Book Review – Being A Starving Artist Sucks By Jeremy Tuber

This book is a whopper and stands at an impressive 501 pages. Reading this book actually teleported me back to my college days when I was buried in the 800 odd pages of the Robotics compendium or the 600 page Object Oriented Programming minefield. When I started reading this, I was not very sure I would finish it. But like Jeremy’s last book I reviewed, Verbal Kung Fu For The Freelancer, this was easy reading in the same infectious engaging style that conveys a lot without preaching with plenty of stories and scenarios to keep your interest alive.

Being A Starving Graphic Artist Sucks targets a graphic artist, especially one who is leaving the roost and is striking out on his own. With a little bit of imagination and common sense, you could easily take all the advice in this book and apply it to your own occupation whether it is photography or marketing guy. What I am trying to say is that although the title reads "Graphic Artist", it is not just graphic artists that will benefit from reading this book. In the book Jeremy talks about the dreams and aspirations that people have and how quickly they turn into dust once they are burnt by clients from hell, bad economy, excessive competition and overcrowding ofd the market. He shows you how you can not let factors like that deter you from your goal. In the book you will find interesting tips on how to find jobs and hold on to returning clients even in a downturn, how to build solid foundations and business relationships and how not to fall into the beginner’s trap of bartering for services.

Jeremy wisely emphasizes on the importance of having a business plan, marketing yourself and your skills and getting down and dirty with accounting and finances. The book takes an in-depth look at focusing your strategies and sticking to a time frame. It educates you on drawing up contracts and sticking to legally right channels in every aspect of your business.BASAS teaches you to stop floundering around trying to do a little bit of everything, tempting as it may be, and find a unique niche that will accelerate your progress a million fold.

But most importantly it tackles the age old dilemma of assigning rates for your services, whether it should hourly or on a per project basis, how you shouldn’t be afraid to increase your rates and best practices revolving the "How Do I Charge My Client?" conundrum that we all seem to have.

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