Your next novel gets you a $1,000,000 advance.

Buy a whole bunch of lottery tickets.

If the novel was completed and accepted as is? Probably take a few weeks off and take a little vacation. Charge up my creative-writing cells.

Then sell my condo and buy a house somewhere conducive to some serious writing and get busy.

I said I'd run and scream, but mostly I'd just stay in a catatonic shock state for at least a year.

I'd dance a lot, too.

After reading John Elder Robison's account of what happens to a million dollar advance, I'd keep my day job for a while and crank out some more novels.

I'd so go on a vacation. I really want to go to New Zealand. I'd probably also take my friends and family out for a meal.

Then I'd put the rest in savings. Because I am boring.

After I picked myself up off the floor from fainting, I'd run outside screaming and dancing, then I'd realize it was probably a practical joke and start plotting my evil revenge on the prankster.

I vote for a state of catatonic shock, for sure.

First, I would tell my husband. Then, I would hire a tax specialist so I would have more of that money left to spend.

After I could breathe again, I'd pick myself up off the floor and tell Hubby.

Then I'd begin making plans to pay off the house and figure out how much money to put in the bank so I could live off the interest (hopefully.)

Then, Hubby would probably want to celebrate with dinner out. I'm not sure that would be a good idea, because I'd probably be all dopey from excitement and disbelief.

Then, I'd spend a lot of time daydreaming about my new future.

Phone an accountant, figure out how to make the most of the dosh.

Get the feck outta this town and move somewhere where it rains and stuff.

Well to be honest, there is nothing I want, or want to do that I am not able to do for myself or family now. So, I'll just start on the next book. I already work 2 jobs and wrote my first novel (rather quickly for the first time I wrote selfishly - outside of work). Writing is like, vacation to me. So, I'll put the money in the bank (or some investments) then keep writing, cause truthfully 1 million doesn't go that far. Just add up how much you have earned (before taxes) in your lifetime, then you will realize that you have probably already made your 1st million.

1) Pass out

2) Cry in a heap on the floor because I'd just realized I'd never have to work a day in my life.

XX

After some shrieking, I'd call up a realtor and start looking for a nice apartment or house to buy. And I'd pay cash!

Tell my kids that they can go to the colleges of their choice without having loans. (This is imminent; my 17yo is at this moment deciding between a private $$$ school with loans or a state school without them. He's been accepted to both.)

Pay off the house.
Pay off the credit cards.
Pay off the cars.

Then start the next novel.

Dance. Badly.

Then call the hubby, and start work on the next book. I doubt I'd see any money from that for quite some time, so we'd have plenty of time to decide what to do.

Tell the agent I love her, and put the money into savings.

Now that is the perfect occasion to go out and eat some sushi!

TTCleveland said:

By the grace of the Fates, you write a novel and Penguin agrees to publish it. Your agent (somehow) negotiates your advance to one million dollars.

What's the first thing you do?

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I wake up. I discover that it is six o'clock in the morning, meaning I slept too long. I quickly make breakfast for my car pool and rush out the door so that I can drive to three houses in the pitch dark of night. Later, after wrestling with rush hour traffic, I'll find a parking spot at the school that is, at bare minimum, one hundred yards from my first class -- which will be starting in six minutes.

I will then realize that I left my binder full of blank paper at home, meaning that I have nothing to take notes on. I'll arrive two minutes late, winded and gasping, to discover that the teacher has locked the door. I will pray to wake up, but I only wake up from $1,000,000 book deals.

With luck, the sweet release of death will keep me from working on my poor abused novel later that evening.

Move. We're tired of being smushed between two houses. I want space and privacy. Then my husband would tell me to hurry up and write another book.

Pay off my student loans. Pay off my car. Get my fiance a new car. Buy a house. Put the rest to college for my MA and savings if any is left. Work on the next novel. Don't tell anyone I have a lot of money.

Pay off tuition and student loans while laughing hysterically.

Worry. I'll never make this advance back, and no publisher will ever give me the time of day again. The end of my career.

Pay off my loans.

Probably my brother's loans, too, just to be nice.

After that, eat a cake.

Then nap.

Then get back to work?

Palmfrond said:

Worry. I'll never make this advance back, and no publisher will ever give me the time of day again. The end of my career.

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This is the reason I would ask them to not give me that much. If I make a million on royalties, great. If not, well then I'm pretty much screwed with an advance like that, no?