Squidsquatch. A new interview (almost) every day. A single question. The subject one day becomes interviewer the next.

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Jonathan Strahan: Your first story was published in 1977, thirty years ago. You’ve had short fiction, collections, and novels published here in Australia, in the US, and elsewhere. Given all of your experience, what do you think it takes for a writer to build a career? Has science fiction, fantasy, and horror publishing changed a lot during your career? And, how does that affect someone starting out today?

Stephen Dedman: Firstly, this depends on your definition of a career. If you mean ‘a living’, then he or she needs to be able to write something that people will want to read, and that at least one publisher will believe that enough people will want to read to make it viable - and to get it to said publisher at the right time. If he/she has no independent income, he/she also needs to do this at a rate that will keep himself/herself alive between cheques - the larger the cheques, of course, the longer he/she can take to write the next thing. There’s a formula I use: E = mc%. E is for ‘Earnings’; m is the minimum number of words you can write every day (alternatively, M=1,000, which is my usual quota); c is the cents per word you get, on average, for the work you sell; % is the percentage of work you sell. If you can fill in all those variables and come up with a living wage, fantastic. If not, don’t quit your day job.

Of course, that’s about as helpful as the Monty Python sketch where they taught you how to play the flute: “You blow there and move your fingers up and down here.” And it comes more from my experience as a bookseller who writes, rather than a writer whose books sell (I wish they did sell well enough that I didn’t have to do anything but write, but they haven’t).

If, however, by ‘career’ you mean continuing to write and publish professionally or semi-professionally over 30 years, then all I can recommend is that you write what you would want to read; write as much as you can as well as you can, and as Hemingway said, some days you may write better than you can. I’d advise against trying to deliberately write crap just because you think that some people will buy it: you might succeed, but I suspect you’ll be facing even more competition than if you were trying to write purely for the pleasure.

Has science fiction, fantasy, and horror publishing changed a lot during your career? And, how does that affect someone starting out today?

Yes. Fantasy publishing has certainly increased, and that’s in number of titles, not just the number of words. Science fiction… I don’t have figures to hand, but while Australian publishers seem to have pretty much given up on it in favour of fantasy, US and British publishers haven’t. Horror has always been a bit player, except of course for Stephen King and a few others.

I’ve been doing this for long enough that I regard the situation with local market and short fiction markets as being rather like Melbourne weather: if you don’t like it, then wait a little while and it will change. When I started writing, there were no paying markets for sf in Australia. They flourished briefly in the mid-80s, then there was two years of nothing again, then Aurealis and Eidolon appeared… Some of the best paying short fiction markets have disappeared since I started, and until Cosmos appeared, no 21st century Australian sf market paid even as well as Aphelion had done 20 years before: most still don’t.

Obviously, the more short story markets there are, then the easier it is for writers to break into the field - especially if most of them pay so poorly that the professionals don’t bother submitting to them. Of course, it’s possible we may go through another slump like that at the end of the 80s, and it may last even longer… OTOH, webzines will probably continue to publish some fiction, though whether they will pay, or attract readers, remains to be seen. But I’m not going to try to predict the future. What do you think I am, a science fiction writer?

Addendum: I just received this Dorothy Parker quote from Writer’s Lifeline: “If you’re going to write, don’t pretend to write down. It’s going to be the best you can do, and it’s the fact that it’s the best you can do that kills you.” She said it better than I could, and said it first, but no great surprise there.

Stephen Dedman is best known for his subtle emotional horror stories, but he has published in a broad range of genres to widespread acclaim, currently co-edits Borderlands, and has served on professional committees and judging panels. He has an employment history that is even more baroque than usual for a writer, including being “an experimental subject and a used dinosaur parts salesman” and currently sells books at Fantastic Planet in Perth. He describes himself as “author of four novels, a non-fiction book and more than 100 short stories, plus reviews, role-playing games, stageplays, essays and editorials. Most of the fiction I’ve written has been speculative, fantastic, or just plain weird, but I’ve also written thrillers, erotica, and westerns. Sometimes all at the same time.” Here is Stephen’s LiveJournal.