I eagerly opened up a blog I had been following for a while. Its owner had been engaged in an athletic pursuit, not one that is particularly noteworthy, since hundreds of other people do it, but still, worthy of some praise. I wanted to see how this person had fared on the journey. Instead of stories of the trip, there was a request for….Patreon!
I hesitate to lump this service in with Kickstarter and Go Fund Me, but it is kind of the same premise. I guess you can convince yourself you are supporting the arts. Or something. But seriously, asking strangers to pay so you can write a book? A book from which you derive all the profits (granted, not many, but still)? I seem to see a lot of these requests from the younger age group. While I’m sympathetic to the plight of the frustrated writer, I have written three book length works while having a full time job that demands a ton of my time. Plus I had to wait until I was fairly old to do it–sometimes you just have to pay your dues.
Bottom line: if you really want to write a book, you will figure out how. If you care enough, you won’t beg others to do the work for you. Nope. You’ll be squeezing every ounce of time from a day that is too full already. You’ll work a job because you don’t want handouts from others, and because you know it makes you humble. You’ll scratch and claw for every word and it might take you five years. It might take you ten. But in the end you’ll have done it on your own.