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Even in a little thing  Dear neighbour While leaving the security door open is never a good way to endear yourself to the folks who share it, leaving it wide on on a day that reaches 34 degrees is going to lead to discontent. In fact, it has led to discontent. I got back from teaching and my flat was ten degrees hotter than when I had left, a few hours before. Dear everyone else Do you have anyone you want me to whinge about, while I'm on a roll? The beginning of the end of historical fiction covers where body parts are lacking or heads are partly cut off. Maybe the worst of those book covers can be recycled as zombie fiction? Anyhow, I like this new style of cover, even if it means I don't get to imagine strange growths coming from the missing top-of-head or left side. ETA: if Elizabeth Chadwick sends a posse after me (I was definitely in Evil Gillian mode when I commented on her blogpost), one of my nephews wants my library. He has to drink all the bullace liqueur to inherit the books, though. Bullace, it appears makes a slightly medicinal flavour liqueur. Maybe I should take it to my next booklaunch "Buy my book or you have to drink this." Medlar or cherry, those are both magic. Plum is good. Bullace is very slightly challenging. Apparently there's a Jane Austen Festival in Canberra next year. It's a busy week for me, but I'm looking forward to talking food. Evilly yummy recipes from Austen's time. In fact, some of those evilly yummy recipes are from Austen's family. The question is, should I cook a few more Austen family recipes, just to prove I can? The other question is whether this should replace decanting unlabelled liqueur (possibly bullace - but all the labels have merged with my books in a very romantic fashion - they will emerge one day, proudly showing off dustball offspring) as my evening's special acitivity? Actually, it doesn't have to. My family recipe for liqueurs is identical to several I found from Austen's time. I merely have to think ladylike and ironic thoughts while decanting. Today's inbox had lots of baby pictures. Welcome to the world, Alec and Lily. And thank you, their four parents, for sending the photos. I don't think I'll be able to do baby visits for a little, so they were a very welcome sight. There's an interesting interview with KJ Bishop up on Charles Tan's website. I look at the picture she links to and can see where The Etched City came from and suddenly the gulf between the first section and the rest of the book makes sense. On a more personal note, I want to be distracted today. This isn't the fault of the interview. In fact, the interview is a symptom. I suffer from magpie gaze. My eyes just lit on one of those old copies of the Strand magazine I so like, and it announces boldly that it contains CS Lewis and Dorothy Parker and Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh. It's going to cause problems, those four in such a small space. I bet they argue. I blogged about it when I bought it, but I never resolved that potential for argument. I need to know what Parker has to say about it all. Getting to her thoughts is slow, though, and fraught with interesting obstacles. I must first stop and read the advertisement that calls "Where's your magnesia smile, uncle?" Which has to be science fictional. (I'm not sure I want to read a short story on magnesia smiles.) Or maybe I need to buy myself an Accurst Watch. Oh, it's an Accurist Watch - why would I want one of those? Flick, flick and my magpie eye lights upon something else. I'd be lying if I said "... but I've got a tin of NESCAFE!" What I have is a tin labelled Community Coffee which is thankfully not (as this proud advertisment tells me) "a soluble coffee product composed of coffee solids, with dextrins, maltose and dextrose, added to retain the aroma." There is truth in advertising, but it doesn't tempt me to buy the product. Nor does the gentleman saying "I prefer NUFIX" - he is the well-groomed evildoer from a mild horror movie, with his hair neat and vegetable-oiled. Maybe he's one of those vegetarian vampires? His picture is right next to an ad that is about razor smiles. It's times like this when one needs Dorothy Parker. Or a good SF novel. Or both, with pages read alternately. Except I have to wait: this is a Christmas issue. The science fiction is CS Lewis with "A Christmas Sermon for Pagans." Don't nitpick. Just because he didn't write it as SFnal doesn't mean I can't read it that way! - it's illustrated by Ronald Searle, after all, and those illustrations mainly consist of an angel being abusive to a poor little demon. Mervyn Peake has also done some illustrations in this volume, which almost makes up for the fact that Parker and Olivier and Leigh were quoted, rather than wrote anything. Sometimes the truth in advertising is marginal, it seems. I knew this, but had forgotten it. That's the trouble with a bird brain. Something cool to distract you while I pretend to work. Dealing with racism is way more complicated that this, but dealing with most apparently-racist statements isn't. Today was the last day of my worldbuilding class, and I now understand why my mind inhabits the past instead of analysing it (remember, a few weeks ago I was mourning the temporary loss of historian-Gillian and her historiographical capacity?)*. I was explaining to my students, you see, about the need to play with their learning and to take it on board. I'm a bit besotted right now with the need to create an environment that feels real. My students were a bit addicted to writing every fact I gave them. I was trying to get them to do exercises that would help them with techniques and they were telling me "This is useful. Let me just write it down." Now, I can hardly deny that I utter great words of wisdom. Even when I say stupid things, I shall claim they're great words of wisdom, largely to see how far astray I can lead everyone. That wasn't the point, though. The point was that, without grand stratagems** for transforming knowledge to understanding, any worlds we built in class would be hollow and will read hollow on the page should they be used in a novel. There are good novels written using hollow worlds, but there are much better ones written with worlds that are alive to the reader. There are so many ways of turning theoretical world building into an understanding that's good for writing. My mind inhabiting the past and investing in key figures is one. Laying out a table with plot trigger points and a character's possessions is another. Maps and timelines, character life histories, role playing games, or even mentally walking down the streets of a created town are others. The exercise we used in class was taking the basic design of a building (a house last week, a castle this week). Last week I had them add the people dynamic to it: we discussed how different parts of the house were used. This week we looked at the time dynamic: we discussed how the functions of a particular castle changed over time in response to changing circumstances. And that was what I did with my afternoon. I discovered why my mind has been so very odd these last two months. I also did my best to make the minds of others just as odd. *The punctuation in that sentence is so evil I decided to make it worse with a footnote. Besides, footnotes are fun. The world needs more footnotes. This world, not the world of my novels. I know one person who will never forgive me if I add footnotes to novels again. **Grand stratagems are obviously big piles of semiprecious stones in many layers. I need more grand stratagems in my life. The world needs footnotes and I need pretty rocks. I was going to post something cheerful last night, for Virginia Lee. She found my posts about the finances of writers far too sober. I agreed with her, too, and so obviously did the hordes of people who failed to comment. I was serious when I asked for corrections and emendations - this is something I really, really need to understand. (I need to understand everything - that's the way my brain works. If something doesn't make entire sense, I will fret about it till it does.) I was going to thank a bunch of people (who are not guilty of any of the flaws in my posts - those were all my own doing): Sean Williams, Alma Alexander, Sarah Zettel, Nicole Murphy, callistra, Narrelle, kulpunya, littenz, little_foxy and graywave. For the record, I know everyone's names, but I'm not clear whether they want to use their LJ identities or their writerly selves. Let me know if this is you and you would like your name whole and proper and I will change your identity. I am a whiz at changing identities today!Why I didn't get round to doing any of that was that I was out enjoying myself. I watched the whole of Season 2 of Primeval, with a friend. I paid for it today, though. Except for teaching (which was lovely), today has been a bit difficult. I told my mother I would come down and take care of her, and she announced to me that she would be well by Tuesday. I think she was worried I would descend on her and cook. She seems to think I have exotic food tastes, or like hot spices. Spices are good for pneumonia. My mother really is a lot better. She walked upstairs, even, earlier today. I'm just a worry-wart. I can't do a boppy post tonight, but I might be able to do one about the cool moment my students and I had today. Watch this space. Actually, don't watch this space. Get yourself a cuppa. That's what I'm going to do, after all. Yesterday's post was all about stating the obvious. I wouldn't have had to write it if so many people didn't assume that income is optional for many writers. Today I'm going to work through the list of overheads and expenses and other stuff. Like any small business, these items vary from writer to writer and the problems that need to be addressed also vary*. Keep in mind that writing income can fluctuate wildly and that if a writer draws on their reserves to meet one of the needs listed below, they may not have income to cover basic living expenses. Or they may. It's unpredictable. We can't just spend up to the limit of our credit card and wait for Thursday**. I've divided all the material various writers have given me into categories, to simplify things. Since businesses vary so considerably, the line between what's normal for a business and what has to be done for a particular person to be able to work in the business can be drawn in a number of places. Business expenses (sort of an overview) Sean Williams has broken down a bunch of the business expenses in the post I quoted so extensively yesterday. He emailed me the link and I looked and thought "Neat – I remember him posting this." Then I remembered "I ought to look closely at it." Then I thought "Why don't we all get safe public service jobs and give up on novels?" Here's a blown-up version of the most important graphic. Basic equipment Things like computer and peripherals, office consumables, phone. The easiest way to think about it is to consider that a writer has an office or formal workplace. The office/workplace may be oddly configured sometimes, but it still exists and it needs office equipment. It's hard to talk to an editor with no phone or internet. I don't know how one would write a novel without basic equipment. Even Jane Austen needed paper and pen and a table. She also needed a blotter to hide her current work, so that no-one would know she was writing, and the capacity to post her finished manuscript to London. This leads us to services. Services Writers' offices require certain servicing. These can overlap with household needs when we work from home. Services include things like electricity, water, sewer, garbage/rubbish collection, telephone, internet, insurance, rates and/or property taxes, post. Various forms of insurance, bank fees, paperwork could fit in here, or even have their own heading. Time costs as well as financial ones need to be allowed for whenever services are involved. Every time a writer queues to pay a bill, that's time they're not working on fiction. The same goes for wear and tear – replacing or fixing things takes time out from writing, and so is a cost. Wear and tear A standard work-related expense. Just as crucial as disposing of rubbish and having electricity. A lot of things fit into wear and tear – anything that's essential to a writer for work that breaks down or gets old, basically. A dead computer is a serious problem when that computer is used to earn their income. There's also wear and tear on the body and mind, which brings me to leave. Leave The fact that the writer pays by not working rather than an employer giving days off still has to be factored in. Same with bereavement leave, holiday leave and any other sort of time off. Being self-employed (which is essentially what most novel writers are) means that the money and time for all kinds of leave have to be factored into finances. Taxes Writers who are not hobbyist pay taxes. Refunds usually come in the following tax year (well, they do for me and the writer who commented on US taxes). What this often means is we pay taxes up front on big lump sums (like advances) and then recover some of it later on. Most writers also have an accountant. I did my own taxes when I wasn't self-employed, but then it became complicated and now I need help (I probably need all kinds of other help, too, but let's not go there). Health and retirement Two big items are superannuation and healthcare. With no employer to provide, they have to come out of the money a writer makes. Whether you regard them as business overheads or not depends on your definition of human resources, I suspect. The truth is, though, that not many writers have enough money left after everything else to get superannuation. Healthcare provision (its nature and extent) depends heavily on which country you're in – it's a giant other topic. Research Research can include books, internet access for internet research, my recent trip to Sydney and a bunch of other things. So many non-writers ask where ideas come from. One of the answers is 'through research and hard work.' Sometimes it just takes time (time is a cost, remember), but research expenses can be significant. Like other expenses and overheads some are tax deductible, but some aren't. Promotional expenses In a dream world, books sell themselves or publishers do all the work. The reality is that, more and more, writers are expected to do a substantial amount of work (time cost) and even in making and distributing promotional material. Getting the word out about a new book or project is a part of the writing business these days. Examples various writers gave to me included making bookmarks, fridge magnets, business cards, travelling to cons, donating services (time cost as well as donation of the service itself). Memberships in professional organisations Just what professional organisations do writers join? It varies from writer to writer. Just like everything else.I'm not a member of every professional organisation I ought to be, because of the cost. Personal expenses Some basic living expenses have to be taken otherwise writing cannot happen. This includes things like food, drink, clothes, education, healthcare, childcare, care of frail relatives. Technically, they're mostly not business expenses or overheads, but, as Sarah Zettel said "I suppose I could plunk my kid in front of the TV for eight hours a day while I work..." These are just as much issues with writers as they are with anyone else in paid employment. That many writers work from home can mask this. Basically, if something can't be done by someone in a normal fulltime job, then the writer has to sort it out and allow money for it or take time out of their job (writing) in order to meet the need. This comes out of the income earned part of a writer's life ie the money made from a book after tax, agent's fees etc have all been taken out. Remember that portion of the % of a % of each book sold is the writer's equivalent of a salary. How many books does it take to make a liveable wage for a writer? That's the big question. A liveable wage is what's left after the business essentials are dealt with. Some of these essentials are overheads. And that was what started these posts. * These two years my biggest timesink is deaths, oddly, and long phone calls sorting out the consequences of deaths. I'm hoping that relatives and friends will decide to live forever, starting tomorrow, and that I shall have more time to be self-centred and obnoxious and maybe follow up with more of the promotional stuff I really ought to be doing with 2 new books and a rash of short stories. ** Australian Federal Public Service payday. I live in a city where every second Thursday lots of people go shopping and drinking and celebrate having money again. This post is about overheads, and it isn't. I read all the emails and all the comments on my two posts about overheads for writers and realised that we weren't all thinking about the same subject. I thought it might be a good idea to spell out (for myself, as much as for anyone else) how everything fitted together. There are many people who know far more than I do about the money side of novel writing. If any of you have additions or emendations or better explanations, I'd appreciate your comments. Please also feel free to lie through your teeth and say nice things about my two posts. Two posts? Yes. You don't want to know how long my first draft was. After I got rid of most of the jokes, it was still too long. Even after I deleted digressions, it made enough for two blogposts. I want to number things, or something, but instead, I'm going to start by belabouring the obvious: the money paid to a writer because of a book contract isn't profit. It's a writer's income. Fortunately, Sean Williams (one of the kind souls who emailed me thoughts and ideas) has given me the perfect graphic to explain this. In Sean's piechart, you want the section labelled 'for me'. You can also see where the rest of the income from his books goes. Of that, the one we're mostly interested in here is 'expenses.' The income described in Sean's piechart is proportionate. It doesn't cover a regular sum of money or predictable earnings. Sean's breakdown is his income over time. It's very clear where his income goes in a year and what proportion he gets to take home to pay for groceries. Take a look at another of his pictures. Make sure you're sitting down. This is a graph of the changes in amount of that income over time. Don't look at the wonderfully high peaks or the very depressing troughs. Think of it as a day-to-day way of earning a living. Consider what it's like planning a life where you have absolutely no idea if you're going to get $50,000 or $5 in your next pay. Knowing that, for most writers, pay is at the low end of the scale. That was the perspective I needed to give before anything else would make sense. Now we can start talking about other stuff. Stuff that eats into that income, whether it's rolling up to a gorgeous high, or has just plummeted into non-existence. Stuff that has to be allowed for from that strangely rollercoastering income. littenz pointed out that there are terminology issues in considering that other stuff. Specifically, what many writers consider as overheads, have other meanings to other people (which might be what tripped me up with that bookseller). Rather than argue about terms, what I thought I would do was look at the various things writers encounter and have to allow for in order to keep working professionally. Some of these might be overheads, some expenses, some hard to categorise. It's not a complete list. I created it from my own experience and from those emails and comments I've received over the last week.There's one definition that's unavoidable, however. When I say 'writer,' for the purposes of this blogpost, I mean a fiction writer who makes their living (or significant part of their living) from their writing. There are many writers who write perfectly beautifully, but who write as a hobby. The way one deals with costs, expenses, overheads, life choices when the activity is a hobby is quite different to the way the way one deals with exactly the same thing when it's income. Teaching is my main source of income right now and writing my secondary, but the teaching is as sporadic as the income from writing, so most of my calculations are similar to those made by someone whose whole income comes from fiction. I'm not alone, either. Quite a few writers have portfolio existences: income comes from a variety of places. My income comes from roughly the same sources as Sean Williams but all the proportions are different. No two writers will have quite the same division, but almost all of us have money from more than one source. Sometimes it evens out the rollercoaster. Sometimes it makes it nauseatingly topsy-turvy. That's a really good place to finish for today. I'll give you the second post tomorrow or maybe later tonight, depending on when the heatwave breaks. Please forgive any addling of the brain in these posts: it's been a difficult week. |
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