Joe Kolbek asked T.A. Uner:

Has writing been lucrative for you? A rather personal, but, I feel, viable question.

T.A. Uner Well it depends how you measure "lucrative". I feel that I've met a lot of great folks here, and made some awesome friends on Goodreads. So it has been lucrative from that standpoint.

From a monetary standpoint I believe that if a writer is seeking riches from his/her books, they're in for a major let-down. Most books fail to earn back their advances. Only established authors, after many bestsellers, or that all-elusive "First-Hit Book", can contemplate huge payouts. And that is usually from the supplemental deals: movie and foreign publishing rights, merchandising, etc.

But for us independents it's different. We are more flexible since we're able to set our own standards and prices. But many independents have struck it rich. Just look at some of the bestselling authors on amazon.com, many are independents who started out with zero name recognition.

My books are "genre-bending" which means I write outside the box. I use the Universal Pen Writing System which seamlessly combines 5 or more genres within my chosen genre. So if I write a Historical Fantasy book, you'll get History, Fantasy and three more sub-genres all packed into one story. But if executed correctly, Universal Pen can pay huge dividends to a writer from a financial standpoint. Not only that, the readers win too, they get a great story filled with all the right ingredients. But executing the Universal Pen system takes many years of hard work and reading. You can't become a great writer without reading the classics.

In my opinion this is a good example of pleasing everyone, which is hard for any author to do.

But with the Universal Pen writing system, you can finally have your cake, and eat it too.

flag