Jessica Titone's Blog - Posts Tagged "twilight"
Soundtracks
Lately I’ve been traveling for work. I teach at a virtual K-12 school. It’s a cool job, but that’s another story. Anyway, our students live in all corners of the state of Louisiana. So three times a year, we get in a van and drive around the state conducting benchmark reading and math tests for the elementary students. During this time, I do a lot of riding in vans and staying in hotel rooms. The hotel rooms are great for writing, but I’m someone who’s easily carsick, the car rides are not. So, I sit in the backseat, sunglasses on, headphones streaming music into my ears as I stare out of the window at the trees lining the interstate.
My free time on this trip has been split between editing the hell out of Watermarked and writing its sequel. Immersed in the process of doing this, I chose music that aligned itself with my books and the characters in it. To understand why this is so important to me, or even where I’m going with this, I’ll have to start at the beginning. Strangely enough, this means I’ll have to divulge a deep dark secret about myself.
Deep breath.
Okay, so here it is - I went through a phase where I actually liked the Twilight series. The first movie had just come out. I saw it and then found myself reading all of the books in one delicious gulp. The books have their faults, but they also fell into the realm of things that could be enjoyed without having to expend much brainpower. My interest in the series waned as quickly as it came on. It was literary “candy”, and turns out that if you eat enough of it, you’ll get sick. But for the course of a month, I lived and breathed Twilight.
One of the things that fascinated me was Stephenie Meyer, herself. Here was a girl who had never before written a book. One day, she simply decided she was going to. So after long days of raising her kids, she stayed up late at night and powered through it. Girl didn’t write one book, but four. I mean, if nothing else, you have to admire her determination.
I was wading through the mire that was the ten years in which I cycled through stop and start phases of writing my own book. Hearing Stephenie’s story about how she created Twilight inspired a newfound determination to get Watermarked written. To aid in my venture, I became particularly interested in what she had to say about her process. Something that stuck out to me was her confession that she created soundtracks for each of her books, which she’d listen to as she wrote.
Now, I realize that this is not a new invention. I’m sure there were tons of writers besides Stephenie Meyer that created soundtracks. I’d always heard music that reminded me of a particular scene I’d written or encompassed Jack perfectly, but I never actually sat down and created a physical soundtrack for anything relating to my own novel. Being that Watermarked was more character-driven than plot-driven, I opted to create not one soundtrack – but four. One for each main character. (I’ve always had a knack for overdoing it, it seems.) The process of doing this helped the writing tremendously. It gave me something to occupy my brain while I was writing, but it also allowed me to dwell within the Watermarked landscape while I was away from the computer. Some of my best scenes were inspired by listening to one of the soundtrack songs as I was cruising down the interstate at 70 mph.
Music is so intrinsically tied to emotion that it communicates the mood of a scene or a sentiment far better than I ever could with words. Being able to hear what an author was listening to when he/she wrote something brings such a deeper level of understanding to the text. I adore when other authors share songs that inspired them. So that is what I aim to do:
In the following blog entries, I will attempt to tackle the musical inspirations behind the four main characters in the Watermarked series. (Yes, I’m calling it a series now, even though the two following books are light years away from being released.) There will be one post devoted to each character, in which I’ll create a shortened soundtrack, complete with the reasons behind why these songs/artists were chosen. I’ve always been a music nerd, so I am excited to share a different layer of my work with readers. I genuinely hope it will provoke some good discussion.
First up: Audrey.
My free time on this trip has been split between editing the hell out of Watermarked and writing its sequel. Immersed in the process of doing this, I chose music that aligned itself with my books and the characters in it. To understand why this is so important to me, or even where I’m going with this, I’ll have to start at the beginning. Strangely enough, this means I’ll have to divulge a deep dark secret about myself.
Deep breath.
Okay, so here it is - I went through a phase where I actually liked the Twilight series. The first movie had just come out. I saw it and then found myself reading all of the books in one delicious gulp. The books have their faults, but they also fell into the realm of things that could be enjoyed without having to expend much brainpower. My interest in the series waned as quickly as it came on. It was literary “candy”, and turns out that if you eat enough of it, you’ll get sick. But for the course of a month, I lived and breathed Twilight.
One of the things that fascinated me was Stephenie Meyer, herself. Here was a girl who had never before written a book. One day, she simply decided she was going to. So after long days of raising her kids, she stayed up late at night and powered through it. Girl didn’t write one book, but four. I mean, if nothing else, you have to admire her determination.
I was wading through the mire that was the ten years in which I cycled through stop and start phases of writing my own book. Hearing Stephenie’s story about how she created Twilight inspired a newfound determination to get Watermarked written. To aid in my venture, I became particularly interested in what she had to say about her process. Something that stuck out to me was her confession that she created soundtracks for each of her books, which she’d listen to as she wrote.
Now, I realize that this is not a new invention. I’m sure there were tons of writers besides Stephenie Meyer that created soundtracks. I’d always heard music that reminded me of a particular scene I’d written or encompassed Jack perfectly, but I never actually sat down and created a physical soundtrack for anything relating to my own novel. Being that Watermarked was more character-driven than plot-driven, I opted to create not one soundtrack – but four. One for each main character. (I’ve always had a knack for overdoing it, it seems.) The process of doing this helped the writing tremendously. It gave me something to occupy my brain while I was writing, but it also allowed me to dwell within the Watermarked landscape while I was away from the computer. Some of my best scenes were inspired by listening to one of the soundtrack songs as I was cruising down the interstate at 70 mph.
Music is so intrinsically tied to emotion that it communicates the mood of a scene or a sentiment far better than I ever could with words. Being able to hear what an author was listening to when he/she wrote something brings such a deeper level of understanding to the text. I adore when other authors share songs that inspired them. So that is what I aim to do:
In the following blog entries, I will attempt to tackle the musical inspirations behind the four main characters in the Watermarked series. (Yes, I’m calling it a series now, even though the two following books are light years away from being released.) There will be one post devoted to each character, in which I’ll create a shortened soundtrack, complete with the reasons behind why these songs/artists were chosen. I’ve always been a music nerd, so I am excited to share a different layer of my work with readers. I genuinely hope it will provoke some good discussion.
First up: Audrey.
