Charles
asked
David Wong:
David/Jason, Love all your episodes on the Cracked podcast; I recommend "Millenial-Panic!" to everyone. You've talked about how you work crazy-long hours but it sounds like a lot of that time is devoted to working behind-the-scenes at Cracked. If you could wave a magic wand and live in an idealized world where you could reliably depend on an income from only writing more books/more frequent Cracked posts, would you?
David Wong
I don't want to get too much into personal money stuff but I could actually do what you're suggesting at any time, and make it work (I'm married and my wife also has a career). But Cracked as a whole is something I kind of helped build and shape, I invented the whole process by which articles get written and helped decide what kind of subjects we would cover etc. So I feel a sense of ownership of it even though I don't literally own it (like I could be fired tomorrow and that would be that - I'm just another employee). So it would be hard to walk away from it because I feel heavily invested in its success and in deciding what it looks like. Also I really don't have tons of other article or book ideas running around that I'm just not able to get to time-wise. I think I'm able to write stuff at about the rate it occurs to me. That said, I won't be able to maintain this schedule for too much longer, I'm really starting to feel it (kind of shocking the difference turning 40 made).
More Answered Questions
JOe
asked
David Wong:
I feel like the JDATE series is one of the few fictional universes that feels open-ended, like most anything can, will, and has happened. So what is your process around world building? And do you write linearly or do you work from a broader set of ideas and form a story around those? Please and Thanks.
Dan
asked
David Wong:
Having read JDatE, I have to ask: does the dialog come naturally, or do you have to think about "how would this guy talk to that guy?" I find when I write, I can produce some "natural" dialog, but I always seem to question my decisions, then rework or rephrase, and I rarely get a natural, "organic" flow. A lot of my conversations feel contrived. Just looking for some pointers from a success. Please and thank you.
David Wong
5,716 followers
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