Having Lived Through a Hollywood Writers’ Strike…

Way back when, there was a writers’ strike in Hollywood, and all the writers went home from their writing jobs with the express instructions from the Writer’s Guild to not write. A few months after the strike ended Hollywood was awash in spec scripts written by all those writers who weren’t supposed to be writing.

I mention this because social distancing has apparently inspired a Renaissance of sorts. There are thousands — probably tens-of-thousands — of aspirants out there taking advantage of having nothing to do to pursue that novel they’ve always wanted to write. From my informal research, they’re mostly mysteries, romances, and thrillers set in whatever corporate environment the author is avoiding.

To my friends in publishing: prepare for the onslaught.