Writing for money

Recently I read a blog post where the author mentioned the unlikely chance that a writer will ever sell a book, let alone make much (or any) money off said book. He noted that we all dream of making it big, of being the next Terry Pratchett (or whoever you admire), of reeling in cash.

I've often seen/heard/read people talking about the "dream" that writers have of getting some fantastic amount of money from books, and it occurred to me: I have never thought about making money from books.

I would love to write a book, to sell a book, to see people enjoying what I write. But money? I don't care. I'm keeping my day job. I just want people to enjoy my writing. For all I care, if I made any money I'd donate it to a charity somewhere. In fact, that's a cool idea. But make money? No.

Sure, I'd love to be the next big name, but I know that won't happen; I'd just love to be published. I want to create and to craft words, to make magic, to provoke emotion and to stir thought. I don't want to write the next crappy Mills & Boon novel which might make me money; I want to write something good, that I can read and love and respect, that I can give to my parents.

It's hard to explain. I just want to write a book that I think is good, and that a publisher thinks is good enough to publish. Money doesn't mean anything; I'd never want to make a full-time career of writing, because I always want to keep my head in "the real world". But I love writing, and this NaNoWriMo so far has really reminded me of that; I'm in love with this story so far, and I love my characters and my world and my plot.

I write because I love writing. I'll try to get published to see if I'm good enough to be published. And I want to sell books to share my writing — never for money.

Total words today: 1891.
Total words overall: 32,091.