You often see writers or other artistic types do these kind of “how to’s” about their profession. But this one, by horror author Brian Keene, struck me as being something exceptional. After talking about the economics of writing he gets into how it destroyed his marriages (well, in fairness, he acknowledges his faults as well) and then talks about losing friends.

Writing has also cost me friends—both from before I became a writer and after. Childhood chums, pissed off that I mined so much of our lives for fiction. Friends from High School and old Navy buddies who I no longer had anything in common with, who assumed that just because they saw my books in stores or my movies on television that I must somehow be wealthy and hey, could I lend them a few dollars or help them get published or be the dancing monkey and star attraction to impress all their friends and family members with at their next Christmas party. Fellow writers and peers, people I’d come up with, promised to do it together with, only to have them lose touch with me when I got successful.

As one of the commenters says, “This is a fantastic and fairly horrifying post…”