Why We Should Give Authors All The Love

I freaking love authors.

Authors really should be appreciated- and they are appreciated.*

Because let’s face it, being an author is hard. Probably. I don’t know, since I’m not an author. BUT I WANT TO BE. I also want to be a dragon, a book shaped cake, a bookshelf live-in-er, a Totoro, and a really happy dog. But author is higher on the list.

But authors have to actually write books- and they publish them!** And publishing books is hard! And it can take 10 years!

Also um… all of those shows that have kids finishing books and publishing them really easily… ARE LIES. YOUR CHILDHOOD IS A LIE.

*I mean, a lot of people agree that there can be a power imbalance between authors and reviewers and that sometimes authors can harass reviewers. WHICH IS TOTALLY NOT OKAY. But I’m talking about cool authors *finger guns*.

**But I also DO think that we should stop acting like authors are a gift from nature or something. They’re potatoes humans, too.***

***UM AM I JUST TRYING TO DISPROVE MYSELF RIGHT NOW.

They Are Nice Humans

Of course, this is assuming that they are humans and not just sentient potatoes.

Hey, I’ve talked to authors. On Twitter. But THAT STILL COUNTS, ok? I’ve tweeted them and like 80% of them replied! Darn the other 20%. (Just kidding. I still love you. Maybe.)

For example: Once I tweeted Leigh Bardugo as one of the people that I wanted to meet and she replied. REPLIED. AHHHHHHH.

Okay, let’s move on from my creepy fangirling.

Authors are kind and they will (usually) reply to your tweets if you tweet them, which is obviously awesome.

*whispers* Sometimes authors reply to my tweet and I feel famous by proxy.

Also, they’re usually super kind to people if they ask for help about writing/their books/otherwise!

Writing is Hard

Authors put so so so so much effort into pleasing readers and putting their best work out there. For example, diverse characters. Authors, of course, have to research in order to represent them correctly. And they also have to research to get historical facts correct. And they also research for… other stuff. #IAmGettingIntoTheSpecifics

And I don’t know if you know, but WRITING IS HARD. It can take up to several years to write a book, encompassing the actual writing, revising, editing, querying, doing more edits, and so on.

Is this gif from a certain show/movie? I WANT TO WATCH IT. (I just stole this gif from the internet.)

Being An Author is Hard

Authors also deal with negative reviews. And being a writer of negative reviews myself, it can be hard to deal with the fact that not everyone likes your book.

But of course, for all authors, it’s pretty much a given that at least 10% of the population won’t like your book. Unless the author is a writing magician that makes everyone fall in love with their book. If so, tell me who they are and I shall force kindly ask them to TEACH ME THEIR WAYS.

Another hard part of being an author is that they’re expected to come up with more ideas. For more books. And be creative. 

CREATIVITY IS HARD WHEN THERE A TON OF OTHER BOOKS OUT THERE. You cannot have a 100% original plot when there are 8 billion people on the Earth.

Promoting Your Book Can Be Difficult

I feel like promoting your book can be really hard, especially if you’re a POC author or EVEN MORE if you’re self-publishing!

I feel guilty, because… I hardly read self-published books?? BUT THEY DESERVE MORE HYPE if you have any recommendations just throw them at me please?

Anyways, promoting books definitely can be hard- and even if you ARE traditionally published, promoting your book can still be really hard.

Hype for a book does a lot. I feel like the hype and preorders of a book really determine the success of that particular book, and it’s really sad that some good books that weren’t as hyped aren’t noticed as much.

Obviously, this doesn’t mean that authors should shove their books into book reviewers’ faces randomly, but it’s fine to promote your book and approaching reviewers IS fine if you do it kindly. (So, don’t comment on one of my posts saying, “Great post. Check out my book.” because obviously that means that you don’t actually care about my posts??)

Writing is Hard To Make A Career Out Of

Can we talk about all the unpublished authors? Because there are tons out there, querying and querying and not getting accepted by a publisher.

It’s also really hard to score a six/five-figure deal with a big publisher, okay? Even more popular authors often don’t make that much money, unlike what you might expect. A lot of authors are struggling to make ends meet, in fact.*

And anyways, us readers are really fickle and picky/choosy with what we like. Something an author poured their heart into could seem boring to a reader, or a certain clever pieces of a book could seem stupid to a reader.

THE BOOK INDUSTRY IS HARD OKAY.

*According to an author I know from Twitter. Obviously the Internet is trustworthy???

Authors Are Humans

Authors are sentient potatoes humans too. And no matter what, they deserve basic respect and love.

me at all the authors

Also, random announcement to up my word count, I’m doing NanoWrimo in November! Are any of you guys doing it? Here’s the link to my profile if any of you want to add me.

I mean… I’m probably not going to reach 50K words but I haven’t done much writing lately so I REALLY WANT TO WRITE MORE. (That’s why I haven’t done any writing updates recently, by the way! There’s nothing to update on, okay? YOU’RE NOT MISSING OUT.)

What are some other reasons we appreciate authors? What have YOU done to appreciate your authors? Are you a sentient potato or a human? Is there even a difference between sentient potatoes and humans?

STOP TALKING ABOUT POTATOES JULIANNA.