Writing About Writing, Days 7 and 8

7. Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to your characters?

Whether I listen to music partly depends on where I am. If I'm at home, no, I usually don't. Sometimes if I'm in public, I will put on headphones to listen to music in order to drown out ambient noise. I like soft rock, Celtic music, and movie soundtracks.

I don't usually deliberately apply songs to my characters, but sometimes when I'm hearing a song I will find that the lyrics are appropriate to them. Once I did wander around on YouTube specifically looking for songs that suited my novel characters, and actually found a couple.


8. What’s your favorite genre to write? To read?

My interests are so varied that it's really hard to pin down a favorite. I mean, my favorite book is Pride and Prejudice; I love Austen, and Shakespeare, and Doyle, so you could probably say that my favorite genre to read is classic literature. I also love fantasy, and have a soft spot for fantasy geared toward younger readers. Harry Potter is one of my favorite things in the world, as is Fullmetal Alchemist, although I can't for a moment believe that's intended for kids. In non-fiction, I love history, especially biographies of English monarchs (I'm a bit of an Anglophile, which is probably fairly evident from my other remarks here).

But as to what I like to write...that's pretty much exclusively the impossible. I think I'm slightly bored by reality. :)