Answers I Don't Want to Give to Questions I'm Often Asked

Hi friends!

This week I did two very fun, very different events and some questions asked there sparked an idea. Today I'm going to answer hypothetical questions that I bet a lot of you want to ask, or have almost asked, or wish you could ask, but you're too afraid of the answer to raise your hand or send me a note. These questions are not directly from actual people at these events, but sometimes I know the question an author really wants to ask but might not know how to. This might be tough, but I promise to be gentle.

Anon asks: How do we, as writers, deal with the fact that the deck is stacked against us? There are so many other writers vying for so few spots on agents' and editors' lists and even if we do get published, it's an uphill battle the whole way to making this art form we love into a career. Should we bother? How can we keep motivated in the face of this?

Ok, so, bear with me a minute because I'm going to talk about sports. Longtime readers of A&B know that I occasionally talk about running, and running, and use football metaphors, so I'm here I go again. This week Cal Raleigh of the Seattle Mariners hit 60 home runs in one season. That doesn't seem like so many, does it? I mean, there are tons of baseball games a year and tons of chances for batters to hit home runs, right? But of course it's hard to hit a home run. Only 6 other guys have done that in the history of the MLB: three guys who took steroids and Aaron Judge, Roger Maris, and Babe Ruth. Even if you call it "sportsball," you've heard of at least one of those guys.