As you may (or may not) know, I turned the Big 5-0 back in November. I decided to make Year 50 full of fabulousness that honors all the years that contributed to me being me, filling my year with lots of my favorite things. One of my favorite ways I've done this so far - just on a geeky, OCD I Love My Lists kind of way - was creating YouTube Playlists.
It started with my Birthday Playlist, which I created to play in the background of my intimate family birthday party. It's no question that music has played greatly into my life (and still does,) so I got this wild hair that I would create a playlist that plays one song from each year of my life. I researched all the Billboard lists from 1969 on, picking a song that I either loved, or was reflective of the era, (preferably both) to take the fam and me on a musical odyssey Through the Years (and that was what I named the playlist.)
Turns out it was such a hit, not just for me but for my fam as well, who got some insight into my taste and the music I loved, as well as introduced to the 70s and 80s culture, that I decided to keep going. Once I got to the current year, I started over again with one more song from each year (which was a little harder the second time around, I won't lie.) This kind of forced me to be a little more creative, which I love. I'm working next on a Through the Year - Favorite Videos list, which I'm not going to be as religious about with only one song per year, because it's video and some years between 69-78 don't have them and some years I didn't really have video favorites, while some years I can't really choose between a handful of great ones I can't bear to leave off the list.
All of this put a bug in my ear to do a TTY list for all of you, featuring all the music that has driven my writing. I wanted to start this in February, since I always like to do heavy promotional stuff in February. Over the next month I'll be sharing this list daily (hopefully, cuz, y'know - life,) and over the month I'll be doing free books and all kinds of goodies, like Amazon giftcards etc that will be directly related to the information provided on this list.
Basically, there will be a test. But I'll make it totally worth it. ;)
ANYHOO.. we'll get this started right where it started: at the beginning... in the 1960s.
One of the earlier influences, literally, came for one of my earliest books. I always had a love/hate relationship with Country Western music due to its prevalence in my childhood. My parents LOVED Country/Western music (which, you should understand, looked a LOT different than today's Country.) It was twangy and COUN.TRY, and I (mostly) rejected it as my parents' music.
From a very early age I preferred things with a more rock feel, so much so that initially I didn't like the song The Devil Went Down to Georgia, because I felt like it was reinforcing this idea that rock music was inherently evil. I rejected that as a nine-year-old. I reject it now. But there were some songs that got through my Rock Snob filter, and one of them was from Patsy Cline.
Technically I think the reason it got through was that it was written by Willie Nelson, and he's just cool no matter what type of music you like. But this song is the epitome of unrequited love. It's a theme I have explored at length in my books, so I leaned on it heavily to create a mood for UNDER TEXAS SKIES.
I initially came up for the concept for UTS in the 1990s, which was when I started to write it. As a lifelong reader of romance, I explored all the tropes I had come to love as I pieced together my story. There was the angst of not knowing if the person you loved loved you back (because I'm a freaking scholar in such things.) I made their relationship contentious because I personally dig the fight for power between two strong characters. I grew up loving the rogue-vs-the-stubborn-good-girl and wanted to bring that to life in this story, complete with a marriage of convenience AND surprise baby. I threw it all against the wall because I really wanted to write a romance honoring all those books I grew up loving.
I finished writing it as the 20th century wound to a close, and tweaked it later for publication. It's a one-off in that it resolves in the first book, but I did bring a character from this book into the Groupieverse. Not so ironically, it was the one who sang Patsy Cline's iconic tune at the ill-advised wedding:
Imagine dancing close with a sexy someone that you can only love for a moment, where forever isn't guaranteed. That's what this song meant to me and to my protagonist, Jessica, and that's what I wanted to bring into the scene.
Enter Patsy Cline/Willie Nelson.
We also had to reach into the 1960s for the next little ditty. I say we because honest to God, it wasn't me doing the reaching:
Here's the thing about writing, at least for me. It comes with a LOT of discovery in the process. I can outline every sentence and every letter, but eventually - particularly if I've done my job right - those characters will take shape and live and breathe and often tell me their secrets in beautiful and surprising ways.
Such was the case in my book MASTERS FOR HIRE.
For those who don't know the story of this book, it all started because my bestie asked me the moral hypothetical question: Would you ever hire a male escort?
I think I may have balked initially, but it was brief. Instantly I started to think about it. Can you imagine hiring a person to do everything you want them to do and having them ACTUALLY do it? Any scenario you want to play, any service you want performed - you could have it all, no questions asked, no strings required, IF the price was right.
That's got a certain level of appeal, rather than tossing the dice on regular guys who quite often don't understand what you need and don't care enough to find out. My past is littered with disappointing encounters because in our culture quite a few guys are conditioned to believe that their pleasure is paramount. In my lifetime, we've watched sexual culture change from women begrudgingly performing wifely duties to women both liking, pursuing and owning their own sexual satisfaction.
Women are no longer giving in to their spouse because men like it more than us and if we don't want them to stray, we have to keep them happy. We've come to the place where we can love it every bit as much and pursue it every bit as freely.
Unfortunately this still comes with some cultural backlash in many circles. Sadly the concept of slut is still alive and well. So, when the bestie asked me this question it became something I really wanted to explore from the female perspective. I didn't want a whole Pretty Woman thing, where the "lady of the night" was trying to find true love. I wanted a story where a wealthy woman wanted to get hers and was surprised by love along the way.
Instead, I was the one who was surprised by Devlin Masters, the male escort who wedged his way into my protagonist Coralie's life and made all her dreams, seemingly, come true.
When I started, I didn't know much about Devlin beyond the fact he was Irish (as in, born in Ireland and has the Irish brogue) and he had a complicated history that brought him to his unconventional profession. I knew going into it that he would be behind the eight ball a little bit, with the scars to show for it. But I had NO idea the details that would flesh him out into an interesting 3D human until they just happened to be in a hotel suite complete with a piano and the guy sat down on the bench and expertly played this for Coralie's best friend, Lucy:
My honest-to-God reaction was, "Oh, you're a pianist! Look at you!"
Honestly, Devlin had plenty of surprises up his sleeve that included LOTS of music (including classical!) You'll be seeing his influence in the coming month, including one of the coolest writing song moments of my entire life - but we'll get to that story later. Stay tuned. (It WILL be on the test.)
The last song from the 1960s is from the I was born, 1969, and technically kicks off our Through the Years - Writing Edition. You can't be a sixties baby girl from Texas and not be influenced in some way by rock goddess Janis Joplin. And I totally was inspired by her and her famous diddy, which absolutely brings out the frustrated wannabe singer in me:
Normally I write about sexy rocker boys. It's a preference and I'm quite shameless about it. But this song helped me create a SOUTHERN ROCKER CHICK in Lacy Abernathy, who was born with rock and roll in her soul.
We meet Lacy initially in SOUTHERN ROCKER BOY, where she is the tough as nails rocker bitch that our protagonist Jonah finds himself drawn to. This country boy finds himself on a big music stage in Austin with this reluctant star, who doesn't want people to tell her what to sing or what to wear... she just wants to perform because singing is life to her. He was never supposed to be part of the plan, and doesn't take it too well when she finds her professional life tied with his.
Because I was exploring the concept of "Three Sides to Every Story: His Side, Her Side and the Cold Hard Truth," we don't find out what has made her so hard around the edges until Book 2, which some folks might skip because they think it's the same story in SRB but from her perspective. (It isn't, at least... not until the last third of the book.)
To be quite honest with you, SRC is one of my favorites of all of my books.
I mean, they're all my favorites to a certain degree, but when I read SRC I feel like I'm reading all the books I grew up loving, kind of a mix between Danielle Steel and VC Andrews, both of whom I read like a maniac as a YA. Their influences are strongly felt in SRC. It honestly breaks my heart more people haven't read it or lightly skip over it, because I love Lacy and going on her journey with her was one of my favorite writing experiences.
Which is kind of true of so many of the books we're going to talk about in the coming month. Those books where I have definitive soundtracks are my most unsung.
Welcome to February, folks. I'm about to start singing. Follow along and check out my official Facebook page for upcoming details how to earn a $100 Amazon Gift Card.
