As an author of fiction and nonfiction, I’m often asked which I prefer to write. It’s not that easy a question.
I cut my author teeth on nonfiction, first doing corporate communications—newsletters, press releases, sales letters, web content—and then as a magazine writer, focusing on the business of travel for the travel trades. Fiction was always my “final frontier,” something I never believed I could write until I finally did it, with my first novel published in 2016.
I didn’t write a nonfiction book until 2020 (Thanks, Covid!) when I finally had the time to do so. It became the autism travel bible and did quite well, winning a major award—Lowell Thomas Gold—from the Society of American Travel Writers Foundation. My second nonfiction book dropped on March 25th and is quite different. It’s the first in a multi-volume series called Vacations Can Be Murder: A True Crime Lover’s Travel Guide. The first volume covers New England. The second volume, due out in August, will cover the Mid-Atlantic states of New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, I have seven novels out under two pen names and in several genres (psychological/ domestic/romantic suspense and one sweet romance that slipped through) and I’ve edited or co-edited two anthologies with a two-volume set coming out in 2025, and another in 2026.
So, I’m pretty much all over the place. Here are my feelings about each:
Body Count: Since my first nonfiction book, Traveling Different, was about traveling with children with autism, I used to laugh that there were a lot fewer dead bodies in my nonfiction. I can no longer say that. The majority of the pages in my true crime travel guides are filled with tales of murder, sadism, and even cannibalism. It’s now gorier than my fiction by far.
Research: Even though I’m constantly referring to Google for my fiction to make sure I get all the facts right, that’s nothing when compared to basically writing a history book. I may have to scour ten old newspaper articles in order to find the address where someone was murdered for Vacations Can Be Murder. I have to work out routes for itineraries. I have to dig up crime museums, hotels and restaurants that used to be courthouses and jails, and so forth. It takes me about a month to research each of the states I include in a regional guide, and then another month just to do fact check. Each book includes hundreds of bibliographical entries. In that time, I could finish writing at least half a novel.
Exposure: I get a lot more exposure with my nonfiction. Maybe it’s because of the uniqueness of the topics; I write books that no one else is writing. When it comes to fiction, there are dozens of psychological or domestic thrillers out there, so it’s harder to get noticed. Likewise, it’s a lot easier for me to secure podcasts, because I’m targeting very specific areas: true crime, travel, paranormal (I include haunted restaurants, hotels, and ghost tours), tombstone travel (I list where the victims and perpetrators are buried) and in the past, autism and special needs. People want to talk to me.
Compensation: Nonfiction pays the bills; there’s no doubt about it. I also excerpt parts of my books and sell them as magazine articles; it’s how I got published in many editions of Costco Connection (15+ million readers—and they pay great!). My audiobook rights went up for auction for Traveling Different and made me about 400% of the advance I received for the print version. Libraries were eager to buy copies and as an evergreen book, I continue to receive royalty payments. That’s probably why I keep looking for new nonfiction books to write.
Satisfaction: This is what it’s all about, right? I have to say that crafting a plot that works, and coming up with dialogue that includes zingers, gives me the utmost satisfaction. Then again, there’s a great feeling in knowing that I opened up the world for thousands of families who bought and read Traveling Different. Being as anal as I am, I found joy in attempting to hunt down every single haunted hotel or restaurant in a particular state, and making itineraries flow just so. I get in a research zone where it’s comforting just to do the rote work of research and organizing the material in an orderly way. But if I’m going to be honest, the real creativity is in fiction, and it’s probably what I’m most proud to present to the world. No one is going to come up with a story in exactly the same way that I do.
And editing anthologies: I love editing anthologies that contains the work of other authors. I get to “meet” my fellow writers, and I know that I’m theoretically introducing their work to new legions of readers who may go out and buy their other work. So I treat their short crime stories with kid gloves, definitely editing them as carefully as I would my own book. Coming up with the concepts is great fun, too. So far, I’ve solicited crime fiction inspired by the songs of Elton John and Bernie Taupin, and crime fiction inspired by Broadway show tunes. Just wait till you see the open call I put out later this summer—it’s going to be very different.
So which do I like the very best? The great thing is, I don’t have to decide. I get to do them all! (Plus market my books, which I also enjoy.) If you write both fiction and nonfiction, which do you prefer and why? Tell me in the Comments Section below.
Dawn M. Barclay
Dawn offers developmental and copy editing through SuggestedDevelopment.com, and ghostwrites personal histories and corporate profiles through LegacyQuest.net. A member of ITW, she has served as president of Hudson Valley Scribes, vice president of Sisters in Crime-NY (still a board member), and the newsletter author/board member of the NY chapter of Mystery Writers of America. Follow her at www.dmbarr.com.
This is so interesting, Dawn. I started off as a reporter and love reading nonfiction, and I’ve written some articles about writing. But my heart is with writing fiction. However, if I come up with an idea…
Dawn, you are so accomplished! I can’t even answer which of my novels is my favorite. They each bring a new challenge.
I learned something about you, Dawn! Congratulations on a stellar career.
I only write fiction–mysteries, romances, and general fiction. I love using my imagination to create characters, events, settings, and plots. I admire your ability to switch between non-fiction and fiction.
I love that you’ve avoided defining yourself as writing “only” one genre. And I’d imagine that your experience researching/writing non-fiction makes your fiction even richer, with settings, characters, and crimes that feel real. (And this Jersey girl can’t wait to get her hands on the Mid-Atlantic edition of Vacations Can Be Murder.)
I think it’s great how the true crime series dovetails with your fiction writing! I don’t know if I could write non-fiction. I actually don’t enjoy writing at all unless it’s fiction, and something personal to boot. My novels all have a bit of me in them, or me working something out for myself. When I have to do any other kind of writing, be it technical or essays or analytical, I do it, but I cry. And sometimes I can’t do it at all and walk away from the work and the $$$. It’s definitely engaging a different part of my brain that I don’t think actually works 🙂
Dawn, I’m impressed with how you can toggle between fiction and nonfiction. We’re often asked if real-life events inform our fiction, and I suspect that for many of us the answer is yes! But a straight-up work of nonfiction? I’d have to feel as passionately as you do about a topic to attempt it.
I finally had a chance to read this and I’m so glad I did! I knew you had a wonderful varied history, but I am amazed at all that you have accomplished and still do. I love what you had to say about nonfiction too.
Thanks for sharing your story Dawn – it’s an inspiration for writers who don’t want to be buttonholed as fiction or Non-we get to do it all!
Dawn, I relate to this! I was a newspaper reporter and then a magazine editor and writer for years before I began writing fiction. The two sides are very different, but I get satisfaction from both, especially after I was able to nudge my magazine assignments toward my fiction interests. I write about the Gilded Age or the Romanovs or other historical topics for Town & Country magazine, and I have an article set to go in May in the Wall Street Journal about “retro Phoenix.”