The process is NOT to be trusted

You cannot write a book and have a job at the same time (the book deal post)

I remember when I was still an editor at Allure, one of the executive print editors was griping about a number of go-to freelance writers’ unavailabilities taking leave to write a book. “Why would anyone want to write a book? It’s so much work, ugh,” she said to me, probably because I was just there. I remember nodding in a vaguely affirming way. Working may not be my strong suit, but my thought was but isn’t a book deal everyone’s out? In media world, the book deal is the consolation prize for all the bonuses and raises nobody gets. Job security is an urban myth.

I’ve noticed more and more peers and colleagues announcing their upcoming books in the last five years to understand that the editor-to-author pipeline is a thing. So I guess I shouldn’t have been that surprised when sometime in early 2021, two people in different parts of the publishing industry reached out to me, with the very tantalizing open-ended inquiry: Have you ever thought about writing a book?