I’ve always enjoyed reading self-help books on the craft of writing. From Stephen King’s “On Writing” to Ursula Le Guinn’s “Conversations on Writing” to David Gerrold’s “Worlds of Wonder”, all have inspired me in different ways, and gave me plenty to think about as I sit down to work on my own craft.

But lately I’ve notice an interesting trend. As I scan Amazon and Apple Bookstore for new interesting reads in this particular field, I find plenty of books that seem interesting and get fairly decent reviews. But if I go and try to find books or short stories published by the authors of these “how to write” books, it’s amazing how few books I tend to find.

One popular Mystery writer’s YouTube channel is full of authoritative advice on how to plot your murder mystery novel, how to use cliches in new and interesting ways, how to hide your killer’s motives so that they result in a satisfying ending, and so on and so forth. She’s published exactly one novel so far, and is working on a “how to” book based on her YouTube videos. Now, she has a LOT of interesting things to say, and I find her insights useful. Every minute spent watching her videos has been a smart investment in my own craft. But still, only one novel (and no short stories that I could find).

In another case, I found someone who is selling probably a dozen or so short books on various aspects of the craft of writing short stories and other fiction. Each is $2.99. Many of them get great reviews. As far as I can tell, she has no fiction sold under the name she uses to write these books. It seems strange to me not to bank on your own name if you’re successfully selling fiction.

Maybe all of these authors are actually publishing under different names, and thus actually do have the experience to tell prospective writers the right way to go about crafting and marketing their own work. I don’t know, I didn’t dig deeply into the authors I found. And of course, if the advice resonates, it’s undoubtedly useful to one degree or another.

It just looks strange to me when someone is publishing a fiction writing self-help book with so little apparent experience in actually writing fiction.