YA Author Club: Toni's Journey

 “Got something to live for, I know I won’t surrender.” –Bulletproof, Black Veil Brides

I know I usually end with a quote—and I still will—this just felt right. 

This blog post will be about the importance of music while writing and for writing. 

I never really just listen to music.  I learn from it, in a way.  I hear a song and either love it for what it is or love it because my characters do, or love it because I know it will help me during a scene.

“All the greats are the ones remembered.” New Year's Day, Black Veil Brides.  I know I am taking that line out of context from the song, because BVB was not talking about writers.  But how true is that line? The greats are remembered and their works with stand time.  In this song they also say “Legends never die.”  Which is true.  Stoker, Frank, Shelley, etc., and some modern day writers are going to be the greats, and even when their physical bodies pass their works will remain.  But what makes them great, I mean besides withstanding time and having great stories?  I can’t say for everyone, but some writers listen to music while writing and some even say which songs they listened to while writing, and what songs helped inspire them. 

I do.  I am in no way calling myself a great, but I can tell you this music has shaped my writing:

(I wrote this in 2009 about writing and posted it as a note on FB, I will expand on it after)

Music plays such an important role in everyone's everyday life. Without music in life, in each day, life would be boring. Seriously, think about it. In a grocery store, or in any other store for that matter, without music, it would be an eerie quiet. More than just in places of shopping think about movies.

In any movie especially thrillers music plays a larger and bigger role than even the most famous actor.  For example, look at the movie Disturbia. Even if someone has watched this movie four or more times the thriller, the intense scenes still will get to that person. The music begins with a steady drum like a heartbeat, that soon signals the bass to come in and play a few cords, which then signals the guitar to come in and screech out some high suspenseful notes, and so on. Try to watch a thriller movie muted, or any movie for that matter, it will not be as intense. The reason it will not be as intense, is the music is key to get the heart beating faster.

I am writing books and once I got my iTunes account up and running and got my songs (many thanks to my cousin for helping me with my account) I made playlists for all of my books. Each song has a key element in the books becoming movies.   Listening to Version 1 playlist while typing Version 3 helps, because I know what should not go into the book, as well as listening to Version 3 playlist while typing Version 3, because it helps me to know what needs to be in the book.

It is truly amazing how one song, or one word, or one line, or one sentence, or one verse in any song can say all that is need to be said. It is amazing that either a whole song or a little piece of a song can sum up all of anyone's emotions, and it is amazing how music can help someone heal (emotionally, mentally, physically).

I did edit the above a little just now, but it still applies today.

My taste in music has changed a lot from 2008-2009 era until now.  Back then I would only listen to Lifehouse, Switchfoot, Natasha Bedingfield (still love them, still listen).  Now I still listen to them but I also added, Evanescence, Black Veil Brides, Automatic Loveletter, Juliet Simms, Imagine Dragons, We are the Fallen, Ben Moody, David Hodges, and of course others but those most often.  Now, yes some of these bands weren’t around back then, but if they were I don’t think I would have listened to them, because I didn’t understand the full importance of music while writing, until BVB and Evanescence. 

Here is a funny story, I cannot tell you for which book but one day I was on the treadmill at the gym and listening to music and I remembered that I bought BVB’s “In the End” so I put that on and fell off the treadmill.  From the first notes this beautiful scene played in front of me for the end of one of my series.  I literally forgot how to walk, I just froze in awe, and got thrown from the machine.  I had listened to other songs before and had experiences where I saw scenes I already thought about, but this time it gave me a scene.  Black Veil Brides was already a character favorite in the book and from that their music has helped shape that book.  I have to thank them for that.

Juliet Simms music from Automatic Loveletter inspired the epigraph for one of my books (if we are FB friends there are a few chapters of It Started on a Thursday up if you are interested in reading some works of mine).  And from that I actually want characters to meet through her in that book, I just have to go about it legally, like get permission.  I feel like I am rambling and not getting my point across, but music is so important in writing, for writing. 

I am not the typical bands fan.  And with saying what I am about to say please don’t get offended.  A lot of bands have fans that call them “heroes” because the band saved them.  I get it, I do, but I am not that fan.  I personally don’t think it is not fair to put that label on a band, because yes they helped the kid, but it is a big burden for the band to carry.  For me, I like bands because my characters.  There are very few bands that I just like because I discovered them.  For example BVB I love you and am not labeling you, this was Google.  I have this one fantastically gorgeous boy named Jake in Life’s not a Fantasy.  He originally was going to be this emo character, like full on emo.  So I Googled “emo” and Alex Evans came up as the first result, then I was looking through pictures, (I already had a face for Jake, just wanted to fine tune character traits,) then this beautiful face was on the screen so I clicked on it and it said “Andy Sixx” so I was curious and looked up him and found out that he was a lead singer in a band called Black Veil Brides.  I listened and fell in love.  Since then Andy and the band have gone through image and sound changes and Andy no longer goes by “Andy Sixx” but rather “Andy Biersack”. Actually no band I like was my choice it always has something to do with my books.  Yeah, so I am not the typical fan.  Huh, that’s weird…well this just loops back to my post about writer/character relationships.  I wouldn’t like any bands probably if it wasn’t for my book.

Music helps keep me focused in writing.   I sometimes listen to other books playlists while writing so I remember what goes where and don’t repeat scenes from book to book.  I already have a repeated name in two different books, but the gender and spelling changes so I think I can get away with that. Ugh, I feel like this isn’t coming out right and for some reason I am having a hard time writing this.  I’m listening to music right now, writing this and it is wonderful, I am having flashes of scenes coming to me, so maybe I should just give you an excerpt, yeah, that sounds good.  Oh! Oh! and I will associate a song with it.  Yes!

* * *

Here is a scene from a WIP (to be completed December 2013):

Que the music: Just drums, rolling a beat of various rhythms, but all letting you know something is about to go wrong.

Screaming.  A girl screaming.  A girl screaming and clenching her hair in her fists.  A girl screaming and clenching her hair in her fists while falling to her knees on the ground.

This wasn’t any ordinary scream.  No.  This wasn’t just fear.  This was anger.  This was sadness.  Harper was your ordinary school girl.  She was at the time fifteen years old.

Here is where we begin.

Que the music: quiet and slow the drums some, add violins and flutes playing just a few ominous repeating notes/chords.

I felt like I was stuck in a hall of mirrors.  I could see myself and other people’s reflections, but I was frozen in my terror.  I could not find my way out.  Every turn I made took me further into the maze.  I felt like I was staring at myself from two mirrors that were directly across from each other.  Every motion echoed infinitesimally, but I could see how fake it was. It was me, but it was my reflection.  I started the motion and my accursed doppelgängers mimicked my every motion.  I couldn’t break free.  I wanted to crash through the mirrors.  I wanted to watch them tumble to the ground in a chain reaction like large silver reflective and distorted dominoes.

It wasn’t my fault, but it kind of is.  It is all of our faults.  Possibly mostly mine.  I didn’t see it.  I should have.  I remember Jessica aimlessly pulling me to my feet.  I remember grabbing onto her shoulders just in time for the both of us to fall to the ground.  I was a mess.  I never cried so hard in my life.  April 11 a Thursday.  I will never forget.  This was the day I walked into the school gymnasium for a shortcut because I was running late to school.  I kept my head below the windows and walked in the shadows that when I heard it.  It sounded like a belt being slapped on itself but duller, then came the awful gurgling. (Que the music change again: take away the flutes and a bass playing a low and repeating note, just one, sometimes it is held out, other times it is short) I looked towards the sound and saw his body swinging from the rafters.  I started screaming/I started to scream. 

Que music again: add in a symphony.

Parker was struggling.  He was stuck between life and death.  He was slowly dying in front of me and fighting with every ounce of strength he had left in him to reverse his previous action.  He now wanted to live.  I started screaming and his eyes flashed to mine.  He reached his left hand out to me.  I touched his hand and his finger nails scratched my skin, leaving small red marks.  I pulled my phone out and dialed 911.  I said nothing to the operator I just screamed. 

* * *

So I don’t officially have a song for this scene, for other scenes, yes, but that is further in the book, and they are not written yet and would give away too much. 

30 Seconds to Mars is another favorite of mine, and thank god I wasn’t driving, I had the BVB experience with them. A song of their newest album, Love Lust Faith + Dreams, made me freeze.  I saw a character rising from something, while another fell to their knees screaming.  Can’t tell you the song specifically, the scene, or the book, mostly because it will not be in the book.  This will be something that is a movie exclusive only once I’m published and have movie rights, so fingers crossed!

I have a few ideas for my next post, but I want to see what you guys want me to write about so tweet me at twitter.com/write_to_live or write a note to my on instagram and tag me both on the picture and in a comment on your picture username: write_to_live

I will pick my favorite or favorites and write those over the next few weeks. 

Peace, Love, and Inspiration

Keep writing and remember

#itsawriterthing

Toni-Anne Lombardo

Listening to: “In the End”, Black Veil Brides, Wretched and Divine

Quotes: “Music touches us emotionally, where words alone can't.” –Johnny Depp

“Music is the universal language of mankind.” –Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“Where words fail, music speaks.” –Hans Christian Andersen

YA Author Club: Toni's Journey

Hello there, Writers and Readers!
I’m back, and as promised, I will be writing about a writer’s relationship with characters.
Now this topic is one T.R. Graves and I have discussed a lot! Although some writers will disagree, it is very, very important to connect with your characters on an almost supernatural level.

LET ME TELL YOU HOW IT WORKS (for me).
My characters and I are one, although they are far more experienced in life than I am. Let me walk you through my basic day. I wake up, usually from a dream either about friends of mine or my characters. There have been some dreams about my characters that I have woken up from that made me pause and question who I am. In some of my dreams, I become my characters. And, I know that sounds like I should be locked up for psychiatric help, but that is the life of a writer (#itsawriterthing). I go to work with my characters lingering throughout my thoughts. Leave me alone for five minutes and I’ll be in my book. I will be interacting with my character and them with me (or maybe not so much, we will get to this later). I go through my day thinking up conversations, replaying scenes, really, really trying to get to know the subtleties that hide inside my characters. Let me tell you, it works. Give me a situation or opinion provoking something and I could tell you in detail how each of my characters would feel about it or do, better than I could say for me. My day goes on, I write, and eventually I go to sleep thinking about my characters, playing out more scenes. Side note: sometimes I am working on a different book and characters from one of them will be like, that right there sounds more like a _______ comment than _______. They are always right (right here I almost wrote write. I swear writing really is engrained in me. I always want an opportunity to use the word or write the word ‘write’).
More than that though, I really love my characters. They are a part of me. I don’t know what I would do without them. They are like Anne (my muse and BFF) I would be so, so very lost without them. There are times where I don’t know how to react to a situation and I say to myself, “What would Jake, or character x do?” Most of the time that works.

I’M NOT THE ONLY ONE! YAY!


There are a lot of writers who are like me, even ones that write for screen. March 2010 I met Lee Goldberg (Monk), Paul Wagner (Documentaries), and Hugh Wilson (Bay Watch) to name just a few writers. They were on a panel talking about screen writing and characters and everything. It was awesome. Hugh Wilson was talking and said, “You write and a character says something and everything changes. That is almost spiritual.” This couldn’t be truer. My characters have flipped my story inside out more than once. Plus, I have to add this made me feel more normal! Here is this widely known and hugely popular writer, who gets it, who has the spiritual connection with his characters.
Nola Sarina (Gilded Destiny, Jaded Touch, plus an upcoming co-author Wild Hyacinthe) agrees with my stance and like me lets her characters take over, “Sometimes, during revision, writing from scratch gets a sharper voice than re-wording what’s already there. I like to step away from a story for a while and then let the character tell me the story again from his fresh, enlightened perspective – allowing the character to grow with my style.”
I talked with Nola extensively one day about this and wrote something to her, that I want to share on here (it is only slightly edited to make sense for the blog post): “I promise you, I have looked up from writing and looked to the left and said, ‘but this is my book.’ I hear laughter. And I just sit there in protest until I let Devon have his way. The book and characters take life...we are their way of becoming known, it’s not the other way around. We don't make them known, they makes us known. I think they are their own wonderful breed that we must take dictation from because I have fought him and it turned out horribly, and when I listen to him, it is flawless.”
There are many other writers out there that go through this, it is normal, don’t medicate! There are some writers who don’t and that is okay, “to each his own”. And then there are some writers who refuse to admit that they do this, because they are afraid of how they will be received. To those writers, don’t worry, allow your characters to take charge and scream it from the mountain and we here will welcome you with open arms and similar war stories. We love meeting our own people!

BUT, BUT IT IS MY BOOK!
I know your book is your baby, but so are your characters. And your characters are living the story so if they stop you or you get massively painful writer’s block, then your characters are trying to tell you something. The book I am writing, (Devon’s book) at times I have fought with my characters or Devon and wanted something specific to happen or not happen because I am the writer and it is my $*&%$@&@* book! I have felt my characters leave me, until I give in and let them write the book and write what happens to them (basically what I said to Nola in my quote earlier). They are ALWAYS right, always! It is obnoxious. Like sometimes to the point where I want to punch my characters, because it is my book and I should have control, but no, they took life and took over. My book would be nothing or horrible if I didn’t listen to them. After all they know themselves the best; we can pretend we know them as well and 100%, but we don’t. We may never, and that is okay, really it is. I don’t think we are ever really supposed to know our characters, because then writing wouldn’t be magical. It would be boring and a task. Eventually we will get to know them quite well and almost 100% but there will always be that magical percent that adds the beautiful mystique that hold us hostage as writers. I mean, really think about it, do you really know yourself? Do you really know anybody? And I am not talking like knowing their favorite color or birthday or food. I mean really knowing someone. There are always buried deep secrets that we won’t admit to ourselves, let alone other people. And if we do that, why do we demand we know our characters? They deserve privacy too.

ON A CLOSING NOTE
When you are writing and editing and thinking and plotting, take a step back. Take a step back and put your character into a completely new situation. You don’t have to physically write it, but really, really think into the story, make it as real as the story you are writing, tell people about it if you have to get opinions (this is what it takes to write a book). Because based on your characters reactions to the new situation or terrible situation (let’s face it most of us are sadistic and torture our poor loves. We need to though, if people wanted to read happy books about rainbows and butterflies, they’d be in the children’s section not YA and others) you will learn so much about them. How they breathe, what position they sleep in, how they smell, their favorite shower gel, laundry detergent, cologne/perfume, how they feel, how they feel things themselves. How they feel—I can honestly describe my characters down to the touch, how their embraces feel, what their arm feels like when relaxed and touched or tensed and touched, what their hair feels like, the sound of their voice, the sound of their breathing awake versus sleeping, ugh I could go on and on and on. These aren’t things that necessarily need to make it into the book, but they need to make it into our hearts and brains to make the story work. Back to my point, throw them into an unscripted, unwritten plot and see how they react, because it will grow them and you and you will learn them even more, and that will make your story worth reading and re-reading and sharing.

My next post will talk about the importance of music while writing.
Peace, Love, and Inspiration
Keep writing and remember
#itsawriterthing

Listening to: Shattered by David Hodges album: Trading Yesterday (More Than This)

Quote: "When I write, I go to live inside the book. By which I mean, mentally I can experience everything I’m writing about. I can see it, hear its sounds, feel its heat or rain. The characters become better known to me than the closest family or friends. This makes the writing-down part very simple most of the time. I only need to describe what’s already there in front of me. That said, it won’t be a surprise if I add that the imagined worlds quickly become entangled with the so-called reality of this one. Since I write almost every day, and I think (and dream) constantly about my work, it occurs to me I must spend more time in all these places than here." - Tanith Lee