You really have to want to write for writing's sake...

...because it probably won't make you rich. In fact, if you've got a family it might not even make you particularly "unpoor."

Here's the author's bio:

Lynn Viehl, Dark Fantasy and Science Fiction Author. Since 2000 New York Times bestselling author Lynn Viehl has published forty-two novels under eight pseudonyms in five different genres, including her StarDoc science fiction series and Darkyn dark fantasy series. She is the author of Paperback Writer, a popular publishing industry blog, and has been involved in the online writing community since 1994 as a teacher, mentor and occasional activist.

And here's the dismal truth:

If I published only one book a year, and it did as well as this one, my net would be only around $2500.00 over the income level considered to be the US poverty threshold.

It's a good thing I'm just doing this to see if I can. Otherwise...well, there really isn't any otherwise. There can't be. I'm not planning on having a family to support, but that doesn't make the fiscal reality of fiction writing any less sobering.

Meanwhile, Cory Doctorow offers his opinion:

I think that she's right that it's kind of a lot of work for a moderate sum of money, but at the end of the day, a novelist can work from home, to her own hours, in pyjamas, and contribute a fair share to a middle-class income, while enjoying any number of reasonable perks. And while it's true that most people capable of making $50K/year writing novels could make $100K/year writing marketing copy, people who write marketing copy have bosses, offices, commutes...

I just don't see the crisis here. Most artists never get close to quitting their day jobs, even if they're willing to take vows of poverty. The author here can -- and apparently has -- quit her day job and taken a vow of moderately-middle-classitude. That's a pretty good place to be.

I know that Cory quit his day lob at the EFF a few years ago, and it's been several years since I've been naïve enough to think that I was going to make my living solely from putting fictional words on the page. Occasionally, though, I have to grit my teeth against the financial truth and press on. I still remember the sinking feeling I got when I read that Thomas T. Thomas, author of the genderfucking sci-fi novel Crygender and seven others (including one each with Fredick Pohl and Roger Zelazny) had returned to the workforce as a technical writer. It was depressing to realize that even if I wrote a novel, got it published, and then did it seven more times, I could still end up spending most of my time doing exactly what I'd been doing for a decade: technical writing.

I like to think, though, that I'd have a lot more tolerance for software manuals and QA if I knew that I had a small portion of shelf space in the bookstores on State Street all my own...

LATER:

Nathan Bransford weighs in.