I want ..

Jenny

Jenny

I want to write a best selling novel that will make me rich and famous without any effort on my part! Can Talkbackers help?!!

Sylvia

I'll help you, Jenny. I'll rattle one of for you tonight instead of going to bingo.

Flick

Change your name and call yourself something like Liz Hurley or Naomi Campbell. Won't matter what you write then because by the time they find out you're really a gorgeous blonde/brunette/grey haired lady from Chipping Sodbury/Grassington/East Keswick - we'll be hooked.

Jenny

Or I could change my name to Lee or Deadly Whatnot!

Flick

You know, you've got the beginnings of an idea here. I know the jokers on the forum are writing the new James Bond book, but we could do something more serious. Produce x number of words each and then crit the whole chapter. Of course by the time we'd decided what we wanted to write and what to call our characters none of us would be speaking but hey - just like home for me!

Jenny

Flick - that would be quite a challenge, but there's no harm in having a go - if a few people are willing.

Stan2

My name's Stan, not willing. Where does he or she live?

sal

No problem.  Become a celeb by appearing on some mindless reality tv show, be seen topless in M&S with some spike haired youth called Jason.

Island Girl

So what happened, Jenny? Did you ever get it started?

Isabella King

Sorry to hijack this thread but Jenny's question made me think...

What would Talkbackers rather be - rich or famous?

Stirling

Famous for my research papers and writing challenging novels that make people think (not necessarily bestsellers).  With enough money to live on comfortably, without worrying how to pay the mortgage.  I don't need to be a bestseller or rich to consider myself successful.

Jenny

IG - I'm trying to think of a good excuse for not having started it! I'm also wondering why last August I wrote "Or I could change my name to Lee or Deadly Whatnot". What did I mean?!!!

I don't think I'd like to be recognisable-by-strangers famous, so maybe rich is better!

(My husband's working at home this morning and he's just joined a conference call with the phone on hands-free. I can hear what everyone's saying - including one woman who apologised because she had "a mouthful of food"!! Presumably trying to get in a quick snack before the call started!)

richt

Jenny, I agree. Rich I could handle, but 'famous' carries both obligations and lots of inconveniences.
Rich, please!

Clarissa

And what about rich AND famous? Not for me when I read what those who are both rich and famous have to go through. J.K.Rowling had to go to court because a papparazzi took a photo of her toddler without her permission. Princess Di, Kate Moss, even Elizabeth Taylor who is no longer in the limelight cannot get out without being pestered.
My personal ideal? A life like Salinger, he of 'Catcher in the Rye' fame or Thomas Pynchon ( whose books I don't particularly care for). Be able to earn a decent living with my writing and stay invisible. No media, no limelight, no promotion with interviews on TV, radio etc. Practically impossible, I know. Just getting published is tough enough, then having a success is tougher still. Without media attention an even greater pipe dream!

josiehenley

I’d like to be a famous name in literary circles but not necessarily a recognised face on the street. I’d like to be rich but that my riches were distinct from my writing, i.e. that I won the lottery or something. If the riches came with a huge book deal then I’d be contracted to do whatever it took to get my book noticed, and I’d be forced to write in a certain way etc. it would make my writing become a job just like any other job rather than the thing I want to do. I’m quite happy to see writing as a job or career but I don’t want a boss!

As for writing the bestselling novel. I suggest that you talk into a Dictaphone and get someone to transcribe it for you, then have a boob job and call yourself Jordan. That’ll do it.

Jenny

I suppose if anyone became rich and famous and didn't want to be recognised in public they could always wear a mask when they went out. Imagine all those Donald Ducks walking around!!

Crazy Horse

Some talkbackers will find this reference to RICH & famous strange. if one has been successful in life it is difficul to understand the obsession with being rich.. I would not class myself as rich but I have much more than enough for anything I will ever want, so what!. Nearly everything I realy want has nothng to do with money. I sometimes think it would be fun to be hard up and only have finance to worry over. Lose the only one who matters and money has as much relevance as dust in outerspace

Stan2

'Lose the only one who matters and money has as much relevance as dust in outerspace' - well said,CH. 

josiehenley

Lose the only one that matters… hmm, there is that. But at the moment it feels like I’m not spending enough time with the only one that matters because we’re both busy trying to make enough money to make ends meet, and the time we do spend together we get stressed about money. It would be good to be able to be rich enough not to have to work at things that we don’t want to work at and devote our time instead to the things that we want to do – i.e. writing – and also be together. I know it’s probably too much to ask but this was a fantasy thread, wasn’t it?

Isabella King

I agree with everything you said, Josie, so loved ones will have to be taken out of this equation as it goes without saying that health and happiness come before everything else. But I would love to have enough money to allow my husband to give up the job he hates.

Anyone who would continue living the exact same way after a lottery win, for instance, is an exceptionally fortunate person.

Would I continue writing if I was a millionaire?

Yes, I would. I love creating sentences that trip off the tongue like poetry and winding my way through the maze of a story line in an attempt to pull it all together. I even enjoy pulling out threads that don't work or embedding new ones that necessitate a virtual re-write. And making that final read through...well, that must be a bit like an artist deciding not to add another brush stroke to his masterpiece.

Jenny

I hope newcomers to this thread realise my original post was only a joke!

Island Girl

Hehehe

josiehenley

Yes I think we do Jenny!

I agree, if I was a millionaire or billionaire, I’d still be writing. But maybe I wouldn’t be writing programmes to send out automated emails! I’d instead write the things that I want to write and not care whether they are publishable or just for me. Maybe that’s how it should be now for me? That’s how it used to be, but lately I’ve been thinking specifically about the market rather than myself, simply because literature has become user-driven like everything else now.

I wonder if it’s the same for JK Rowling, having heard that she’s continuing to write. Will she be writing for fans or for herself?

Isabella King

Jenny, it wasn't one of those posts you were glad to see drop off the end of the page, was it?

If it was, I'd like to point out that it wasn't me who resurrected it...but I know who it was.