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Writing What Moves You Vs Writing To The Market
Spoiler alert: The Market is a fickle place.
My first love as a writer has always been science fiction and fantasy. As a kid, the first stories I wrote were sci-fi (a 50-page, illustrated book at age 9, a typed, 36-page book at age 12 or 13). The first full-length novel I completed was high fantasy.
Over the years, I’ve dabbled in other formats. This and the other blogs I write make up the majority of these. Still, I’ve considered working in and with other genres for different reasons.
Even within sci-fi and fantasy, there are a ton of subgenres. Sci-fi breaks down into hard sci-fi, sci-fantasy, sci-fi romance, crime sci-fi, and more. Fantasy also breaks down into various subgenres, like romantasy, dark fantasy, high fantasy, urban fantasy, and so on.
One of the reasons for the acknowledgment of subgenres is to understand how to market them. Readers of romantasy, for example, might not be into an epic high fantasy, just like sci-fantasy fans might find hard sci-fi too intense and literal. Beyond that, however, various subgenres tend to heat up and draw audiences along the way.
Because of this and other factors, a writer might consider writing to market. There are, however, a lot of things to take into consideration along that line.
Today’s hot market is tomorrow’s frozen wasteland
The first consideration one must make for writing to market is the state of the market. Trends in every way come and go. This is true not just of book genres, but fashion, art, diets, celebrities, and more. In the digital age of instant gratification and global reach, hot and cold will shift swiftly.
Maybe vampire romantasy is on fire today. If you start writing a novel in this specific subgenre, you might be able to tag onto that. However, even if you can bang out a whole novel and do all the editing, art, and such in a month, you might miss the trend. The hot market can cool off that fast. Sometimes faster.
People try to predict what will be hot. Trendsetters are always looking for the next big thing. The problem is, the market is utterly fickle. Hence, even if you get it right, that might last such a short amount of time that only a very select few manage to profit from it.
But that’s not necessarily the biggest problem with writing to the market. The problem is the question of whether or not what you’re writing speaks to you. Do you love the work? Are you enthusiastic to create it? Does the writing make you happy, draw you into the void, bring you contentment? This is important because readers know when you’re not writing from a genuine place.
The term for someone who cares only about profit and writing to market is a hack. A hack is only looking for what pays, not art that moves them. And that isn’t sustainable.
If, however, writing what moves you is writing to the market, then more power to you. Just recognize that the market is fickle and change is almost constant for what’s hot versus what’s not.
Writing what moves you matters
Why do I write sci-fi and fantasy? Because I love the escapism these offer. From alternative versions of reality steeped in mythology to potential futures of exploration and growth, these genres are wide-open realms of creativity.
I think my love for Star Wars encapsulates this well. Not simply sci-fi, sci-fantasy. Space wizards and laser swords coupled with epic space battles, starships, and lasers in a diverse galaxy far, far away. I spent hours as a kid in the backyard with my action figures, playsets, and vehicles, inventing new adventures before I began creating my own stories with original characters of my imagination.
Sci-fi and fantasy move me. And I write stories in these genres because that’s what brings me joy. I’m in the middle of creating a new series now, and also beginning to develop a couple of other ideas for the future.
Writing what moves you matters because your creativity is most important. There is passion in art. That passion drives its creation and that, in turn, inspires the viewer/reader/patron. When it comes to writing, if you write from your heart, writing what moves you is the reason to do it at all.
Writing to market can be writing what moves you. How do you know? If you write to the market and feel it crushing your soul, are lackluster toward the process, and get hyper-focused on how it can make you money, you’re not writing what moves you.
What makes a person a hack? Not giving a fuck about being moved as a writer. Doing the work because you think it’s how you can get paid. Using Generative AI for the actual writing and not just research and marketing.
AI and writing to the market
Using AI to write a story is the most disingenuous thing you can do and hurts the market in the end. Why? Because the creative force must remain human. We are the storytellers. If we stop imagining, if we let the artificial machines tell the stories, we kill ourselves, our society, our potential, and possibility. I know that’s harsh, but look at how AI is already causing infrastructure issues and generating fakes – and this is just large language models, not true artificial intelligence.
I’m not utterly anti-AI. It’s a tool that can do some super-useful things. Unfortunately, it’s an easily abused tool that people are exploiting without recognizing the consequences. As a writer, you can utilize AI for research and marketing assistance. But you need to remain the writing tool. The story, the ideas, must remain human.
Writing to market by abusing generative AI is the very definition of a hack. And I, for one, have zero respect for that and how it hurts the market, as well as the creative process. If you need generative AI to write a story, you’re not a writer, not writing what moves you, and you are negatively impacting the future for everyone.
No, I am not pulling punches on this topic. We can’t make AI go away, but we sure as hell can guide its use and clamp down on its abuse. Please consider that when and if you use these tools.
The point of being a writer is writing what moves you
Ultimately, I’d love to be a bestselling author. But what I’m really focusing on is generating new, imaginative works that draw more readers and make my sales capable of sustaining me. Collecting most of my pay via writing would be ideal.
It’s a long road. I know that my backlist could still gain attention and make sales rise. Maybe my next idea will hit the market at just the right time and sell at the levels I seek. But writing to market, the ever-changing, always shifting, fickle market, is unsustainable. Writing what moves me is the goal.
I also believe that putting imaginative ideas into the world expands the potential, possibilities, and creativity further. As some shrink and withdraw from fear of change, it’s up to creatives like writers, painters, singers, and the like, to keep building. Imagination is not limited to the arts and artists. Everyone can imagine. But some need guidance and the imagination of others to make better use of that.
I’m writing what moves me rather than writing to the market because that’s the point of being a writer. Creating something imaginative that could inspire others in lots of different ways.
Thanks for reading. As I share my creative journey with you every week, please consider this: How are you inspired and empowered to be your own authentic creator, whatever form that takes?
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