Veteran author Warren Adler offers a "reality check" for would-be authors who believe fame and fortune is just a book away.
"It's so easy to become an author of novels. Others have done it, why not me?"
In writing a novel, all you have to do is follow the formula. Classes abound that teach the formulas. Hell, you probably believe you can imagine and create stories as good as any of them. You have things to say, stories to tell, fantastic ideas floating around in your imagination that deserve to be communicated to a vast army of readers. You've been validated by your teachers and peers. Maybe a publisher took a chance on your first novel. Okay you didn't sell that much but the publisher didn't promote it and you know in your gut it is a great piece of work. It is a prize worth pursuing. You burn to write stories and novels. It is in your genes. You thirst to see your work converted to the big or little screen. And the money? Lots of money rolling in. You'd be lionized at book parties. People would line up for your autograph. You know in your heart you can be the next Hemingway, the next Faulkner, the next Fitzgerald. Your talent deserves the celebrity and prestige of authordom, the shot at immortality.
You might think I'm putting you on, satirizing the author's dilemma. I'm not.