How I made money as an author in 2022/23
I made a chart and everything!
Welcome to the first issue of Life Beyond the Page!
The point of this newsletter is to inspire and help people to live a more creative life. But you can't do that without money.
Inspired by Keris Stainton’s brilliant Substack, The Ladybird Purse, I want to be more honest about money. That doesn’t mean I’ll be sharing my income with you (sorry, but the thought of that makes me feel icky), but I will share the breakdown in the hopes that it sheds a little light on how creatives are surviving.
I’m sure I don’t need to repeat the frankly hopeless stats about author income. Needless to say, the majority of us are far from wealthy. Most of us have multiple sources of income in order to keep afloat; doing what we love comes at a cost.
Anyway, I don’t want this to descend into doom and gloom. Especially because I am thrilled with how my career is going. If you told 2017 Alex that six years later, she’d have published four books and had another three on the way, she’d be over the moon. I remind myself of this when my income is frustratingly inconsistent or I have to pay HMRC an eye-watering amount of tax due to payment on account.
If you want to be a full-time creative, don’t be disheartened. You can make it work, but it will take some juggling.
As you can see from my chart (I’m making the most of my Canva free trial, okay?), only half of my income comes from my book advances. The rest is from a mix of book-related opportunities and social media freelancing:
This is my income before tax and expenses such as agent deductions. About 30% of everything I earn goes into a savings account which I never, ever, acknowledge. I tend to over-save for tax and National Insurance because I’d rather be safe than sorry.
Advances (53%)
I earned advances for three different projects last tax year: one middle-grade novel, one YA novel (out next month - pre-order!) and one secret project which I still can’t talk about publicly. My first book came out in 2019, but I think this is the first year that book advances made up the majority of my income.
I’m quite proud of that.
School Visits (26%)
If you are a teacher or librarian who has hired me for a school visit, then THANK YOU. I won’t pretend that they aren’t exhausting (not the kids, but the travelling, organising and early starts) but I love every minute of them. And this year, they made up a sizeable chunk of my income.
I am extremely proactive about finding school visits. If you’re an author who wants advice on organising them then I’ll cover this in a future issue. Hope you like spreadsheets.
Social Media (10%)
Before I was an author, I was a social media manager working in advertising agencies. Freelancing for the last few years has absolutely kept me afloat. This year, thanks to higher-than-usual earnings the year before, I didn’t have to take on as much freelance work.
Events (5%) and Mentoring (2%)
Pretty self-explanatory. Did some events and helped some writers.
Sensitivity Reads (2%)
I don’t do these any more as they are so time-consuming relative to the fees publishers pay.
Interviews and Panels (1%) and Royalties (1%)
A couple of publications paid me for my time when interviewing me, which was a nice surprise. And by royalties I mean ALCS and PLR, so technically not royalties, but it’s a small fee authors get when our work is reproduced or our books loaned at public libraries.
Did you find this post useful? I’d love to know what you thought, or if there’s anything else about author life you’d like me to cover. I want this newsletter to be as useful as possible!