Jaka TomcPeople used to ask me if I was making money selling my books. And I always told them it’s not about the money, it’s about passion. Well … I still have a strong passion for writing, but I had to accept the fact that if I want to make a living by selling books, I have to change something.
“Maybe you just don’t have what it takes to be a writer,” some people would say. Not to my face of course.
If I measure success by the awards I’ve received then I don’t. I should stick to my job, forget about books and live an ordinary life.
But if I look at the numbers, then I must be doing something right. I’ve sold more that 2000 copies of my books. Add another 1300 copies that were borrowed from libraries. Another 2000 were downloaded. And we’re talking about a very small Slovenian market.
So I’ve got thousands of reasons to believe I’m a writer.
But that’s not enough. As I said at the beginning, I want to make a living as a writer. The choice was obvious. I had to translate one of my books and offer it to readers worldwide. And I did.
Will it be a bestseller? I don’t know.
Will I sell enough to cover my costs? Probably.
Will I give up if I don’t make it? Absolutely not.
It’s still about passion, I will never lose it. But I want to take the next step and make a living out of writing. Because that’s what I love to do. To do what you love (and love what you do) is the foundation. Only then can you build a beautiful house on top of it.
