Author day jobs?

[SicOne]

Authors, what other professions outside of writing or editing do you work, if any? I asked this years ago and remember a lively conversation here about it, but that was only when a mere handful of you were on the BBS. I don't know for a fact, and am not looking for hard numbers (and understand if your rules or contracts keep you from specifying), but I'm of the understanding from what I remember from that conversation (post-"Destiny" trilogy) that it's not really enough to afford to leave regular employment for full-time writing if you're doing tie-ins, unless you're doing a bunch of them. I'm curious how that's changed in the last 10 years since I remember that conversation, or if some of your own personal circumstances have changed, as I know many of you have your original non-Trek works as well and though I don't know for sure, I would imagine that pays well if it's something you don't have to share with franchise owners.

Beg pardon if this has been asked and answered recently; if so, please direct me to that thread. I'm not a writer and don't have that level of imagination and creativity; I'm a locomotive engineer, but I've read enough of your Trek books over the years that I've idly wondered while driving trains if these guys and gals writing for Trek have yachts with helicopter landing pads...

(I know it's not Tom Clancy-level of money, but I do hope it's enough to let you guys do it full-time and not have your creativity stifled by working for others than your own self. I can't imagine you sitting in an office cubicle and having a great story idea and trying to jot it down before it goes away, all the while as the drone at the next desk yammers away at you about his golf game or how poorly Cleveland's doing in the NFL...)

 

[Greg Cox]

As always, it's a juggling act: I write tie-ins, I'm a consulting editor for Tor, and I write a fair amount of cover copy for Tor and other publishers.

 

[Jim Johnson]

My day job involves business writing and editing. I write fiction on the side and also freelance write and edit. Most of my freelance time over the last two years has been working on Modiphius's Star Trek Adventures RPG, which has kept me busy enough to not take on other freelance work aside from my fiction writing business. Like Greg said, it's a balancing act.

 

[Lonemagpie]

I'm Self-unemployed.

Well, or editing military history books and stuff.

 

[Butters]

There’s a successful author driving our local bus.

I don’t write for a living, that’s just the dream, but you’d could do a lot worse than a public sector non-job for getting words on the page.

 

[David cgc]

Dayton's talked in his blog about getting a new day job recently after fiction-writing full-time for a few years. Some sort of technical or industry-specialist writing and editing, though he's been understandably nonspecific.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

public sector non-job

Is that some kind of anti-civil-servant crack? Because I've been a civil servant (four temporary assignments, doing three different jobs, for two different school districts), and my father spent a quarter of a century as a civil servant (worked his way up from line plumber to plumbing technical supervisor of a large metropolitan school district), and I know from experience that, at least in the school districts, civil servants work their butts off. Often for much less than they'd get doing the same job for a for-profit corporation.

 

[Butters]

Is that some kind of anti-civil-servant crack? Because I've been a civil servant (four temporary assignments, doing three different jobs, for two different school districts), and my father spent a quarter of a century as a civil servant (worked his way up from line plumber to plumbing technical supervisor of a large metropolitan school district), and I know from experience that, at least in the school districts, civil servants work their butts off. Often for much less than they'd get doing the same job for a for-profit corporation.

Not a crack at the civil service. More directed at mismanaged multi billion pound IT projects.

My experience in the public sector brought me in to contact with both the underpaid overworked angels making the best of their lot in matters of life and death, and the overpaid paperweights sitting out the days to their well funded early retirement, and everyone one in between. I see the value in the public sector, but my cynicism is hard earned and deep ingrained.

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

Fair enough. But there are plenty of people in the private sector who make fortunes without doing a lick of productive work, their entire lives. One of them went on to get himself elected POTUS. (Call me a Pollyanna-ish optimist, but I haven't ruled out the possibility that what one humorist called "our first openly asshole President" is intentionally trying to get himself impeached, convicted, and run out of town on a rail. Intentional or not, that's one of the few things he's doing a good job at.)

 

[T'Bonz]

How 'bout leaving the politics out of here, OK? Bad enough I have to read about it everywhere else. This isn't the place for it.

 

[Tim Thomason]

It would be neat, though, if a higher-up political figure wrote Star Trek fiction.

Newt Gingrich has written some historical fiction, and has had an interest in space affairs. I wonder if he ever expressed interest in Star Trek.

Barack Obama is a Star Trek fan, and has written award-winning non-fiction. I don't think he has expressed any interest in writing fiction.

Gary Hart, who ran for President in the '80s, has written five novels, some under a pseudonym. But none in the science-fiction or licensed genres.

Any figure of their calibre would probably have an easy time getting published, although they would take alot of flack from the media and internet for working out of their wheelhouse. It would probably be treated by fans as well and binding as the Shatnerverse novels (which were at least ghostwritten by accomplished Star Trek writers).

 

[marlboro]

If only Calvin Coolidge were alive today to write the definitive Morn biography.

 

[rahullak]

Shortest biography in history: "Morn talks too much."

 

[DrCorby]

It would be neat, though, if a higher-up political figure wrote Star Trek fiction.

Newt Gingrich has written some historical fiction, and has had an interest in space affairs. I wonder if he ever expressed interest in Star Trek.

Gingrich has frequently cowritten with Willam R Forstchen, a mixture of historical and alternate history novels. Forstchen, probably best known for his novel One Second After (about the aftermath of a terrorist EMP strike that shuts down much of America's electronic technology), has also written some media tie-in fiction, including The Forgotten War (TNG), as well as novels from Wing Commander and a Riftwar book w/ Raymond Feist and a smattering of his own SF and fantasy stuff. So that's an interesting Star Trek connection, if somewhat tenuous.