Some Grumpy Musing

Do you ever feel like your writing is taking second place to your salesmanship? I'm being serious here. More and more I see writers standing on the Internet corners hawking their wares and personally, it makes me sad. I know we all have to let readers know what's out there, but when does it hit the point of too much? When will it become more about the actual story and less about the person who wrote it? Are we writers so entangled in our words that there is no separation of story and writer? Do we all need to walk around with some sort of brand on our ass and a price tag on our forehead just to get people to read our work?

Yeah, I'm a little grumpy today. The reason? No one wants to discuss writing or markets or that amazing story they found. They remind me of the hucksters at the sale barn when I was a child. "Buy my peaches, buy my apples, buy my book."

And I wonder, is that what I'll become if I write a novel or manage to sell a collection of shorts? And the bigger question, is that what I really want?