I’m going to take a cue from author Jim C. Hines and post my 2015 earnings income from my writing here. In part, because I really like the way he shows his earnings trend, and in part because I personally found it very reassuring and motivational. He’s been tracking his income from nothing (in 2002) to a very successful level. And although Jim is a traditionally-published fantasy author, he has also begun indie publishing some of his own work. Check out his Amazon author page here.
I also follow successful indie authors I know, like Anthea Sharp, Annie Bellet, JC Andrijeski and others, trying to emulate their success. All are USA Today best-selling authors. I’ve met these women, I admire their talent, and buy (and read) their books.
While I’m not a USA Today bestseller (yet!) or even paying all my bills with my writing, 2015 seems to mark the beginning of a positive upswing, which i’m hoping will be helpful to others. By the way, none of these charts reflect the $5K winnings I received by winning the Writers of the Future Golden Pen Grand Prize. Since that is a (large and) once-in-a-lifetime sort of thing, I didn’t want it to skew the data.
I was paid (pro rates) for three stories I wrote this year–one of which was was my novella, Stars That Make Dark Heaven Light. At six cents a word, the novella length really helped to boost my income. And although it doesn’t look like much, that 5% revenue stream from my “Indie Published Titles” was largely earned in the last quarter of the year.
I believe 2016 will be even better.
