I Can't Listen To Music While I Write, So Here's All The Antique Furniture I Browsed But Didn't Buy While Writing My Next Novel

Speaking of — my third novel is due June 20th, so next week I’ll be running classics from the Chatner vault (there’s eight years’ worth of newsletters in there!). I gave a reading from one of the early draft chapters back in 2023 and you can watch the recording here, if you like. The Chatner will return to regularly scheduled programming once the manuscript is in the hopper. In the meantime, wish me luck!

Back in January I claimed that this post contained the only advice I’d ever have for other writers — namely to keep your author bio as brief as possible for panels and readings, and try to get an invitation to Australia because their writer’s festivals don’t just cover travel and lodging, they also come with a cash per diem — but I’ve since thought better of it.

One of the many reasons pretty much everybody likes Jane Austen is because she introduces all of her main characters with an account of how much money they make per year. It’s important to know!

Sometimes I’ll see people release playlists of music they listened to while writing a book, and my reaction is somewhere between amazed and skeptical. I can’t listen to anything when I write fiction; if I have to listen to the wrong kind of white noise I can’t write a word.

But I do like to come up with a “furniture playlist” for each of my main characters.

Even if the information doesn’t make it into the book itself, I like to know the following:

• How much money does this character make per year?

• What’s the most money they’ve ever made in a year?

• What’s the least amount of money they’ve ever made in a year?

• Do they make more or less money than their own parents did at the same age?