Walking through the morning market, restless in someone else’s clothes, thinking about the job. A lifetime of habit tracks the city watchmen, yawning as they watch merchants haggle over fresh produce. On impulse, he snags some grapes while the vendor smiles at a comely servant girl. Years since he had to steal his lunch. The petty victory brings a smile to his face as he scales a teahouse wall and takes to the roofs. Relaxing in the sun, he eats grapes and spits the seeds down onto rich men’s heads. This time tomorrow, he’ll be rich or he’ll be dead.

This is kind of tangentally on-topic: does anyone have any advice about reading one's work out loud? Other than practice the selection a couple of times? I'm starting to get a tiny bit nervous about the Internet radio interview thingie I'm doing with Victor and paperdol. They will be amazing and brilliant, I know this. I just want to make sure I don't sound like a moron.

We're reading our work out loud?

We're reading our work out loud?

Didn't the email say to be prepared to read excerpts? Am I crazy?

oh crap.

I can't check, because I apparently cleverly moved the email with the details into a separate folder on my home computer, and thus can't check it via webmail.

I've got a couple of things.

First thing, slow down. You'll be nervous, and when you're nervous you tend to speed up, and your pitch goes up. Chipmunks on speed. Okay, maybe not that bad. But reminding yourself to slow down, even if you think you sound like a stretched audiotape? Is good.

Second thing, try to remember to hit your consonants. Again, when you're nervous you tend to swallow your consonants, particularly ones at the ends of words. In fact, the syllable at the end of sentences is in severe jeopardy. So slow down, and make sure you have enough breath behind your last syllable to actually get it out, and be aware of your consonants.

Other than that? You're all vibrant, articulate people. Go, talk, be brilliant!

Rehearsing is good -- especially if you can find a way to record it for review. Slow down -- you will almost certainly be reading faster than you think you are. Remember to breathe.

See, dcp said it so much more eloquently than I--listen to him.

X-post! Hah! That's what I get for trying to post from my dinky little phone. Too slow.