Why Do You Write?

No, seriously. I'm asking.

I’ve been watching Rooster, the new HBO Max show where Steve Carell plays a bestselling beach-read author who is, to put it gently, a complete walking disaster. The show gets funnier as it goes along. Stick with it past the first couple of episodes.

But there’s a scene early on where his writing class gets into the question. You know the one. It’s the big one. The one that is maybe the whole game.

Why do you write?

The answers the students provide are heartfelt and a little uncomfortable, which mirrors real life. We all have a deep down reason. But anyway, I can’t stop thinking about it.

The Chaos Is Loud Right Now

If you’ve been reading this newsletter for any amount of time, you know I spend a lot of words on the state of the publishing industry. AI filtering submissions. Four million books published in a single year. Harlequin turning romance novels into AI-animated TikToks nobody asked for. Sales records that follow you like a credit score. Algorithms that reward the familiar and punish the weird.

It’s like a fire hose these days. Publishing is in the throes of what feels like paradigm shifting change.

It’s exhausting. I talk to writers every week who are tired of the noise, the sense of the ground shifting every time they get their footing. They’re asking if any of it is worth the effort.

I get it. I really do.

Go Back to the Question

So, let’s go back to the question. When everything feels like insanity, I think the most useful thing you can do is sit with the why.

Don’t fall into the surface answers like how you want to be published by a big traditional publisher or you want an agent or the details of your future writing career. These are all fine goals but go deeper. Peel back the layers the way you would revealing a character on the page. Get down to the pulsing heart of the thing.

Maybe you write because something happened to you and you have not found another way to make sense of it. Maybe you write because you’ve had a story rattling around your skull for twenty years and it won’t leave you alone. Maybe you write because when it’s going well, really well, you lose track of time and forget to eat lunch and suddenly it’s dark outside and you didn’t notice and what a rush it is to be in the zone. Maybe there’s pain inside you that’s better on the outside, held on the page. Maybe the characters on the page are the people you wish you could be. Maybe it’s your escape, you working meditation, your happy place.

Whatever your answer is, write it down. Keep it somewhere. Tape it to your monitor. Stick it in a drawer and pull it out when you need it.

Because you will need it.

Use It Like Armor

Publishing will keep doing what publishing does. There will be more noise and I’ll keep writing about all of it because I think you deserve to know what you’re dealing with.

But your answer to why is the thing that doesn’t change. It is part of you, regardless of what happens in the outside world. Think of it as a mantra. A layer of protection between you and the chaos. The industry can make you doubt your strategy, your timing, your genre, your platform. But the reason you sat down and started putting words on a page in the first place? That belongs to you. The industry doesn’t get a vote.

So I’ll Ask You

Why do you write?

I mean it. Hit reply. Tell me. I read every single one.

And the next time it’s just too f*&@ing loud, go back to your answer. It will still be there.

---

🎙️ On the Writers With Wrinkles Podcast: We’re talking about the massive shifts in the publishing industry these days. Join us for the fun.

📚 Reading: Beautiful Ugly. by Alice Feeney. I’m not sure I’m buying what she’s selling in this one but we’ll see.

📺 Watching: Rooster. Obviously. :)

🛠️ Book Coaching: I’m opening for a few clients in April. Let’s talk.