Freelance Writing and Author Illustrator Business 2024 Year in Review

It’s that time of year again where I like to look at how the year went compared to the goals I set at the beginning of the year and think about what I want to accomplish in the upcoming year. In my 2023 review, I reflected on the books I read, the books I wrote, and the books from my catalogue that sold the most that year. 

This year, I wanted to take a bit of a different approach, because this was the first year where my income was one-hundred percent from writing. Up until this year, I’ve worked various contract instructor positions at my local college, but in 2023 I had some issues with my voice that prevented me from applying for a new contract. I decided that was a sign to go all in on my writing business. 

Books I Wrote in 2024

Ever since 2021 (when I wrote nine books), I’ve been trying to meet or beat that number. I wrote a similar number of books in 2020, but we all know what was happening during those years. I wasn’t able to teach at the college because of the pandemic, so I wrote. And I wrote like I didn’t care about who read my work, so things came together in the stories super fast. 

I know that might sound bad, like I was just trying to get books out and didn’t care how good they were. I still tried my best. Back then my books were much shorter (more like novella length than novels), and I still tried to polish my work as much as I could before I published it. I’m still a perfectionist at heart. 

In 2023 I published five books, and this year I published three: Taxed to the Max, Under Wing, and Solstice Shadows. 

Income from Book Sales in 2024

When I started self-publishing, people made it seem like it was so easy to earn a living writing books. This has not been my experience, and I want to write about that because I feel like it’s important for anyone considering this career path to know what they’re getting into. 

I’ve also heard people say that the more books you write, the more money you will make. That also hasn’t been my experience. I’ve published over 20 books at this point, and as you’ll see shortly, I don’t earn a living with my book sales. 

I did increase my books sales over 2023, so that makes me happy. In 2023 my book sales were $600 for the year (I’m rounding to the nearest hundred to make things easy). This year, sales were $1,700. 

Something I always wonder when people share their book sales numbers is how much they spent on advertising so, I’ll share that too. In 2023 my advertising costs were $1,700 and in 2024 my advertising costs were $2,200. So as you can see, the advertising costs completely wipe out what I earned from book sales. This doesn’t even consider what I paid for covers and editing. My books are still costing me money, but I didn’t lose as much money this year as I did last year. I guess that’s something!

Income from Freelance Writing in 2024

My freelance writing income consists of articles I write about business, tax, and accounting, as well as website copy I write for accountants and financial planners. Thankfully (since I wasn’t teaching this year) I was able to pick up some extra freelance work and increase my income. I didn’t quite make up for the lost teaching wages, but I’m happy with how my business has grown this year. 

In 2023, I took an angel numerology course with Radleigh Valentine. According to numerology, 2024 was an eight year which means abundance and prosperity (among other things). That worked out in my favor when I consider my freelance writing. I’m so grateful for that!

In 2023, I had a net profit (after expenses) of $17,500 and this year my net profit was $46,500. I’m truly appreciative of the work my clients have sent me during the year. It allows me to keep writing my books. 

These numbers didn’t increase just because I gained extra freelance work. That definitely helped, but I also worked hard in 2024 to keep my expenses down. I love learning and tend to spend a lot on writing and drawing courses, but I was able to cut that amount in half in 2024. I believe I can still do better though, so I’m going to work on taking courses I already have rather than purchasing new ones!

Goals for 2025

Of course, I’m still working on breaking my record of number of books written in a year, but I’m just going to go with publishing more than three books in 2025 rather striving for ten or more. I would love to at least finish the Spirit Guides Mysteries series, but there are five books left to write in that series, so we’ll see. I can’t seem to stay focused on one series, and I always end up jumping around. 

I’ll continue to look for additional freelance writing clients. I’d also like to branch out from business, tax, and accounting and see if I can find some publications where I can submit my short stories.

One exception to what I mentioned above about taking new courses is that I’d really like to take Mike Lowery’s course Getting Paid to Draw in the spring. I’m an illustrator, yet you may have noticed none of my income comes from illustrating. So far, all of my illustrations have been for my own projects, and I’d really love to get some illustration work. 

I took a year long illustration course in 2024 that I thought was geared to teaching illustrators how to find work (and improve their skills), but it didn’t do either of those things. It did help me create some new work for my portfolio though, so that was helpful. 

There you have it. My highs and lows of my writing and illustrating business for 2024 and where I’d like to see 2025 head. If you follow numerology, 2025 is a nine year, which means the time is right! Let’s hope that means our hard work is about to pay off! I’d like that a lot!

I hope this review helps you reflect on your own year and build on your successes. Whatever your goals are for 2025, I wish you all the best!