The Reasons Why you wrote your book or books discussion

I like to make people laugh. I did that for a time as a standup comic, and for the last ten years through my books. I know some people who write book after book, which never get published, and yet they continue. I am in awe of them. In a sense, they are the true writers because they are doing it out of pure love. If I started a book and I had some sort of precognition that it was never going to be widely read, I'd stop right there. I wonder how others here feel?
Best,
Denny (www.dogtellsall.com)

There is lot of pleasure in writing that most people will never realise, if you do manage to write a book and you like it and are actually satisfied with it then that is achievment, being published if you do not really need the money is of little importance.

Self publishing; or just completing a book with your own skills is a job well, the technology to do that is available today and quite resonably priced, a book bound into a plastic cover with a Rexel T20 binder from Staples is of good enough quality to sell at a reasonable price, and well worth the effort, "It is Achievement"

If the content is good, and the book worth reading, most libraries will take them, and small Royalties come back to you every time your book is taken out to be read.

Denny! the words "widely read" and "stop right there" are a bit negative, if you have any talent at all; as they quite rightly, "Carry on regardless." You may be pleasantly surprised."

Cheers H.

The book was a monkey on my back, pardon the cliche. I couldn't rest until I wrote it. But, as it turns out, the monkey never climbed down. Instead he waved his whole family on. Or so it feels.

Goes like this: Eight years before my book was published last spring, I interviewed a courageous, cursing, curmudgeonly slum priest from Longview, Washington. Father Joe was a 61-year-old Redemptorist Catholic who'd been living and working for three decades in the squatter camps of Bangkok. At the time, I was a wire reporter sent to Thailand to report on sex trafficking. Father Joe was helping me to understand the abject poverty that leads to trafficking.

To combat the stubborn cycles of poverty, Father Joe had built 32 schools, four orphanages, a children's AIDS hospice, another hospice for their mothers, and much more, on squatter land without permission from the Catholic church or Thai authorities. He'd done it simply because it needed to be done. It was the right thing to do. At first, the authorities tried to shut construction down. Now, Father Joe's a national hero in Thailand.

When I first saw the 250 orphans housed in his Mercy Centre charity, kids who had been abandoned, abused, and in many cases, infected with HIV, I knew there was more to this man's story than I could write in a newspaper. Mercy's children hopped and skipped and whistled and played at a clip faster than the kids in my own relatively affluent cul-de-sac outside of Washington, D.C. And, as I write in the book, faster even than the two sons in my own home. There was a magnanimous energy on the grounds and in the children of Father Joe's slum charity. But I couldn't quite understand or define it. It was ineffable to me in 2000.

I returned in 2005 to explore the magnanimous energy and to pick the brain and heart of Father Joe. In effect, I went back to the shantytowns of Bangkok to find out what in God's name Father Joe knew that I didn't know.

And, of course, to try in vain to remove the monkey from my back.

I play the guitar (fairly well) and have a decent voice. For the past ten years I rarely just play; rather, I practice in the continuing effort to get better. I do this knowing quite well that nobody other than my wife will ever hear me. I honestly don't know what motivates me.

On the other hand, I would consider it pointless for me to write something that I knew quite well would never be read (= bought) by others.

I'm very self-aware, but I cannot come up with reasons for this dichotomy.

I assume no one will ever read anything I write (even posts on forums, seriously, right now I assume everyone will skip over my post) that's my motivation I guess...

I'm trying to make my solitude a little constructive.

Didn't skip over anything/ so hello! I started writing because it was worth remembering. I'm not a writer/ I'm a story teller. I come from a very large family ( I am #4 out of 33 grandchildren) on my daddy's side of the family. I started a newsletter to the family a few years ago to reconnect all of us and the books came from that. I have written 2 in the past year and both are now published and selling. You never know who will buy your book or why they picked it off the shelf which to me is the "fun" in all of this. If your motivation is purely to make $ well I guess that is a good goal if you want your words to be purely for the $ they bring back to you BUT if your words are from your ability to share your talent I think it's worth more...just my opinion but that's why I write. When a publisher actually accepted my first book and paid me $ it was more than I ever expected. I was just thrilled to have my book complete with a bar code and listed on Amazon.com for people to buy. The day I got the notification of acceptance I laughed, then I cried, then I laughed some more. What a glorious experience. My stories won't change the world but they will bring a smile to your face and laughter to your heart and hopefully comfort too. That is why I named my first book Southern Comfort and it has absolutely nothing to do with the drink. All of the stories are linked with the feeling of comfort. If you want something to lift your spirits then check out my books. All of the stories are true and about real people/ my crazy family. Nobody in my family has ever been published, nobody in my family has ever been mentioned on Google so both of these are "really big deals" for me and my family. I wrote these books so that when I am just a memory there will be something tangible of me left in this world for future generations. So think long and hard before you dismiss writing down your thoughts even if it is only for your own pleasure. My dad died when I was 16 and a few months ago his sister ( age 87) found 2 letters that he had written to her a few months before he died. He was only 38 years old and getting sick and then passing away a few months later was never even on his mind or ours. She sent me those 2 hand written letters and priceless doesn't begin to describe their value to me. They were written 44 years ago and are now in my safety deposit box at the bank. See...your words might be priceless to someone someday...

I write because I was finally forced to admit that it is my destiny. I was born to write.

I have a degree in Business Administration & Sociology from a four-year accredited university in the Texas academic system. For years I attempted to ignore my writing talents, but, to no avail. Every new position I attained (climbing the career ladder in one of the top 5 oil & gas companies in the U.S.) I found myself writing a job description and a desk manual to make each job run more efficiently.

Finally, in 1996 I wrote my first short story which was published in an anthology. In 1997 I wrote a second short story that refused to be concluded. It was my first published novel. Now, I'm working on completing the second book in the series and have already begun outlines of the next two in the series.

In addition to my series, I have so many storylines and two to three chapters for more than 40 others. The hot topics that I feel compelled to explore insists upon being immortalized within the pages of their own books. I don't seem to be able to run dry.

I guess, sometimes, the profession chooses you...and, you must follow where it leads you.

I write because I am a writer. And, I have a million stories to tell you.

Jcwillis, that is a great idea writing a paper for your family that is so large! I'm sure they enjoy it.


I write for the joy of it. I use to think I wrote because I "knew" it would sell and I'd become rich and famous (that was my younger naive self). I learned quickly that the publishing/agency world is very brutal and it's extremely hard to get published. Yet, I continued to write, because "the next one would go somewhere". I learned later in an article that authors actually don't make enough to live off of unless they sell their rights to the film industry. Even after that, I continued to write. I finally learned that it had nothing at all to do with money, and everything to do with the joy that it brings me and those who read it :) Even now with my book coming out, I will not receive much for each of the copies sold. My husband, who supports me fully, cannot grasp why I'm putting so much effort into selling it with such a little net profit on it...but I'm doing it because it just makes me happy. I love knowing that children are going to read it and laugh. And their laughter is because of what "I wrote". That's worth much more than money to me :)

So Why Do We Write?

On a daily basis, I eat because I'm hungry and because I have to. I write with much the same urgency and because there are times I just have to.

A story: a little more than seven years ago, my then not-yet-seven-year-old son decided to write a follow-up to Lord of the Rings. Ambitious, I thought, but didn't say a word about it. Just gave him the xerox paper and a portfolio to hold his masterwork together. It was Spring Break week, so we all had time on our hands. Neither my wife nor I paid any attention to the detail of what he was doing.

One day, while attending to errands, Elliot strapped into his car seat, me at the wheel, he called out to me: "Daddy, how do you spell 'echoing?'" Hmm, I thought, interesting word choice. I spelled it out for him, and then without another word said, went back to attending to our mission.

A couple of hours later, he called out to me again, "Daddy, do you want me to read the page I'm working on?"

"Sure, El, go ahead," I said.

He described a battle scene at the end of which his hero escaped back into the castle. To be honest, I was only half paying attention, at which point he read: "Drums were echoing through the dusty black sky." I nearly drove off the road.

And determined then and there I had to read what he'd written.

Long story short: I decided I had to write, to blaze the path for him and his sister, should either child wish to choose this course in life.

Should you have interest to learn more: http://www.hanellpress.com

Greg wrote: "The book was a monkey on my back, pardon the cliche. I couldn't rest until I wrote it. But, as it turns out, the monkey never climbed down. Instead he waved his whole family on. Or so it feels.

..."

All power to you for your efforts to promote his work. Glad to hear the monkey has a family!