Top Ten Influential Albums

For me, music and writing are interconnected. I listen to music while I write, I get writing inspiration from songs, and some songs remind me of my manuscripts or characters. THE TREASURE HUNT and my current WIP are extremely influenced by music—they wouldn't exist without it.

Music is also influential to everyday life. Certain songs or albums can take you back to a specific time and place (good or bad). Music shapes our lives. I don't have a musical bone in my body (I think my parents cursed me by naming me Melody), but music is very important for my writing and visual art.

In no particular order, here are my Top Ten Influential Albums for my life and writing:

1.) They're Only Chasing Safety - Underoath

This album will always take me back to grad school and when I first started dating my husband. For our first official date, we saw Underoath in Boston when they toured for this album.

2.) The Jurassic Park soundtrack

I was so obsessed with Jurassic Park when I was in middle school. (As an adult too, to be honest.) When I wasn't watching the movie or rereading the book, I would listen to it on cassette over and over, picturing scenes from the movie.

3.) All's Well That Ends Well - Chiodos

This is another album that reminds me of grad school. Also, it reminds me of my first job after college, working in special education at the local middle school...and the days of Myspace (where I heard them for the first time).

4.) Metallica (the black album) - Metallica

Metallica's self-titled album was a HUGE influence for THE TREASURE HUNT. I actually changed the time period (in an earlier version of the manuscript) to include this album because it was so important to my characters, especially the song, "Nothing Else Matters."

5.) A Fever You Can't Sweat Out - Panic! At The Disco

I LOVED Panic! when I was in grad school, and I saw them in concert at least twice. It's funny, I hadn't listened to this album in years and when I listened to it again recently, I still knew all the lyrics. I think this is one of the funnest albums to listen to.

6.) Wish You Were Here - Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd is my all-time favorite band. And if I had to pick a go-to album by them, it would be Wish You Were Here. When I draw or paint, I almost always listen to Pink Floyd. For me, they're so inspiring.

7.) The Game of Thrones season 1 soundtrack

I drafted STRANGE ATTRACTORS while listening to nothing but this soundtrack. It's great writing music, especially when you're writing something epic like fantasy or sci-fi.

8.) Selfish Machines - Pierce the Veil

Pierce the Veil gives me ALL THE writing feels. Their songs could seriously be the soundtrack for all my contemporary manuscripts. And I just love them. ;)

9.) Sixteen Stone - Bush

Besides the Jurassic Park soundtrack, I didn't really listen to music in middle school. I'd just listen to whatever my parents were listening to...until I was introduced to Sixteen Stone. Instead of boybands, my friends and I had Bush.

10.) The Lord of the Rings - The Fellowship of the Ring soundtrack

When I was in college, I listened to this over and over when I was in my room doing homework or drawing. Now it's great writing music. "Concerning Hobbits" makes me happy—I dare you to listen to it and not smile.


What are some of your favorite or inspirational albums?

Artsy Writing

(Visual) Art and writing are interconnected, I think. 

Sometimes I try to sketch my characters. Sometimes I draw maps of the world. I almost always make Pinspiration boards on Pinterest. But I've never made an actual inspiration/positivity/vision board before. 

After talking with my CPs about staying positive through the ups and downs of writing and where they find inspiration, I thought it would be fun to make an inspirational collage/vision board for my current manuscript and writing as a way to stay positive. 

Here is the (almost) final product:

I clipped pictures and phrases out of magazines, printed out quotes I found online, and even sketched/wrote things myself. 

Here are some close ups and explanations:

"Attitude is the difference between an ordeal and an adventure."

I think that's the perfect quote for writing and querying. It's so hard to stay positive all the time, but a good attitude can make all the difference.

"Hope, but never expect. Look forward, but never wait."

This quote reminds me of something my friend once told me, "Go into something with positive intention, not expectation." Intention and expectation sound similar, but I think with intention you're putting your positivity out into the universe, not expecting something in return. 

"Make it simple, but significant." 

This reminds me of my awesome Pitch Wars mentor Jessie Devine. I was trying too hard with my prose, attempting to make it "fancier" than it needed to be. He taught me how to simplify it. I ended up cutting over 5k of filler from THE TREASURE HUNT with his help.

I found this four-leaf clover in my yard. Obviously, I thought a little good luck wouldn't hurt! :)
(And that picture of Dylan O'Brien is how I imagine my MC's personality—well, more like his character's personality on Teen Wolf!)

This musical-looking sketch represents my first Pitch Wars team: Team PPU. When the lovely Stephanie Garber picked me as her second alternate in 2013, it was my first writing-related ego boost. It was huge for me. (Thanks, Stephanie! <3) 

My teammates, Julie Dao and Katie Bucklein, are two of my closest writer friends. We've been through so much together, so I wanted to give Team PPU, as a whole, positive vibes! The anchor represents Katie's PW book, the music represents Julie's, and the stars represent mine. 

What do you do when you're brainstorming/writing/editing a manuscript? Do you sketch your characters? Make collages? Draw maps? Make vision boards?

If you'd like to be tagged in an Artsy Writing blog tour, let me know in the comments!

Writing Inspiration

Where do you get your story ideas?

My ideas usually pop out of nowhere. I'll be driving, cleaning, at the gym, or making dinner when I'll get an idea or a feeling for a story. It's totally random. Sometimes I'll get several shiny-new-ideas in a week, and other times I'll go months with no new ideas.

And sometimes I'll get new ideas inspired by something else. The inspiration for THE TREASURE HUNT was a random idea inspired by DOCTOR WHO. This sounds completely strange--my LGBT historical romance being inspired by a British sci-fi show--but it's true. The idea of River Song leaving messages for the Doctor across time and space sparked something for me. (I mean, how cool is that?) Initially, I thought THE TREASURE HUNT was going to involve love letters with some sort of time travel element, but the sci-fi elements eventually fell away, leaving me with a treasure hunt with metal heads set in 1992.

But the inspiration for STRANGE ATTRACTORS came about in a different way. Instead of it popping out of nowhere, I was looking for a new idea. I was out for Mexican food with my husband for our anniversary when I asked him to tell me some interesting science-related topics that I could include in a YA sci-fi. He listed several, like solar flares and and nuclear fallout, but the last idea about someone being able to travel between the multiverse really sparked something for me. I immediately pictured Piper and thought of ways she could travel through universes.

Sometimes these ideas come to me fully-formed and are easy to turn into a story, but other times I really have to think about them. STRANGE ATTRACTORS came together fairly quickly. I almost immediately knew Piper was a teen spy, but her motivation wasn't always the same. THE TREASURE HUNT, on the other hand, took a lot of pondering. I mean, initially it started out as a sci-fi. But when I couldn't think of a way for the characters to send love letters through time, it became a historical romance involving a treasure hunt instead.

What's your craziest story inspiration? Do you involve other people in your brainstorming?