Authors Don’t Owe You Books

Aside from Rothfuss’s other public interests that readers perceive as getting in the way of his writing, the other most commonly cited grievance is the claim Rothfuss made that all three books in the series were finished at the time of the first’s publication—a grievance that, to me, betrays a lack of understanding of the creative and publishing processes. (Although, I guess it shouldn’t surprise me if the authors of passionately meandering Goodreads comments aren’t familiar with the concept of editing.)

Editing is the larger, more significant hurdle. Everything you’ve ever read that was worth the effort (and, realistically, even a lot of what you’ve read that wasn’t) went through a some kind of editing process to make sure it was in its best possible form. The complaint that the trilogy should be complete by now simply because Rothfuss already has a draft of it disregards the fact that, even if such a draft exists, it is, for one reason or another, not ready to be published. I can’t help but wonder how many of the same people harassing the author that the book is taking too long would have done the same had the final installment been substandard.

However, the alleged existence of a draft for The Doors of Stone is almost completely beside the point. The bigger grievance I have with the people demanding the third Kingkiller book is their entitlement to the author’s time and energy.

As you’ve seen in the comments selected (and which you would continue to see in abundance if you were to be so foolish as I am to peruse the Goodreads page yourself), many of Rothfuss’s readers are angry. They’re not only angry at the lack of third book, but also angry at his YouTube channel. They’re angry he makes appearances at PAX and Comic Con. They’re angry he plays video games. They’re angry that he maintains an active blog. In short, they’re angry that he isn’t writing enough, and some cases angry that he isn’t writing enough of the specific thing they expect him to write.

We must ask ourselves: what authority does anyone have over how Patrick Rothfuss spends his time other than Patrick Rothfuss?

If Rothfuss never writes another word of any book ever again and instead decides to become, I don’t know, a full-time podcaster, why does any one of his readers get to decide that’s wrong? While you’d certainly be entitled to your disappointment that the Kingkiller Chronicle will remain unfinished, does not getting to read a book really entitle you to tell its author to fuck off?

I’m not going to defend Pat Rothfuss as a human being, nor the content of his character. I don’t know him as a person, and as such am not qualified to make any sort of judgement about him or his work ethic. What I do feel qualified to comment upon is the nature of fandom.

The access to our favorite creators that the internet affords us has instilled an expectation of said access—a truly awful feedback loop of entitlement and agitation. Such agitation is borne of when our favorite creators don’t perform to our standards. Content creators, including authors, have to in some way commodify their humanity in order to reach and satisfy their audience.

Everyone on the internet, from famous and successful artists to your weird uncle on Facebook, makes content of their personalities in this way. We are each performing a version of our personalities whenever we post something. You do it when you share pieces of your day on your Instagram story. Your weird uncle does it in his colorful rants about cancel culture. I’m doing it right now, in the form of this post on BookRiot.com.

No matter how smart and compartmentalized you believe your relationship is with the media you consume, there is no escaping the fact that the core essence of our digital and social media is predicated on this idea of access, and wherever there is access, so too will you find entitlement. Maybe someone who usually posts memes suddenly has a political take you disagree with. Maybe the comedy songwriter posts their serious music and you feel weird even giving it a chance. Maybe the fantasy author whose books you adore is spending what you think is too much time on Twitch playing Minecraft.

I don’t believe people are wrong to be disappointed in the long wait between Kingkiller books. Nor do I think you have to support every last endeavor your favorite content creator embarks upon. I’d even go as far as to say there are tangible benefits to allowing consumers such direct access to who and what they choose to support with their time and money. At its worst, though, this model breeds a combination, of entitlement-via-access and the agitation caused by personalities not meeting our expectations, that becomes an often toxic cocktail.

On his otherwise cheery and irreverent blog, Rothfuss has occasionally posted about his depression. Again, I don’t know him as a human being, but it is not too much of a stretch to wonder in what way the pressure of appeasing an often thankless fanbase can interact with extant mental illness.

We’ve seen evidence of the toll trying to satisfy fans can take on creators. I think of Travis McElroy’s anxiety surrounding reactions to the newest campaign of The Adventure Zone, or the tragic passing of professional wrestler Hana Kimura, who died by suicide after the online harassment she endured became too damaging and all-consuming, or Twitch streamers who feel psychological pressure to stream every day, as not sticking to their schedule will cost them fans, ergo costing them money, because of an expectation placed on them to ceaselessly contribute to digital scrolls of infinite stimulation.

Fandom can be insidious. The stresses of being a content creator can unravel your very sense of humanity, because modern artistry is almost always a game of selling yourself as a brand. In fact, even deliberately choosing not to engage with the online circus, even holing yourself away and writing books and not making public appearances—a privilege that fewer and fewer authors get to enjoy—is itself a brand. As a culture, we have demanded access and product to the point of painting ourselves into a corner, from where we, ironically, lack access to our most basic sense of empathy for the people who entertain us.

I don’t mean to get too “oh, woe is the wealthy content creators” on you. I’m sure Patrick Rothfuss is doing fine. It’s important to remember that making art for a living is a privilege, one not everyone is lucky enough to even come close to doing. That being said, even the most privileged people are still people.

Being a fan of things is great. It provides reliability and comfort to our otherwise hectic, even banal lives. But the next time you feel agitated because the next installment of something you enjoy is late, or one of your favorite content creators is doing something other than making content for you, I urge you to remember the human on the other side of the transaction. I urge you to remember that creators don’t owe fealty to your expectations, and I urge you to remember authors don’t owe you books.