My So-Called Freelance Life: How to Survive and Thrive as a Creative Professional for Hire [Paperback]

Michelle Goodman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 30, 2008

Tired of clocking in and losing out? Want to pursue creative, fulfilling work on your own time and also make a living in the process? My So-Called Freelance Life is a how-to guidebook for women who want to avoid the daily grind and turn their freelance dreams into reality. Michelle Goodman, author of The Anti 9-to-5 Guide and self-proclaimed former “wage slave,” offers tips, advice, how-to’s, and everything else a woman needs to pursue a freelance career.

Confused as to whether you should tell your clients that the odd gurgling sound during a conference call is emanating from the infant sleeping on your shoulder? Goodman answers all of the unusual questions that may arise for women exploring the freelance world. Far more than your normal business guidebook, My So-Called Freelance Life blends candid, humorous anecdotes from a wide variety of freelancers with Goodman’s own personal experiences as a creative worker for hire.

Whether you’re a freelance first-timer or a seasoned creative professional, copyediting queen or web guru, My So-Called Freelance Life is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in freelancing.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Since we’re all sh**ing our pants over the current economic situation, this book couldn’t come at a better time. My So-Called Freelance Life saunters its way through the ins and outs of becoming a successful solo professional, whether you’re a newly graduated 20-something trapped in a monotonous cubicle job or a new mom looking for flexible hours. Having accumulated a great deal of experience on the topic, Michelle Goodman (author of The Anti 9-to-5 Guide) leaves no paperweight unturned, explaining how to get started, maintain a budget and schedule, gather/weed out clientele, and legally cover your a**. Goodman includes a bevy of relevant links, contacts, organizations, and advice on everything from negotiating your hourly rate to when to quit working for the Man. While her book thoroughly covers every fundamental career intricacy you can imagine, wit and hilarity are also seated firmly within. (She even quotes Peter Gallagher on The OC, thus actualizing the poetry of my heart.) Not only is this book an incredible guide on how to get started, but it’s also inspiring and oddly comforting. “You can’t hitch your entire creative career on one big break—or one fat failure,” Goodman writes, “you have to keep moving forward, reaching for bigger and better.” It’s a book you will feel compelled to keep in your personal library (probably between your college dictionary and your religious tome of choice), or you can be like me and sleep with it in your arms."
—Bust Magazine

"I love this book! I’ve never had a 9-to-5 job, but it took me years to burn through my conditioning as a woman (that taught me my work wasn’t worth much), my conditioning as a Gen Xer (that taught me I shouldn’t take my work seriously), and my general fear of organization and success. My So-Called Freelance Life would have saved me half a decade of bumbling around. A must-read for established and hopeful creative professionals.”
—Ariel Gore, author of How to Become a Famous Writer Before You’re Dead: Your Words in Print and Your Name in Lights

"Michelle is a freelancing superstar, and this guide is packed with indispensable information and stories from the trenches. With advice on everything from handling missed deadlines with grace, to creating a killer portfolio, My So-Called Freelance Life will show you how to make your dream career a reality and help you feel like you’re not alone in going solo."
—Lauren Bacon and Emira Mears, authors of The Boss of You: Everything a Woman Needs to Know to Start, Run, and Maintain Her Own Business

"A witty Seattle writer who has weathered 15 years as a freelancer pens a sage and encouraging guide for others hoping to cobble together various projects for differing employers into a sustained career."
—Seattle Post-Intelligencer

"Michelle Goodman has done what so many of us are terrified to do (and may all be forced to do in our looming recession economy): cut the strings for a completely freelance existence. Luckily, she made all the mistakes first, then compiled her wisdom… a well organized how-to book about overcoming all those fears that keep us clinging desperately to our cubes.”
—Seattle Weekly

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Seal Press (September 30, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1580052592
• ISBN-13: 978-1580052597
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 1 x 8.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (48 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #48,552 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #42 in Books > Business & Investing > Women & Business
  • #53 in Books > Business & Investing > Small Business & Entrepreneurship > Home Based

More About the Author

I'm a freelance writer who fled the cube in 1992 and has yet to look back. My books -- "My So-Called Freelance Life: How to Survive and Thrive as a Creative Professional for Hire" and "The Anti 9-to-5 Guide: Practical Career Advice for Women Who Think Outside the Cube" -- offer an irreverent twist on the traditional career guidebook. I write a weekly career column for ABCNews.com and the work/life balance blog "Nine to Thrive" for the Seattle Times. My reported pieces about alternative careers, personal finance, and human mating rituals have been published by the New York Times, Salon, CNN.com, Entrepreneur, BUST, Bitch, The Bark, Yahoo, AOL, and more. My essays appear in several anthologies, including "P.S. What I Didn't Say: Unsent Letters to Our Female Friends" and "Single State of the Union: Single Women Speak Out on Life, Love, and the Pursuit of Happiness." I live in Seattle with Buddy, my 80-pound lapdog. For more advice and dirt on the freelance life, visit me at www.anti9to5guide.com.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 43 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Cure for the Common Freelancer September 28, 2008

By Toni V. Martin

Format:Paperback

If you're like me, you probably fell into your freelance lifestyle, rather than deliberately planned and strategically designed a solo career. Which is why Goodman's book had me at the title! This is a well-written, hilarious, solid resource for creative types who still have a 9 to 5 and want to switch to working for themselves, or those of us who kinda already are but not as professionally as we might like.

Goodman covers the fun stuff like getting your online portfolio up and hobnobbing with fellow freelancers. She talks about the icky stuff--like recordkeeping and invoicing and working with a tax professional. And she keeps it real, with discussion on how to not "sell out" creatively while keeping your bills paid and maintaining the work/life balance. All the while, Goodman freely admits her mistakes as proof that it's never too late to get in shape, businesswise. Her popular 1st book, The Anti-9-to-5 Guide, website of the same name, and columns and writing gigs give her advice plenty of street cred.

I have shelves of books on the freelance writing lifestyle, many of which are dear to my heart and great references (Bowerman's "Well Fed Writer" is one example). But "My So Called Freelance Life" is now #1 with a bullet because it's a targeted blueprint to laying the foundation and building my writing business, delivered in a hip, conversational tone that spoke directly to me.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Your FABULOUS So Called Freelance Life October 1, 2008

By SJS

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I read Michelle's last book, The Anti 9-to-5 Guide, and loved it, so I was eager to read this her new one. I have to say that she did not disappoint. Her candor is refreshing, as is her contemporary yet tried-and-true advice for those of us in the freelance trenches. Some stuff in here I'd never thought of, like renting a spot in an office co-op to avoid climbing the walls with loneliness.

I'd recommend this book for new and experienced freelancers alike - in fact, I've already bought a copy for a friend.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great guide for creative peeps... March 31, 2010

By Barbara Bell VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

Goodman dishes on what it's like to be a creative professional in this guide for freelancers. She covers everything structurally (business plan, anyone?), as well as important (licenses and lawyers?) and unimportant (do you really need 1,000 sheets of letterhead on your first day?) issues.

Broken into three categories:
You Fled the Cube, Now What?
Sell, Baby, Sell
Your So-Called Life

and followed by the epilogue and web resources, Goodman dishes it to her readers straight. She doesn't pretend to know it all or have been the star student in her learning process, but she does impart her knowledge in an approachable way.

She even suggests that if you can't take the rejections that come in with selling yourself and your work, for a quick pick-me-up, you should Google "famous rejections." I LOVED that piece of advice.

Goodman also breaks down game plans into do-able pieces. What would you do to write for your favorite magazine? She has suggestions on how to make this happen. She lived it and learned it, and she shares it with us here.