SPEAKER_01 0:00

When people hear you should not do something in writing, please question it. Like I'm always having to like undo that with people who have the shoulds. So hearing the you shouldn't edit as you go is coming from people who probably shouldn't edit as they go because they're not wired to edit as they go. But for people who are, if you don't edit as you go and you feel the urge to, then you can write yourself into a corner and get endlessly stuck because you didn't fix the thing in the background.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

Welcome to the Write It Scared podcast. I'm your host, Stacy Fraser, a formally repressed creative soul, turned fiction writer, story editor, and author accelerator certified fiction book coach. At Write It Scared, we tell the truth about why writing a novel is so hard by acknowledging that most writers grapple with two stories. The one they want to put on the page to the best of their ability, and the often subconscious internal story that prevents them from doing it. This show is designed to help you identify and rewrite the internal narrative holding you back while you discover and write the story you want to tell and learn all the tools to help you do that successfully. Join me each week for a new episode where we'll talk about writing to deepen our understanding of the craft and of ourselves as writers. Writing a novel is an inside job that we do not do alone. Welcome to Write It's Scared. I'm glad you're here. Let's dive in. Hi, writer, welcome back to the Write It Scared podcast. I'm your host, Stacey, and this is episode number 28. Today I'm talking with romance author Ronnie Lauren, who is a two-time Rita Award winner, a Holt medallion winner, and a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author. Ronnie is also a Gallup Strength Certified Coach, and she coaches with the Better Faster Academy. She is my strengths coach, and I have the pleasure of working with Ronnie about once a month. So you're here just talking a bit about the Clifton strengths and how they apply to us as writers, which is a lot of fun. Ronnie is a fantastic person and just a delight, and I can't wait to bring her on the show. I'm gonna read her bio and then we will jump into the interview. Ronnie wrote her first romance novel at age 15 when she discovered writing about boys was easier than actually talking to them. Since then, her flirting skills haven't improved, but she likes to think her storytelling has. She holds a master's degree in social work and has spent years as a mental health counselor. But now she writes full-time in her cozy office in North Texas, where she puts her characters on the therapy couch instead. Thank you so much for coming on the show today, Ronnie. I already gave you a little bit of a bio, but please share with our listeners a bit more about your journey to becoming a writer. That would be great.

SPEAKER_01 2:37

Sure. So I've been doing this a while. I started to write in 2010, technically, but the first book, quote unquote, book I wrote was when I was 16. I did a really, you know, terrible New Kids on the Block fanfiction novel before fanfiction was like a thing because you know the internet wasn't quite what it is now.

SPEAKER_00 2:56

But yes, I just gave you a huge like thumbs up and we just dated ourselves like slow.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

Yes. So early I knew I wanted to be a writer, but I'm a practical type. So of course, like once I got to college, I was like, I should probably do something that would like actually give me a job that will make money so that I could pay rent and things. So went and got a psychology degree at a master's of social work, did that for a while and you know, did therapy and worked with adoption and all kinds of things. And then when I had my son, I decided to stay home. And that was the first time kind of the writing bug had time to come back because I had been so busy with school and everything, and reading came back to me. I had sort of put reading that wasn't academic reading aside. So I wrote a YA paranormal novel that did not sell. So I call that my practice novel. And I always encourage everyone to have a practice novel. You got to have one like get out of the way. And then the second one I wrote, I fell in love with romance and did a contemporary romance. That one also didn't sell first, wrote an erotic romance. The third one was Crash Into You. That got the agent in the book deal. And the second book I wrote eventually ended up getting a deal. So never give up on the ones that were in the drawer. Sometimes they do get a second life. But yeah, and I've been doing that since. I've written erotic romance, contemporary romance. So those are the two main genres I've been in.

SPEAKER_00 4:18

Thank you for sharing that. It's just always so cool to hear people's origin stories. And what I love about them is, you know, when we hear how many books are in the trunk, how many didn't necessarily fly. This is a long game. You have to practice. Those things are practiced. So yeah. Okay. Well, I'd love to talk about your series, The Ones Who Got Away, if if you're up for it, I'm currently reading it. So tell us the premise behind this and what it's about and how you came to write it. Sure.

SPEAKER_01 4:50

So the Ones Who Got Away series is currently being reissued in trade paperback because it originally came out in the smaller mass market. But this series, I had read Columbine by Dave Cullen, like the story. And I graduated in 1997. I'm seriously dating myself now, but Columbine happened in 99. So it was very, you know, just part of my history and reading the book really inspired me. And I thought, what happens after the news story? So we see people in the news stories, we see them for the brief time that they're breaking news, and then people have to go on with their lives, the people that are the survivors. So I wanted to write a story about survivors of something like that and give them happy endings. That's where the story came from. Now, pitching, hey, I'm going to write a contemporary romance series with a school shooting backstory, because that is the backstory of these characters, was an interesting pitch to have to do. But luckily, my editor at SourceBooks loved the idea and kind of saw the vision for it with me and you know got behind it. And it's been, you know, a real journey kind of seeing people read it and it's going through its second phase now with a new edition. And so yeah, it was, it's a deeply emotional story. I call it like rom drum, I guess, is the closest. It's definitely not rom-com, but it's still a happy story. So I tell people not to be afraid of the backstory. These characters are coming out of trauma, and you know, it's been 10 years and they are in the healing phases. Not that you ever, you know, can totally get past that, but you know, that's kind of where the story idea came from.

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Yeah. Yeah. I'm reading the first one. It's really, really beautiful. And thank you. The chemistry is just amazing. I've read several of your books, and I would say that is the thing that always grabs me right at first is the chemistry between the love interests. So, what is it about romance that draw, you know, why are you drawn to write about write about that?

SPEAKER_01 6:36

So I didn't grow up a romance reader despite the new kids on the block fanfiction, which was definitely romantic, but I grew up reading suspense and horror of all things. Um, and I still like that. But when I had my son and was staying home, I think I was looking for escape and something not too heavy. And so I found romance via that was like the Twilight Years. So so I found it via Paranormal Romance Way. That's why the first book I wrote was that. Then I'm like, oh, they have this whole genre of books that really I haven't explored, which didn't make sense for me because I love rom-coms. I grew up loving like all the romantic teen shows, you know, Dawson's Creek and Felicity and all those shows. Oh so I always loved romance. I just didn't like connect it to, I think, the stigma of like the bodice ripper covers and all of that. I just never, my mom wasn't a romance reader, so it wasn't around the house. But I once I found it, like there was no going back. I'm like, oh, this is, you know, fantastic. They get happy endings and it's escapist, but you can really dig into character because I'm a character-driven writer. So it, you know, things that were intricate plots. I'm like, I don't need to write that.

SPEAKER_00 7:43

You you have several series out in the world for, I think. And one of them sounds like it's very much romantic suspense. Like there is a significant mystery going on, and I believe that's the Loving on the Edge series, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:57

So the very first one, Crash Into You, has a suspense thread. And it kind of was marketed, like we sold it to Penguin as sort of romantic, erotic romantic suspense. And I don't know if I could ever do it again. Like, I don't know. I think I just had that story idea and it worked for that story. But like since then, if you're looking for suspense in my novels, don't go looking for beyond that book. Okay. Yeah, I went straight up romance after that. But yeah, I think I needed a way in. And I thought looking at the market at the time, it seemed like that was kind of a vibe that was really selling. So I put the suspense thread in. Didn't know at the time I wasn't a plotter yet. So I was still on the early journey of writing of like, you know, how do you do this? So yeah, too much plotting and I get myself in trouble.

SPEAKER_00 8:43

I can relate to that. I'm relating to that right now as a matter of fact. But how do you keep the romance stories fresh? There's a form, a very strong form to romance, right? So how do you keep coming up with new things and new angles and new avenues to explore?

SPEAKER_01 9:01

I think for me, it comes back to characters. So since I'm so character driven, like that's where the story is guided from for me. So I really want to put my characters like on a therapy couch. You know, the therapist, my former therapist comes in of like, what is your wound? And what do you believe yourself to be? And what's your real, you know, kind of who you are that you don't realize, and all of those things. And so I think when you have very individual characters, not I'm hoping none of my characters are the same, like they're hopefully nuanced. Then if you put them in something that is a trope, because you know, romance has trope. So if it's I've written a number of friends to lovers stories, I've written enemies to lovers, you know, those kinds of things. But if they're different people in that story, then the trope is just kind of the structure holding it together and the familiarity for the reader of like, I like a friends to lover story, so they'll pick it up. But, you know, hopefully you twist it a little bit or you flip the genders on it, or you know, but the person is so different from the other friends to lover story that it doesn't feel like the same story because all of our romances in our own lives have some sort of trope, right? Like mine was true. Like a little I met my husband on the internet before it was a thing to do that, you know, and so the long distance thing was a trope for us. So I think we all recognize tropes because they exist in real life. So it makes sense to read them in books.

SPEAKER_00 10:21

I have so many questions, which is part for the course. So you, you know, your background in psychology and counseling, I'm sure really helps you. Like you said, you put your characters on the couch. For a writer who doesn't have that kind of background, do you have any advice or anything you would recommend to be able to and they are writing romance and they are coming up, trying to come up with fresh angles and fresh ways to approach anything you could recommend to help them build character-driven stories or to dig into their characters to build the build them out so they they can then apply the trope and twist it as appropriate for the character.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

First, I would say figure out if you are a character-driven writer, because you might have to reverse engineer if you're not. So if you're plot-driven, you might need to find the characters that fit your plot, and then you can work backwards to get what kind of character would be best for this plot. If you're character driven, I look for things like if they were coming in and you were a therapist, even though you have no therapy skills, you don't have to have therapy skills for this, and you get that initial history, like when the person first comes in, tell me about your life, tell me about what's, you know, whatever. Like, do that with your characters. What is the thing that happened to them in their childhood that has never left them? You know, those kinds of things. What is what is the wound? And then everybody has kind of an identity that we put. This is from Michael Haig's stuff, feed writing stuff. So that identity part of what do we show to the world? Every character has that. So you can look at how do they present to the world, but who are they really underneath? And the character may not know, you might know as the writer. Like, what are they hiding? What are they ashamed of? All of those things we don't want to tell other people. That's what you want to know about your character, all their secrets. You know, we talk about flaws, but for me, the flaw doesn't work as well. Like my characters are flawed, but I look at it through a different lens of like, what hurt you? What happened to you that has made you scared or ashamed?

SPEAKER_00 12:16

And how do you protect yourself?

SPEAKER_01 12:17

Yes. And so what are you doing in your life? And what when have you had a chance to overcome that and you didn't? Usually your characters have tried a couple of times. Like if they're like, I'm never falling in love, it's because they've been burned in it, or I'm never trusting someone again, it's because they've been burned in it. So knowing the background, and you don't need to put all this background in the book. So we don't need three chapters of backstory, right? But you need to know it sometimes as the writer. So that's the stuff you can write down in your notes, or you can write it in your chapters and delete it later, you know, for yourself just to get into the story. But, you know, just think about your own journey in your own life. Like you've overcome things and you've had wounds that hit you, or things in childhood that still stick with you. Like your character should have those things too. And no character is going to have the same story just like no person does. So that gives you a different nuanced character to go put into whatever trope if you're using tropes you want to put them into.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

I love that. And one of the things that I've started to do just for myself to apply this is you know, look out at the people in my sphere, in my world who I notice that behave a certain way. And I ask myself, I wonder why. And then like I kind of go backwards. But I kind of have to start with an outside pillar. If I try to build somebody from the inside out in a way, it doesn't work for me as well. So take that for what you will.

SPEAKER_01 13:47

Yeah, no, it's a great tip. You can do it too with like TV characters and movie characters too, of like looking at them and like why.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

Or what would happen if they were different?

SPEAKER_01 13:56

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Or what would happen in this situation if you put them in this, you know, totally opposite environment or something, how would they react? But yeah, and then I'm nerdy. I have worksheets that I have, like every writing book that I read that I really like something from, I'll make a worksheet. So before I start writing, I have all these character worksheets that I've developed from other people's stuff, not my own stuff, but like that I fill out and you know, you gotta find your own process, and my process is very nerdy.

SPEAKER_00 14:23

I love that. And that's another another question I had is how did you discover that you were a character-driven writer versus a plotter?

SPEAKER_01 14:31

So that was I every other aspect of my life, I'm very organized. I have three planners sitting in front of me as we talk here. You know, I am that person. So I thought for sure I would be some like detailed plotter. Personality-wise, it would look like I would be. And then when I sat down and did it, I figured out if I plotted, I had already told myself the story. And now I'm bored. You know, we might talk about Clifton Strengths in here, but I didn't know at the time that my number one strength is learner, which I think is yours too. And so, yeah. So we don't like to be bored, we like to discover things and always be growing in new stuff. And I needed to do that in the story. So I didn't know, you know, about strengths starting. I but I did discover before that, like, okay, I need to start with character and I need to be a pantser or whatever you want to call, you know, version of it of finding my way via the character of what's gonna happen in the story. Now I was selling to New York, so you have to give a synopsis when you sell the book. So what I would do is I would write what I thought was gonna happen in the story and sell it to my editor and tell her, so this is what I think will happen. Everything beyond the setup will probably change. Just warning you know, and she was okay with that, but all the editors I've had have been okay with that. So I can pretty much think past just the setup, the first third, and then after that, I have to write into it and see like now what will these characters do that they've so it was trial and error, and I think every book can be different a little bit. So I think people need to know you're never going to find your solid process that works for every book, and that's okay.

SPEAKER_00 16:05

And for people who like certainty, it is really painful, it really is. But yeah, and then you know, books take what they take. Yeah, cool. Well, thank you for answering those questions. It's fascinating to hear about other people's process and how they, you know, came to I don't know, just kind of an acceptance about them, where they are. So a big part of this podcast is dedicated to telling the truth about why writing a novel is hard and not just all the nuts and bolts of it, right? But the internal piece that makes it hard. So would you please share a time about when the writing has gotten hard, when you struggled, what it was like, and what helped you get through it.

SPEAKER_01 16:49

So writing is always hard for me, pretty much always. I'm a really slow drafter. So the only easy part of writing for me is editing and revising. I can revise and edit a book in two weeks, but it will take me six to eight months to get my first draft, quote unquote first draft finished because I'm an edit as I go person. And I cannot, I've learned that I cannot write forward if there's something in the back that I need to go fix. So I do a lot of going back and rereading and writing forward some and then having to jump back three chapters and reread and write forward some. So it's a painful, slow process, but it does get me to where I need to go. And then when I'm ready to edit, it's pretty much been edited. And you usually once I send it to my editor, I don't get a lot of major changes back, which is nice, but I hate drafting still. So like I always hate it because I because it I don't have a plot ahead, right? Like, so it's very just tedious and going a long way. Now, a time that it got the hardest, I did hit burnout in 2022. I had been under a deadline for 11 years, and which was a blessing. So I know when we're all trying to get published, like that is a blessing that I had a contract, you know, going for that long. But being under deadline for that long, never having a time when I wasn't pushing against a deadline meant I was always working. I didn't want to take vacations. I was squeezing and writing time, you know, I was grumpy if I couldn't go write and do had to go do things with my family, like all of those things that will lead to burnout. And so I kind of hit the wall in 2022 when I finished a contract. I finished the third book in um the series that starts with Yes and I Love You. And I told my publisher, I'm not signing a new contract right now. I'm going to take a break. And I took a six-month sabbatical. And that was a challenge to do as someone who has been, you know, I like to be busy, I like to work, but I needed it because I had just hit no ideas were coming. I didn't even know if I wanted to be a writer anymore. Like all of those feelings that can come up with burnout. So it was really good to step back and just do other things for six months and read and rest. And I was still busy because I can't just sit, but I was doing other things that were not writing and taking the pressure off of getting another book out because I I just really needed the reboot. So that was probably the toughest time, and I'm happy to not be in burnout anymore. So that's why I coach people trying to prevent it for for them, you know, for other people, because it sucks.

SPEAKER_00 19:18

I I think I think that's why I'm so drawn to you too, because our strengths are very are similar and yeah, have the I have definitely have that drive to work into the dirt. Yeah. Yeah. Fun and cheavery things. I know. Do you have a later too in your top? That's probably why you edit as you go.

SPEAKER_01 19:40

It's in my top 10. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:41

It's in your top 10, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:44

Yeah. I struggle with that too. I tend to like to do edit as I go. And sometimes I'm always trying to like slap my own hand, but I think maybe I need to relax a little bit about it.

SPEAKER_01 19:56

But but anyway, I I would just say before we go into the next question, for that, when people hear you should not do something, like in writing, please question it. Like I'm always having to like undo that with people who, you know, they have the shoulds. So hearing the you shouldn't edit as you go is coming from people who probably shouldn't edit as they go because they're not wired to edit as they go. But for people who are, if you don't edit as you go and you feel the urge to, then you can write yourself into a corner and get endlessly stuck because you didn't fix the thing in the background. So, like your brain won't show you the rest because this thing back here is blocking the door. So if you have to edit as you go, even if it slows you down, it might be your process. So if you're out there listening and you feel you heard this, you should not edit as you go, you should just write until the end and push it out. Like, not all writers can do that, and not all writers should do that.

SPEAKER_00 20:50

Well said. Well said. You all can see why I go to strengths coaching. Okay. So when you look back on your own writing life, what did self-doubt look like for you initially? And has it changed over the years?

SPEAKER_01 21:05

But I think it's always there at some level. Our number one strength also was the most with imposter syndrome. So yes. But I think most writers have imposter syndromes at some point. Early on, it was because when I first started, indie publishing really wasn't a thing. I mean, it it was, but it was a small part of the market still. So New York was the game, right? And it was, it's such a hard game to break into. So that feeling up front of like, can I actually do this? Can I actually land an agent? Can I get a publisher to look at it? Felt I felt very impostery, you know, then. And I had gone through, I had gotten a book rejected, like that first one I wrote, and gone through all those nice letters, the form letters. And then you get excited when it's a rejection that's not a form, but it's still a rejection. You know, but it's like, this was great, but so that was probably the initial one. But since every time I go into something new, I still feel it again. So, and I think it's a double edged sword. So I I hate the feeling, but also I think that's what can drive me because a new thing is a new challenge. It's a new thing to learn. So when I switched from erotic romance to contemporary romance, I had that feeling of like, who's going to trust me with more mainstream contemporary romance? Like I've been writing this other thing. And then now I've just written a nonfiction proposal. I can't talk about the details of it, but it's on submission with New York. So now I'm going through all over again, like, who am I to write a nonfiction book? And they don't know me from anybody because I write fiction and they don't nonfiction editors are different. So when I started coaching, who am I to coach someone? You know, so all of each time. But I think that's also what makes me want to work really hard and do better and learn everything I can and be the best at it, you know, I can be at it. So if I didn't have that, if I just thought, yeah, I know how to do this, then I don't want to do it. And that can get me in trouble sometimes too. Like sometimes I don't want to write what I've already written or stay in my lane, you know, because all the marketing advice is like stay in a lane and stay in a genre or subgenre and stay in a series. And like, I really don't want to.

SPEAKER_00 23:09

I don't either. I don't, I don't either. Which is interesting because you write romance, but I think there's so many subcategories that you can play with there that you know, maybe that can appease the learner in you, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, uh good luck on the nonfiction book proposal. Keep your finger keep my fingers crossed for you. And I definitely agree. Like, I don't know, did this ever happen to you like when you were in school? I would study until I bled. Because what if I didn't know it? Right.

SPEAKER_01 23:45

Yeah. Yeah. I think when you're somebody who loves to learn or has the strength of learning or learner, it's we're always aware there's more of a learning curve, that there's not an end to it. So it's like we're always trying to just get a little further on that curve and it's an impossible goal. So it drives us to we usually know more about the subject than most people because we've been, you know, like my book, Yes and I Love You has an improv actor in it. Now, improv is not something I've done, and it's not something I would ever, ever do. It's my worst nightmare, the thought of improv. But I read like three or four like books on improv, like how to do improv and all the history of improv. I'm like, I don't need all of this to write an improv hero, but I I did it anyway because it's like I want to know, I don't want to get it wrong. I don't want to be that person who they're like, well, I'm an improv actor and I read this book and she got this all wrong. So yeah, it's, you know, you never feel like you know enough.

SPEAKER_00 24:42

So I just think it's a great example of, you know, strengths can become weaknesses if, you know, we're out of balance, right? And and if we don't have a system of checks and balances set up to help us temper. I think that's what's really key about being in community with other people and who really know you and really can look at your face and go, uh-oh, something's wrong there. You don't have to say anything, they just look at your face, like, uh oh, something's wrong. So I think a writing community or working with a coach or you know, being involved in some kind of group in the writing world is really important.

SPEAKER_01 25:17

Yeah. For sure. It's a really lonely job otherwise.

SPEAKER_00 25:21

Yeah, very, yeah, it can't it can it can be, especially the creative part process part of it. It's like, you know, especially when you're starting to struggle and fight your battles, that's when it gets lonely for me. When it when I'm writing, it's not so much, but when I'm when I'm not when it's not coming, then I want a couch. I'd rather talk to. Right. For sure. I didn't used to be like that. I thought I had to do it all on my own, but I just I've learned there's an easier, softer way. Okay. So what gives you the most joy and satisfaction when it does come to writing? You said revision. You love revision.

SPEAKER_01 25:56

I do love revision and I do love hitting flow. I mean, you know, it doesn't always happen when I want it to, but it's the best feeling when you kind of get into it and you know, you've written a scene and it all just fell onto the page and you can walk away and feeling good. Or when I wrote this recent proposal, like the proposal ended up being like 60 pages, but I wrote it in like a week and I just felt like that rush of new project, new thing, and like exciting possibilities. And so I think the creativity part of it always has magic to it. It's just until I get to the middle of the book and hate life and everybody in it in every chapter and want to dump it in the trash.

SPEAKER_00 26:32

It's not the fun part. I love it when we get to the point where we've given our characters this internal backstory. And you're like, no, that actually isn't what's going on with me. And you need to fix this.

SPEAKER_01 26:45

Or I'm not gonna do this thing that you wanted me to do next. Yeah, I don't do that.

SPEAKER_00 26:48

Yeah. All right. So what is your wish for fellow writers out there who might be struggling?

SPEAKER_01 26:56

So one of the things you already said was community. I think reach out to other writers and surround yourself with people to know that you're not alone and that you're not broken in some way because you're stuck in your writing or that you're not, you know, stupid because you don't know how to do something. Like we all have been there or we all are there regularly, you know, that we feel this way. So talking to other writers, obviously I'm a strengths coach, so I think strengths can be a game changer for people. It was for me. Knowing what your magic superpowers are as a writer is a and strengths can get at that. Really has can be transformative of like, oh, you're doing this thing that your friend told you works for them, but they're completely wired different from you. And when you hear, like, actually, no, you should do it, you know, this way, and this would play to your strengths, like it's like, oh, this makes so much more sense. So I wish everybody, you know, could kind of get that insight at least, whatever method they want, if it's strengths, if it's enneogram, if it's, you know, have whatever personality thing works for you. Um, just that self-insight can really help not feel like you should be doing it one way and it's just not you're not doing it right.

SPEAKER_00 28:05

Thank you. So what are you currently working on?

SPEAKER_01 28:08

So while I wait for this nonfiction proposal, I do have the reissues of the Ones Who Got Away series. So the first two are out, which is the Ones Who Got Away, and then One You Can't Forget. They have beautiful new covers, and then the third and fourth will be out soon. But I love newsletters, so I have two newsletters. I have my author one, which is RonnieLoren.substack.com. And then I have one just for writers since there are writers listening to this, that's called the Nourish Writer. So where I talk about, you know, basically the health and wellness of writers mentally, the the nourished writer.substack.com. So those are the easiest places to find me because I'm I try to do very little social media to project the writing brain for me.

SPEAKER_00 28:48

So perfect. Okay. Well, thank you so much for your time today for just coming on and being honest and vulnerable about your process and when you struggled. And you know, I believe that hearing other people's stories is how we create empathy for our own selves because things resonate. So I appreciate your time and can't wait for nonfiction proposal and look forward to reading more of your books. All right. Thanks, Stacy. Thanks so much for having me. Oh, absolutely. And I will make sure to include a link to all of your Substack newsletters in the show notes. Thank you for listening to the Ride It Scared podcast. If you enjoyed today's show, please make sure to hit the follow button so you never miss an episode. And please leave a review. Reviews help other writers like you find the voices and messages they need to hear to continue to write their stories. Let's lift each other up. Remember, you can be scared and still be unstoppable. I'll see you next week.