site this institutechildrenslit.net and I am really pleased to see you have what I am actually looking for here and this this post is exactly what I am interested in. I shall be pleased to become a regular visitor :)

    Comment by AssoseSycle — April 3, 2009 @ 10:02 pm

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL

Leave a comment