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Now, even if it would be difficult to continue making a living as a novelist, what would not be difficult is to keep writing novels.

I might upset a few people by saying this, but writing novels is a specialty of mine. You could even say it’s my only redeeming quality. I know it’s rather ridiculous for the person who said he’s never written a novel to claim writing novels is his specialty, but it is. I don’t know where I’d be if I wasn’t so good at it. What would I be doing? What kind of 30-year-old would I be if I wasn’t writing novels? Whenever I find myself lying awake in my futon thinking about that question, I become seized with anxiety, like I had stepped on an unidentified object in the dark.

I don’t like myself all that much. In fact if I were completely honest I probably hate myself, but I do like the novels I write. I allow a lot more for myself under the umbrella of it being for writing “my novels”. I allow myself to eat delicious food, read books, play games, and go to karaoke alone. If I weren’t writing novels, I would probably only allow myself to get away with the bare minimum to survive (and even then I still wouldn’t kill myself. It would be a disgusting way to live at any rate).

I stopped counting the number of novels I’ve written at some point, but if I included all my short stories in with the novels, it’s probably well over 100. As far as works that have been published in book form, that’s somewhere around 50, I’d say. To say I’ve worked hard would be putting it mildly.

I’ve probably worked too hard, in all honesty.

This isn’t the 1980s, with books selling left and right. Nobody (least of all my readers) asked me to work at this breakneck pace. I’m overworking myself to a ridiculous degree.

But I’m perfectly aware of that.

Saying this would really only serve to make a twisted person like myself even more twisted, but when I go to a bookstore and see the cover for a new book proclaiming, “The latest work breaking XX years of silence!” I get pretty jealous. I’d like to break my silence someday.

But, to one degree or another, the amount of work I have is out of my control. It takes a high level of craftsmanship to be able to stop at some nice, round number. All sorts of things, whether it be a company, a project, or culture at large, fall apart when you lose sight of the right time to stop. That said, I’m falling apart too, in my own way.

This might actually be the perfect time to pull out that classic line, “I know that I am, but I can’t stop myself.”

If only I could fall into a slump and become unable to write, everything would be so much easier for everyone involved, and I wouldn’t have to worry my readers. But I can write, so there’s nothing to be done. If I were to let something like that slip in public, I’m sure I’d just hear, “My oh my, Sensei. Despite all the fancy words you say, you’re just talking yourself up.” But I acknowledge that this skill has nothing to do with my own efforts.

My specialty of writing novels has nothing to do with me. It’s not innate talent, and frankly speaking, it’s not even luck.

If anything, I’d describe it as bad luck.

I’m not trying to sound all melodramatic, it truly was a stroke of bad luck that got me here. Couldn’t have been anything else. If you had to split humanity in half, I wouldn’t have guessed I’d be on the lucky side, but I also wouldn’t have assumed I’d be so horrendously unlucky as to experience what has happened to me. Even thinking about it now makes me shudder.

The reason why I can continue to write as a novelist, and why I was able to begin as an author, can be very cleanly summed up in a previous life experience.

The most frequent question an author gets in his working life is, “How did you come up with that story?” From what I’ve seen, most authors are beyond fed up with that question. From our perspective, if it was something that could so easily be put into words, then the question wouldn’t even have to be asked. Fortunately, due to my extreme neglect for keeping anything approaching a social life, I don’t get put in the position to be asked that question very often, though it has been shot at me a few times during magazine interviews.

Whenever I’m in that situation, I default to the usual, that is, stringing together random words to sound like an eccentric. I talk big about what it takes to be an author, varnished with a layer of what would appear to be my own set of values. Now, the interviewers are typically considerate enough to censor my views from the general public, so most of what I say gets cut out in editing, but all of those abstract and emotional words I was throwing out were usually lies anyway. If I’m being honest, lying during interviews is probably my worst habit as an author.

But I became an author so I could lie, and the magazines shift around my words to suit their narrative, so I suppose the fabrications are mutual.

Now, if all that stuff is lies, then what exactly is the truth?

What is my honest answer to the question of, “How did you come up with that story?”

I think it’s time I told everyone.

I think I’ll expose my trauma to the public.