Photos for your Novels

[Alistair Roberts]

I have a selection of songs on the pc that I play when I'm writing, always have

 

[Jason Byrne]

You should... it really helps if you have to go out or if you can't write you can just listen and visualise.

Mines usually includes a LOT of Clanadonia, Evanescence, Fun, Nickleback, NIN, Marlin Manson, Metallica, Iron Maiden, Pink, Maroon 5, Kelly Clarckson, Sara Bareilles, Ke$ha, Icona Pop, Lady Gaga and some total random ones like the background track to Sam and the Womp, The Great Escape blah blah etc...

Mine is very Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings heavy (it's magic, after all), and also very Hans Zimmer soundtrack heavy for the epic component: Angels and Demons, Inception, the Last Samurai... Yiruma for the lighter dream sequences, Dead Space for the nightmarish magical monsters, Omnia for the realm of Arcadia, and then things like The Fountain, Life of Pi, Gravity, etc. Fifty-four donor albums, for 346 tracks on 13 soundtrack CDs of 5 books, totaling 13 hours, 59 minutes, and 34 seconds.

 

[Karen Gray]

Oh OH!!! I forgot! Look up Taylor Davies on Youtube... she is AWESOME. One of my 2nd series main characters takes some ques from her (though you won't know which until you read about it) She is a violinist and her stuff is amazing. She covers lots of things and composes herself too. I listen to a lot of her stuff

 

[Karen Gray]

Mine is very Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings heavy (it's magic, after all), and also very Hans Zimmer soundtrack heavy for the epic component: Angels and Demons, Inception, the Last Samurai... Yiruma for the lighter dream sequences, Dead Space for the nightmarish magical monsters, Omnia for the realm of Arcadia, and then things like The Fountain, Life of Pi, Gravity, etc. Fifty-four donor albums, for 346 tracks on 13 soundtrack CDs of 5 books, totaling 13 hours, 59 minutes, and 34 seconds.

If I go for soundtrack music it would be Tron, Narnia (pick one they are all good), Brave, Wreck it Ralph, Schindler's list, and many many MANY musicals because really, I am all performance arts at heart, though I no longer perform. It was all amateur really, but I lived for it. I may join the local theater group if I ever scrape together some time :/ hmmmmm


I get annoyed when composers reuse their music in lots of soundtracks. John Williams does it a lot... and whatshisface who did the Titanic album... I forget his name...

 

[Jason Byrne]

Oh OH!!! I forgot! Look up Taylor Davies on Youtube... she is AWESOME. One of my 2nd series main characters takes some ques from her (though you won't know which until you read about it) She is a violinist and her stuff is amazing. She covers lots of things and composes herself too. I listen to a lot of her stuff

Amazing. I'll be interested to see how that ties in.

 

[Karen Gray]

I'm just going to put this here... and run away!

 

[Alistair Roberts]

Oh my...to quote Captain Sulu, er, I mean George Takei. Thanks Karen

 

[David Steele]

The book I've just finished contains two songs which I can "hear" as clearly as if I were listening to a CD. I'm almost thinking about getting them produced to go into the audiobook.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

That's another good point, Katie-Ellen! I wonder how many people play a sad song when killing off a character, or heavy metal during when writing a fight scene?

I got a step further and put together a "soundtrack" to each of my books; it makes it feel more grounded, more real, somehow. I even made CD covers for the books, and named the audio files for the scenes of the book to which they correspond, so I can look at my iPod, see the CD cover of my book, and the name of the scene:

4 - Journey of the Kohrstadts - 4:28 - Santiago de Compostela - The Way
5 - Magic Training - 2:24 - The Whomping Willow and the Snowball Fight - HP & TPoA
6 - The Beacon Tree - 2:38 - from Fly Me to the Aegis Seven Moon (≤2:36) - Dead Space
7 - Return to Fallowdell - 3:27 - The Violet Hour - Barton Hollow

Yes, I have a 'novel' playlist. I think of it as a mood board. It's fun, isn't it If I can't get going, it can get me going, then once I'm going, I don't hear it anymore.

 

[Meerkat]

I like Lisa Gerrard for when I'm writing. She sings in glossolalia, so there's no distraction by lyrics, and her music is so otherwordly. If you haven't ever heard of her, she did the soundtrack for Gladiator.

I can't listen to anything with lyrics when I'm writing . . . I end up listening to the lyrics. Actually, until I had my office job, I couldn't bear any sort of music at all when I was writing. But at my old job, since it was an open floor plan, everyone around me was always talking, and I couldn't think, so I got used to listening to my iPod all day to block the chatter out.

 

[Jason Byrne]

The book I've just finished contains two songs which I can "hear" as clearly as if I were listening to a CD. I'm almost thinking about getting them produced to go into the audiobook.

You don't happen to play an instrument, do you? Like I mentioned, 'hearing' a song when reading only the printed lyrics in a book is the one thing I can't do — it sounds like a wailing, off-key mess. It would be amazing to see a video of the songs, and be able to hear the tune correctly the next time I read it.

 

[David Steele]

I sang with a Male Voice Choir for ages.
Actually, it was more of a drinking club that happened to sing a lot.

 

[Jason Byrne]

I sang with a Male Voice Choir for ages.
Actually, it was more of a drinking club that happened to sing a lot.

That's the best kind of voice choir!