I came accross this site looking for information about submitting articles to magazines. I remember the "Writer's Market" used to the be source before the internet and I see it's a paid service now. But I also wonder if any of you recommend sites similar to this one, (and like "The Writer's Market"), that might be geard toward non-fiction writers too?
As I blaze through my middles age I had an epothony of sorts; struck with the reality that I didn't want to "read books" as much as I want to "have read books". And sadly the same goes for writing! But there may be hope for me yet :)
By chance I went to finish my degree 18 years after starting and took a upper-division non-fiction writing class at a local college. It was taught by Mike Mallowe, an editor for Philadelphia Magazine for 22 years. Never had I seen a teacher more passionate or skilled in what they were teaching! I had no inclination to write non-fiction, but like a great documentary about a subject you don't care about, you aquire knowlege and find inspiration. Another 15 years later now and I find I have things to write about!
The competition I assume is termendous these days. I once heard somone say that "the price of music is heading toward zero", basically saying with the amount of talent and the ability to self produce means so much is going for free that it's almost imposible to make money selling. I'm not sure how true that is, but I imagine writing for 'money' is just as competive.
Money would be great, but I'm a long way from that, and frankly I feel the urge to write whether it pays or not. In 2015 I traveled for five months living in a van. Using a app called Voxer I would spend anywhere from few minutes to an hour a day recording messages to my buddy, telling him about my travels and thoughts; the people I met, etc... It helped keep me alert and took away some of the loniness, it was basically a personal podcast. I couldnt' imagine that my buddy would actually listen to it all, but he did. He's a big fan of books on tape which he'd listen to while commuting, and he told me he'd often pause whatever book he was on in favor of hearing my latest news.
I've often thought that if I just spent five mintues a day writing I'd have a few books finished by now! Finally I have things to write about so hopefully I can move from that idea of wanting to "have written" to actually writing something!
Non-fiction talk aside, I'm also a songwriter and often have ideas for fiction as well.
I started a blog if anyone would like to check it out. It's mainly explortory fluff about mountain biking. The more formal 'articles' I've been working on are not yet published. http://jktrain.com