I don’t yet have a copy in my hot little hands, but Shannon Okey’s Alt Fiber
I also just wrote a chapter on knitting for pets in a knitting encyclopedia book.
I feel weird about this craft writing thing. While I love crafts & writing about crafts, I don’t know that it’s quite my niche, but sorting out my niche is too scary. I’ve only done the one book, and its sales were pretty lackluster despite the awesome early press I got (I blame their decision to make it softcover instead of the original hardcover plan–much of its appeal is for non-knitters, but they’re not going to buy a $20 paperback).
Really, I think the problem is that I’m just not driven overall. Well, I’m driven (in a manic, obsessive sort of way), but not ambitious. To make money, to make a name, you have to actually want fame and fortune. And while I think fame and fortune (especially fortune; fame’s less appealing) would be a dreamy side effect, I’m not really enthusiastic about either one. I really admire people who are casually confident and self-promotional. I’m pretty fucking sure of my actual abilities, but I’m shitty at broadcasting that. I’m not confident enough to spread my own word for more than a few minutes without backing down and getting all aw-shucksy. Braggarts make me cringe, so I get all nervous I’m going to look like an asshole when I step into braggart territory. But that’s kind of where you need to live unless you’re just really, really lucky and fall ass-backwards into something. I kind of fell ass-backwards into my brief, nerdly, and miniature fame and fortune with early Disgruntled Housewife. I think that was my one little lucky break, but that’s ancient history.
Weird.
I should go do something productive. All this introspection is making me peevish.
Niches are inherently weird…I get where you’re coming from with this, for sure. And btw, this remains one of my favoritest patterns in the book — looks so awesome on Nat from CRAFT, who modeled it. I didn’t know you were writing a chapter for (what I presume is the same book)…cool!
Your introspection really resonated with me. I’m much happier doing things “behind the scenes;” I’d rather be painting sets than performing onstage. I’ve been doing a lot of similar introspection lately while I do some physical rest and recovery from crafting about how much I love things about what I do, but feel so awkward about doing the things I’m supposed to do as an independent business owner…like self-promotion.
Thanks for posting your thoughts!
m.k.
And, see, from over here I’m going, how can I make myself more successful with this stuff, like Nikol? (no, really). You seem like you’ve always got stuff on the go. The self promotion part is really, really hard. Insurmountably hard, it seems.