Music & words

[pbray]

Over on fangs_fur_fey, Melissa Marr melissa_writing posted the following prompt, which intrigued me so I thought I'd share my answer here.

Pick one of your novels, screenplays, graphic novels, or short stories. List 3-6 song titles (& the artist singing the song) that will give a reader a taste of the tone of said novel.

Listening to music is an important part of my writing ritual, and in the early stages of each book I become obsessed with finding just the right CDs to inspire me.

While writing DEVLIN'S LUCK, I listened to Steve McDonald's Sons of Somerled over and over again. It was the perfect album to set the mood, filled with songs about living with despair and hardship, struggling to endure knowing that you will not live to see the fruits of any victory that you achieve.

From "I Will Return" where a man hopes to reunited at death with his lost love, to the lonely exile described in "Soldier's Lament" these were songs that didn't just evoke the mood of the book, they were songs that I could imagine Devlin had grown up hearing, and sang to himself when there was no risk that strangers could hear him.

For later books in the series I added other albums by Steve McDonald to the mix, but Sons of Somerled remains my favorite.

Cross-posted from fangs_fur_fey.

Comments

[vcmorris.livejournal.com]

"The Pride" certainly has a soundtrack, that being a series of Enya songs that I rearranged on a tape and retitled to fit the section or character the song corresponded to. Some of the songs matched the scenes so much that I can't listen to them to this day without having those scenes roll through my head again.

The Civil War/Erotica stuff is much more difficult to define musically.

I don't generally listen to music while I write so finding 3-6 song titles that will give the reader a taste of the tone of said novel is diffcult. I've thought of 2 but much like elizabeth_welsh commented, most people reading my blog would not have a clue what either of those two songs sound like.

I mean, that's what the meme is about, right? Not whether or not we listen to music while writing. :)

PS - Enjoying "The Sea Change" so far. Lucius has just been crowned the new Emperor.

[pbray.livejournal.com]

Cool, the lizard crown!

And true, the music we listen to while writing may not be songs that remind us of the book. For DEVLIN'S LUCK, it worked that way. For THE FIRST BETRAYAL, I wrote it while listening to CDs of Italian Renaissance music, mixed with Enya CDs on auto repeat. But songs that invoke the feeling of the story include Matchbox 20's BENT "Can you help me I'm bent/ I'm so scared that I'll never/ Get put back together" and 3 Doors Down's Kryptonite.