Freelancing to Freedom

As I think I mentioned in an earlier post, fiction is my passion. Throughout my childhood and teenage years, while my friends were having fun and not being complete nerds, I had my nose in a fiction book. And I’m proud to be a nerd, by the way. My ultimate goal as a freelancer is to do contract work for some of the top Canadian fiction publishers. However, as a new freelancer, most of my work is non-fiction, and it pays the bills. I have received several emails from aspiring fiction authors and eagerly devoured the sample work they’ve sent me, but as unpublished authors, most of them cannot afford to pay what the non-fiction clients can.

The dilemma is this: Do I spend the time building relationships with fiction authors now, even if it means eating mac and cheese every night? Or continue taking non-fiction jobs to steadily build my portfolio and get my name out there? It seems most logical to continue taking work from non-fiction clients and do the occasional fiction project on the side, even if it means working much longer hours. I know that the extra time spent now will pay off in the years to come.

Oh, and for the record, I do have a second job as a server, so the whole mac and cheese thing is a bit of an exaggeration. I like sounding like a starving artist though.

Cheers!