Shanna Swendson's Blog, page 176

Done! (For now)

I finished draft one yesterday. I already know a few things I want to change, including one big one that I think will add motivation to the ending, but I'll wait for overall revisions to make sure I'm really setting it up right. Then there's the thing that happened near the ending that kind of surprised me, and I need to go back and lay more groundwork for it. It's something that should fall into the category of "finally!" rather than being a surprise. I need to figure out what these characters were doing behind my back while I was busy with other people.

But it will be about a week and a half before I get into the revisions. The rest of this week, I'm getting my life in some kind of order and letting my brain rest. Last night I cleared off my sofa, which tends to turn into a rat-like nest when I'm working. This morning I took care of some errands, and I may do some more this afternoon. Then I want to finish cleaning house and do some reading. I'm going to visit my parents early next week (before they forget what I look like), and then next weekend is ApolloCon in Houston. After the con, I can get back to writing and maybe it will be somewhat fresh so I can do better revisions. I seem to be thinking about the book now more than I did when I was writing it.

In the meantime, I may also need to get to work on coming up with a cover concept for this series. And then there's cover copy. And finalizing the non-North American digital release of the Enchanted, Inc. series. So it's not like I'm going to be a slacker.

It does feel good to have that giant thing off the to-do list.

Writing Advice I've Tried

There's a lot of writing advice that tends to float around, and I'm firmly of the opinion that even the best advice doesn't work for everyone. I generally am willing to try just about anything that might improve my work, so I thought I'd do a roundup of things I've tried and how they work for me, which may help others figure out what might work for them.

1) Morning pages
Back in the late 90s, a book called The Artist's Way was all the rage in writing circles. It was all about unlocking creativity. I tried it and stalled, mostly because I found it to be kind of victimy -- it's about finding and blaming all the people who've kept you from being creative. I figured out that I'm the only one I can really blame, and I didn't think that writing nasty letters to myself was going to help matters. One element of the program that really caught traction even among people who didn't bother with the rest of the program was something called "morning pages." The idea was that you could clear your mind by handwriting three pages of whatever came to mind, first thing in the morning. It was kind of like a diary, but with no structure or topic, just whatever popped up.

I've tried this a few times, and I never got very far. I'm not a morning person, so the first thoughts in my head are along the lines of, "uhhhhhhhh," and who needs three pages of that? I've tried a few modifications, like doing the pages after breakfast or before I sat down to work for the day.

While it still didn't stick, there are elements from it that I have used. When it comes to brainstorming, having a set amount of space you have to fill so that you have to keep going even after you think you've found what you want is a good idea. The best ideas come after you push past your first impulses. I've used the three pages thing in brainstorming characters, forcing myself to fill at least three pages with information about a character, even if some of the stuff I add to fill space might get silly. There's a similar technique of making a list of 20 things, and you have to keep going to 20 even if you think you've found your answer.

A brain dump can also be handy on a distracted day. If you're trying to work and your thoughts are straying, get out a piece of paper and write down what's on your mind. This is great for that shiny new idea that pops up when you're in the middle of a first draft -- you get the idea out of your head, and it's generally obvious then that you don't have enough to start writing then and there, so you may as well finish the current project. It's also good for other distractions -- to-do lists, hypothetical vacation plans or anything else that starts spinning around in your head to the point you can't find your story anymore.

So, while I don't make a habit of morning pages, freewriting can be a useful technique for either brainstorming or clearing your mind. I use it on an as-needed basis.

2) Collaging, mind-mapping, etc.
Another trend that swept through writing circles a while ago was the idea of organizing your thoughts visually by making collages of images related to a story or doing some form of mind-mapping. The success of this will depend on what your thinking/learning style is. It seems like it's a good way for non-plotters to do some pre-writing planning. It's also good for visual people or possibly to force non-visual thinkers to get more specific about visuals. I have to admit that it's never worked for me. I occasionally find images that resonate with me, and I do have some mental casting, sometimes (but not always). I'm more likely to do a soundtrack -- a kind of music collage that helps me get into the emotions of a book. It's worth trying to see if it lends anything to your process, but don't feel like you have to spend the time if it's not doing anything for you because it can be very time-consuming.

3) The Hero's Journey
This swept through the writing world like wildfire in the late 90s, probably because of Christopher Vogler's book The Writer's Journey (and I believe he spoke at a widely attended conference, which helped spread it). He took the hero's journey from the work of Joseph Campbell and distilled it for modern fiction writers. The structure has come under a lot of fire as being formulaic, and you can sometimes tell when a writer was perhaps too consciously using it without maybe understanding it, but I have to say that I owe my current writing career to this concept. I really didn't understand plot until I heard someone speak on this and then bought the book. I've since read the Campbell book, which involves a lot of Jungian theories, and then I've gone on to read and study a lot of Jung, and it just clicks for me. I'm a lot less slavish to it than I was in the beginning, but it makes for a great jumping-off point in creating a plot, as well as a way of checking a plot that isn't working. But I think to really make it work without coming across as formulaic, you have to delve into it. If you just have the list of stages of the journey and go from there without getting into the elements behind those stages, it's probably not going to work as well.

4) Contests
This may be more prevalent in the romance writing world, where a lot of Romance Writers of America chapters sponsor contests as fundraisers and the national organization sponsors a manuscript contest, but I've seen contests hailed as a fast track to publication. I have seen people get a boost from a contest that got a manuscript in front of an editor or agent, but I suspect the editor or agent would have been interested in that manuscript, regardless. Sometimes publisher-sponsored contests with publication as a prize offer far worse contract terms than you'd get from submitting, so it's important to read the fine print. I've also seen writers get so caught up in the contest whirl that they never manage to get anything published. They polish their synopsis and first three chapters in a way that's going to appeal to contest judges, win a lot of awards, but never sell a book. I've been part of conversations among agents who say that they seldom get anything they want from a contest because the things that tend to win the preliminary round are often bland -- they make it past the first level of judges because they tick off certain boxes on a form, while the really interesting stuff probably violates some unwritten "rule" that means at least one judge will hate it, so the editors and agents judging the final round never see the stuff they'd find interesting.

However, some contests can be good for giving feedback or giving a boost when you need it. I sold fairly quickly, so I was rendered ineligible for most writing contests before I got going, but I did win a couple of manuscript contests that gave me an emotional boost. They had nothing to do with me selling a book or moving up in the publishing world -- in fact, I never sold those books -- but when I was just starting, the mere fact that someone thought my work was good gave me the encouragement to keep trying. So, even if the contest isn't going to get your work on the desk of a top editor, it may be worth it to give it a shot, as long as you keep your expectations reasonable.

If you're looking for a contest, here's a plug for one from an organization I'm involved with. The science fiction convention FenCon sponsors a short-story contest every year. You'll find the rules here: http://www.fencon.org/story.html. There's also a contest for young writers in grades 3-12. Here's the info: http://www.fencon.org/youngauthor.html. This isn't going to be your ticket to fame and fortune, but you might get some pleasant validation.

Book Report: Princess Stories

I'm getting an early start today because I very soon have to go sing for a funeral. The deceased, in planning what he wanted during his illness, apparently decided that he wanted something joyful and exuberant, so we're doing a lot of classic African-American gospel music (for a crowd that will be the country-club set -- should be interesting). And there will be a bagpiper. Because that's what he wanted.

It's possible that I could get to "the end" of the book today, but I'm not going to say so because I know how it goes. I'll write 4,000 words and the end will still be 4,000 words away. I'm coming up on the book's emotional climax, a scene I've known was coming since I was working on the first book, and I'm a little afraid of finally writing it. Part of me suddenly wants to change the outcome even though the outcome makes sense and is necessary for the rest of the series (if the first two books do well enough to warrant continuing, but at least it's up to me to make that decision).

I read a fun book last week that's worth sharing. It's non-fiction, but it reads like a short-story collection. It's Princesses Behaving Badly by Linda Rodriguez McRobbie. The title is something of a misnomer, as not all the princesses were truly "behaving badly," but the idea is that it's a collection of accounts of princesses from all over the world, throughout history, who behaved in a way that doesn't fit the "Disney Princess" mold. There were those who seized kingdoms, those who went rogue, those who were devious, those who really did behave badly, those who went mad and even those who were just posing as princesses. It's fascinating reading, with a breezy, entertaining writing style.

I think it does kind of skim the surface, but it seems meant more to provide an introduction to the idea that real princesses are nothing like the storybooks. There's a pretty good bibliography at the end, so if a story piques your interest you can delve into more detail. The intro mentions the Disney princess craze, with this book as an antidote, but most of the stories are pretty sordid, so it's not really good alternative bedtime reading for little girls with a princess obsession.

I think I have some ideas for future fantasy novel characters, though …

Speaking of women in stories, this article showed up in my Facebook feed, and I thought it was interesting. I'm not crazy about the idea of the "strong female character" because too often it means Rambo in drag, and generally it's the traditional masculine traits that are considered good and strong, while traditionally feminine traits are considered negative and weak (one reason I felt compelled to write a book about a sweet Southern belle ballerina you do NOT want to mess with). The result is that "good" female characters are the ones who act like men. But as mentioned in this article, even when a female character is really strong, there seems to be a tendency to just throw her in for demographic purposes and then shove her to the sidelines. I haven't seen most of the movies mentioned, and as I've said before, I tend not to even notice if there are no women in a movie if there's not an obvious role for them. But I do get annoyed when there are cool characters (regardless of gender) who are just there for decoration and don't get to do anything. It's worth thinking about.

Nearing the End

I'm getting to that point near the end of a book where I keep thinking that today will be the day I finish because I'm almost out of story, and yet at the end of the day I still seem to have the same amount left to write. In this case, that's kind of a good thing because an unexpected development occurred during Saturday's writing session that amplified the situation the characters were in. It will make for a more exciting book, but it seriously delayed the "the end" part. I'd thought that this book was going to come in really short, but it's looking like it'll be right about where I want it for a first draft, where I can flesh out anything that needs it and cut anything that needs to go and still have it end up being a good length for a novel.

I think I'll likely finish the draft on Wednesday. I have a funeral to sing for tomorrow morning and a rehearsal tonight for that, which may eat into my productive time (it's not someone I knew, just a need for singers, though I am acquainted with the widow).

Then I'll take some time to wrap up one of the other projects still left on my plate, do some reading and house cleaning and then it will be draft two time. I was rewriting along the way (one reason it's taken so long), so most of the taking apart and putting back together has already been done. I think it will mostly be a fleshing out and trimming revision, not a rewriting the whole book adventure.

And then I'll have to figure out what to write next. That will probably come in a talk with my agent about strategy. I'd like to get another book done in summer/early fall so I can take some time off during the good part of fall. I know I say that every year, but my publishing schedule seldom cooperates. I'm planning to be in research mode for some new things during that time, in addition to taking some time to just go hiking, sit on the patio and read and otherwise enjoy the brief phase between bursting into flames when you go outdoors and turning into an icicle when you go outdoors.

Mamma mia, I'm old

I didn't get as much writing as I hoped done yesterday because I hit another one of those annoying specificity points where I had to figure out exactly what's happening. In the big-picture plot outline, this scene was "the heroes confront the villain." When I planned the scene, this section of the scene was "the villain poses a difficult dilemma to the heroes." Now I'm at that point and had to figure out what the difficult dilemma was. That took me the better part of the afternoon, and then it was time to go to the show.

I had a lot of fun on the girls' night out. We caught the train heading downtown, then had dinner at the little cafe in the music hall before the show, and I only knew a few of the people in the group, so I met new people. I think I was the second youngest, and I felt a little out of place carrying my Target purse when everyone else had Coach and Prada bags. Then I had a very disturbing realization while watching Mamma Mia: The "old" characters in the show should be about my age. The daughter in the show is 20, and the mother, her friends, and the men were all supposedly in that backpacking around Europe/being beach bums in the Greek isles phase of life, so you'd think they'd have had to be under 30, more likely mid-20s. Which would make them in their mid-late 40s at the time the show takes place.

However, they don't seem to cast it that way (and I notice the casting has edged upward since the movie, which was cast about ten years too old), probably because most of the punchline of the show is "old people in spandex are funny." The show seems to be set around 2000, since the 20-year-old daughter was conceived in 1979. But the way the show seems to be cast, the "young" generation in the show and the "old" generation are on two different timelines. The young ones are in 2000, 21 years after 1979. But the older ones seem to be in 2014, so that they were in their early 20s in 1979 and are now in their late 50s, supposedly too old to wear spandex and old enough to throw out their hips when they do vigorous dance moves. I guess the target demographic is Baby Boomers, and so the main characters must be played by Baby Boomers, which means they keep getting older.

It does change my perspective on the show to think in terms of it being about people my age, even if it was a generation before mine. I was a child, not an adult, when I was singing "Dancing Queen" into a hairbrush (well, when I first did it while the song was a hit. We won't talk about how old I might have been the last time I did it). Now I'd kind of like to see a production for which the casting people showed their ability to do math and cast accordingly.

Almost There!

I made a lot of progress yesterday, but I'm still not done with the big, climactic scene. It's turning into a real showdown. Since today will be a shorter working day, as will tomorrow, it's looking more and more likely that I'll need to skip my Saturday plans. By then, I should be down to one good day's work to finish this draft, and I'd rather keep the momentum going instead of taking a whole day off.

Normally by this point, there's some other book that starts bouncing around in my brain to distract me. This time, it's vacation plans. Or hypothetical vacation plans. I find myself wanting to research places to go. I have a spot in my calendar in late August when I could get away briefly, but I'm not sure if I will be tired of convention travel. I like traveling in the fall, but I'm still thinking of that as a good time for the research trip, and after that trip I might not want to travel for a vacation. You see why I've spent so many years talking about this hypothetical vacation without actually having taken it. Maybe if I make it a late fall vacation, I can go somewhere closer and do more of an outdoorsy retreat thing -- a bit of hiking, a lot of sitting around, reading and enjoying the scenery. There are some minor mountains in Oklahoma not too far from here.

Tonight, a group of women from church are going to see Mamma Mia. I've seen it before, but I'm a huge ABBA fan, so it's good to just hear the music, and it should be interesting seeing it with a multigenerational group of women. Of course, wouldn't you know it, a line of possibly severe storms is set to hit our area right about the time we're meeting up to head to the train station. However, the local former TV weather geek (taking time off to work on his doctorate but still posting weather stuff online) just amended the forecast. He thinks the storms will actually flare up to the east of us so we don't get the serious stuff. I'm mostly worried about having my car out in the station parking lot, but glad not to be parked at the music hall. The last time a really big storm hit during a production there, a wave of water came through the parking lot and washed all the cars there up against a fence. Now there's a train that runs just from the edge of our town right up to the music hall entrance. That would have made things so much easier when I had season tickets.

Now, though, I'm going to take advantage of a gap in the radar to run to the post office and then get to work. Rainy days are good for productivity.

Discovering New Muscles

Well, the new ballet teacher isn't really a ballet Nazi because he's quite nice and very encouraging, and he kept insisting that we needed to relax because this is supposed to be fun. But I am in terrible pain at the moment. I think every part of my body hurts, down to my little toes and pinkie fingers. After all this dance, I thought I knew every muscle in my body, but I have discovered new ones. And they hurt most of all.

It's not so much that the class was tough (which it was). But he's very precise and focused a lot on technique. We were doing more difficult stuff, but he was making sure we were doing it exactly right, and I think we'd all gotten into some lazy habits or maybe hadn't quite learned it the right way in the first place (in my case). These were tiny adjustments that ended up making a big difference in how things worked, but they meant that slightly different muscles or muscle groups were being used. I was also pretty tense because it was a new teacher and I was by far the oldest student and the least experienced one and I am something of a perfectionist. That's probably why my shoulders and back are sore.

My normal teacher mostly tells us what to do with our feet and legs with some suggestions about arms, and then we can do what works for us. This guy was telling us exactly what to do, right down to head and hands, which meant retaining and processing a lot more information. I will probably be a far better dancer by the end of the summer, but for today, I'm barely mobile.

But that's okay because this is going to be a writing marathon day. I'm so very close to the end of the book, moving into what should be the Big, Climactic Scene of the whole story. Unfortunately, the end of the book fell into a busy week when I can't just shut out the world and finish. Today I have nothing going on (so I hope to make progress), but tomorrow evening I'm going out with a group of women from church to see Mamma Mia, then there's a concert I want to go to Friday night, followed by the weekly explosions at the lake, and then my friends are planning a big movie day on Saturday. Depending on book progress and whether I'm socialed out by that point, I may or may not make it to the Saturday event.

I'm already getting the other "near the end of the book" symptoms, like suddenly wanting to Clean and Organize All the Things! And wanting to make plans for other stuff. Strangely, another book hasn't yet popped into my head, demanding to be written. That may mean it's a good time to take a little time off and clear my head (and clean my house) before jumping back into a new project. This week, I should pass the number of hours I spent writing all last year, so I'm doing pretty well, but that also explains why I'm a little tired.

I mean, other than dancing tired this morning. There was one funny thing from class: I was having trouble with a step because it's essentially a waltz-like step, but I'm so used to ballroom dancing the waltz that it's hard for me to do it forward (since the woman dances backward most of the time in a ballroom). When I said that, the teacher got me in a dance hold and we waltzed around the classroom. I still had trouble with the step, but a waltz was fun.

More Signs of the Impending Apocalypse

We really seem to be celebrating the great holiday of Send Money to Shanna Day (or week). Just yesterday, I got my royalties on my self-published books, which really went up after the price on the first book in the series was dropped, plus the second half of the advance on my steampunk book. The audiobook royalties will be coming later this week. And I got a check from the last Worldcon, reimbursing my membership fee since I was on programming. Plus, I got a Starbucks gift card in the mail as a thank-you for leading singing in the preschool Sunday school department. My bank balance makes me grin. But quarterly taxes are due next week, and I have a lot of business expenses over the summer, so I can't go totally nuts.

I'm still making progress on the book. I'd say I'm probably in the "the road back" phase of the hero's journey. I know what the next couple of scenes will be, but then I'll hit another big scene and I need to figure out what that will look like.

Tonight's the start of summer ballet and I'm a little nervous because I'll have a different teacher than I usually do (since the regular teacher should have had a baby this morning -- I haven't yet seen the announcement on Facebook). I'm not sure why I'm so nervous, since when I first started dancing my teacher went on maternity leave after just a few months, and the sub was the rather strict teacher who normally worked with the very advanced students (I called him the Ballet Nazi). He was very tough on me, but I mostly just laughed it off and we got along great. But that was when I was a beginner. Now I'm in the intermediate/advanced class, and I'm worried that the teacher will have real intermediate/advanced expectations. Most of the other students are of the sort that danced all their lives, maybe even did a little professionally, and are getting back into it after having kids. I'll likely be the oldest in the class, and I didn't start (other than the occasional class here and there) until I was older than most of these people are now. So I'm likely to both get hyper-competitive and push myself and have my self-esteem dealt a serious blow. Or it could be fun. Who knows. I don't think I've ever met the summer teacher.

But back to publishing … I think we've had a potential Sign of the Impending Apocalypse. Apparently, there's been yet another person getting a huge book (and movie) deal for a book that was originally written and posted as fan fiction. But in this case, it wasn't fan fiction of a book, movie or TV series that's having the serial numbers filed off and the names changed. It's a work of real-person fiction involving the members of a boy band, who, of course, are all kind of in love with an author stand-in. The story apparently isn't about them being a boy band, though. It has the same people doing something else, so I guess it becomes "original" just by changing the names. Though I wonder how that fits into the "this is a work of fiction, it's purely an accident if any of these people resemble any real person" disclaimer, since the whole point of the book is that the characters are based on real people, and that's going to be a huge part of the marketing hook -- maybe not overtly, done by the publisher, but the author achieved this success by pandering to fans of the band. If it had just been a story about characters, with no relationship whatsoever to the band, it probably wouldn't have gone anywhere.

But, yeah, this is the kind of thing publishers are currently throwing millions of dollars at. It's kind of depressing. Or it would be if it hadn't been Send Money to Shanna Day. It's not millions, but I can live on it.

To cheer myself up, here's a look at what conversations might sound like if people talked to everybody like they talk to writers. I think I've had just about every one of these conversations, but they forgot a few common lines. There's "I've thought about writing a book. Maybe you can introduce me to your editor or agent." There's "Oh, you write fantasy novels. I wrote a how-to book about a technical topic. Maybe you can give me some pointers about getting it published." (Sometimes it's "I've written and illustrated a children's book.") And the ever popular "You should give me a copy and I can tell you if it's any good." But those are mostly from strangers. For people I know, my favorite is "I've been wanting to read your books, but I can't seem to find any copies in the used bookstore."

Adjusting Mindsets

It's nice and rainy (and even cool!) today, so I'm hoping for a really productive writing day. I'm somewhat inspired by yet another piece of financial good news (my latest royalty statement). Seeing your work paying off is excellent motivation. This business can be so iffy, and it can take a while to see the payoff. The audiobook money is the result of work I did starting more than a decade ago. That's why it takes a lot of perseverance to make it in this business. There may be people who dash off a book, throw it up for sale online and then instantly rake in the bucks, but I'm on track to have my best earnings year ever because the cumulative effect of work I started more than ten years ago has finally built into a decent-sized snowball, and I'm hoping to build on that with new books.

I do seem to be having trouble adjusting my mindset about money, though, after so many years of just getting by. I already know that I'm in "living comfortably" territory for this year, regardless of what else happens, but I still find myself functioning as though I'm living off my savings. Which is how I made it through those years without having to scramble for work or find another job, so I don't want to go crazy now in case there are more lean years ahead, and I have some long-term, big-picture goals that are more important to me than buying lots of stuff now. Like getting a new house that has more of the features I want. But if there's something I need, I can buy it without worrying, and giving myself a few treats won't kill me.

I may let myself take an actual relaxing vacation at some point -- that trip I keep talking about where I'm not going for any particular event that will require being on any kind of schedule, to a place that has some fun things to see and do but that isn't so packed with stuff that I wear myself out, and that is relaxing and reviving rather than exhausting. I haven't figured out quite what that is yet, though, since travel itself is rather tiring. There's not much within a short drive, but flying can also be tiring and stressful.

And I think I may bite the bullet, renew my expired passport (I'm actually at the point where I need a whole new one) and start thinking of a trip to England in the fall. That counts as work, though, because I'm researching some things.

But before I take time off, I have to finish a book.

Confronting Dislikes

Jam was achieved. All the jars sealed properly, so now I'm set for at least the summer. I may do another batch at the end of the summer when they put the last of the season's strawberries on sale, depending on how much I use during the summer. Normally, the jam is for getting me through the winter, since that's when I'm more likely to bake stuff like scones and homemade bread. But I discovered last night that since this is a rather soft jam, not a firm jelly, it makes an excellent ice cream topping, so I may go through more of it during the summer than I usually do.

I did not, however, get to the end of the story, mostly because the end moved on me, thanks to the insight I had while writing yesterday's post. I'd been worried I was setting myself up for a Return of the King type ending -- the big, climactic battle, and then an hour of resolution as we tie up each character's individual story and say our good-byes. Though in this case, it was big, climactic reveal->big, climactic rescue->big, climactic battle->sad farewell->resolving one character's personal story->some happy farewells. I had written up to the big, climactic battle and thought all I had left were the personal resolutions and farewells. Now, though, it goes more like big, climactic battle->resolving one character's personal story, which leads to gaining an additional ally->final confrontation with the villain->farewells. I spent most of yesterday figuring this out and rewriting the big, climactic battle so that it was actually more of a battle than a "y'all stop that." I still have some work to do on that. And then I have the final third or so of the book to write. I may still have to flesh things out a bit -- in re-reading the previous few scenes so I could figure out my next moves, I added more than 500 words just to clarify the action.

I will be commemorating D-Day tonight by watching stuff blow up (the weekly fireworks show at the lake). I discovered recently that I now have the American Heroes Channel (I think it used to be the Military Channel), and they're carrying all the WWII programming the History Channel used to have when it was actually about history, so I've spent way too much time this week watching D-Day-related programs. This is making me realize that it's been 20 years since I had knee surgery. I had the surgery in late April, but in early June I was still on crutches and still doing physical therapy, and I remember watching hours and hours of 50th anniversary commemorative programming while doing my home exercises or lying collapsed on the couch because just getting through the day was still rather exhausting. The scope of D-Day and the enormity of what those men did boggles the mind.

Then Saturday will be a working day, and I have an early Sunday because I'm singing in a quartet for the early service. I teased the choir director that he was trying to torture me because he knows how much I loathe this particular song. Really, it's the style of music I'm not fond of. It's a pop-style praise song in a choral arrangement, and that just doesn't work well (trying to get 50 people to sing together in random, irregular rhythms and patterns never works unless they're highly trained professionals). I figure that I'm allowed to have one kind of music I'm really not crazy about singing. I get ecstatic about early music. I'll sing Baroque and classical. I actually kind of like the modern tone-poem stuff. I'll sing opera and Broadway, old-timey Southern gospel and rocking African-American soul gospel. I'll sing in Latin, Spanish and French without complaining. I've even tackled a bit of Hebrew (probably badly) and could deal with German. I'll do Sacred Harp a capella stuff. There's very little they can dish out at me that will make me groan and roll my eyes. In fact, there's many a time when I'm the only person in the choir grinning about a piece of music. So I'm allowed to have one kind of thing that I really don't like. I guess it's good for my soul to have to confront my dislike and still do my best. What's funny is that the alto assigned to the quartet also doesn't like it. When the other people in the choir were saying it was just like you hear on the radio, we were the ones saying we don't listen to that kind of stuff on the radio. We listen to the classical station (and for me, also the big band station).

Ooh, I just found out what my first quarterly payment for the Enchanted Inc. series audiobooks will be, and I should have bought some champagne while I was at the grocery store this morning. It's far more than I expected, and far above what they were offering as a flat up-front payment for ten years vs. a smaller advance and royalties. I'm very glad I took the smaller advance and royalties.

Though the champagne may have to wait because I need to write and I have that early Sunday. I may have a nice me party when I finish the book, though. And I may finally buy that new dishwasher -- a purchase I've been putting off for four years now.