Jason walked me through the installation and operation of Veracrypt last night at PLUG MUG. Normally I can follow the kind of instructions posted, but there was some terminology that threw me through a loop. At any rate, I was able to set up a folder (called a volume in Veracrypt) and put files in it that I wanted encrypted. The next thing I tested was the effect of not properly unmounting the encrypted "volume"; i.e. ejecting it from the desktop and not unmounting it from a Veracrypt application window. This didn't hurt anything. I then tested it more severely by improper shutdown of my laptop while a "volume" was mounted. (To simulate an electrical power loss.) Again, no negative effect, but note that in both tests I didn't have any encrypted files open. I should try this with a file open next time.
Since I might have to access files in the encrypted folder from different platforms, that formed the basis of my next tests. I installed Veracrypt on a Mac OS partition on my iMac and on a Windows partition on my laptop. I had access to the files from both OSes and the operation was virtually the same on Linux, Mac or Windows.
My encrypted folder is stored in Dropbox so that I can access it from different devices. One of those devices I wanted to access it from is my Android tablet, and here is where I ran into a small problem. There is no version of Veracrypt for Android, but there is an Android program called EDS that allows access to Veracrypt "volumes". The free version, EDS lite, looks to work OK, but not on "volumes" stored on Dropbox. For this you need the paid version ($9.95). I stopped here because I'm not sure I actually need access to these files on my tablet and if I do, I can buy the app on the spot. The other way to access the files would be to store a hard copy on my tablet, but if I changed any file that way it wouldn't sync to my Dropbox versions.