Novels certainly can make money, but usually, writers start working on them for the sheer enjoyment of it. The same goes for a lot of other types of writing.
Which means there's a question that crops up for pretty much every writer at some point in their writing life:
Should you write what pays or what you're passionate about?
Of course, the obvious answer here is to do both! Find something you LOVE writing about and make money doing so.
That works well for some writers. If you really enjoy writing, say, time management advice or diet tips or technical manuals or advertising copy, you should easily be able to find a way to make a living from the writing you love.
For a lot of writers, though, it's not so clear cut.
- Maybe you enjoy your freelance work and it pays decently, but it's not something you'd necessarily do purely for fun. Instead, you love writing poetry.
- Maybe you've got a well-paying job writing website copy: it covers the bills and more, but what you really want to do is write novels.
- Maybe you enjoy ghost-writing blog posts for your clients ... but you'd love to spend more time on your own literary fiction.
- Maybe you haven't ever written for money because what you truly love writing is fan-fiction.
There's no "right" way to be a writer, and you shouldn't feel that you're doing anything wrong by focusing on pay. Equally, you're not doing anything wrong if you choose to focus on writing what you love rather than aiming to make money. For instance:
- You might choose to focus on an area that is notoriously difficult to make a living from (e.g. poetry). You might enjoy writing something that you're not – yet – quite at the level of making money from. (Learning to write great fiction, for instance, takes a lot of time and practice.)
- Some writers choose to work a regular day job and enjoy writing in the evenings or at the weekend. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that: your writing does not need to be a full-time occupation for it to "count".
- You might write something you're not particularly passionate about in order to pay the bills. There's nothing wrong with that either! You're using your talents, you're still being creative, and while sales copy or technical reports may not exactly be your "passion", you may still find it satisfying to do a good job.
- You could, like many writers, blend together a mix of different types of writing to create a – more or less! – balanced life. You follow your passion some of the time (even if it isn't making you any money), but you do other writing-related things too. Some writers edit, some teach, some ghost-write ... whatever works for you.
The only things I'd suggest avoiding are:
- Working for content mills. (Large sites like Examiner and Upwork, where gigs typically pay very low rates.) Even if you're just starting out, you can do better.
- Writing something that you hate. If a certain type of writing makes you want to pull your hair out, don't do it; look for something different that you'd at least enjoy a bit.
- Deciding to simply "follow your passion" ... wherever it might lead. Ending up deep in debt isn't going to do wonder for your creativity.
- Letting go of your passion altogether. If you love writing poetry / memoir / fiction, carve out some time for it on a regular basis: ideally at least once a week. It doesn't matter if it doesn't pay.
If you feel that your writing life isn't meeting the right balance between profit and pleasure, how you could tip the scales this week? Find one small way to make a change in the next few days.
