Musick has Charms to Sooth a Savage Breast

I write to music. In fact, I create to music. In my head. Often times while I'm driving, which is a little inconvenient because I have yet to master simultaneous driving and writing. But that's just me. Apparently a lot of people think they've perfected it because I see a plethora of folks driving and texting. I do not drive and text, because some day a driver/texter will run into my carriage and kill me. Then all the RARAs will rejoice because another evil slave driver has been taken out of Satan's HR pool.


But I digress... I write to music because the music sets the pace for the scene I'm creating. It brings the emotion to the surface, and helps with the beats. Music also helps me recreate a specific scene in my head, like my very own movie of my novel.


So with the publication of my novel, The Carriage Trade, here is a list for the soundtrack to the book. Some of the titles will be familiar, but I have rather eclectic taste in music so a few will be a bit more obscure. And not every chapter has music.


Chapter/Song Title/Artist
Prologue/New Slang/The Shins
Ch1/Lust for Life/Iggy Pop
Ch3/Coconut/Harry Nilsson
Ch4/Tangled up in Blue/Bob Dylan
Ch7/The Celibate Life/The Shins
Ch8/Dragostea Din Tei/O-ZONE
Ch12/Waterfall/Jim Brickman
Ch14/Pretty Fly for a White Guy/The Offspring
Ch15/Tempted/Squeeze
Ch17/Patricia/Pérez Prado
Ch18/Change Your Mind/The All-American Rejects
Ch19/Crazy/Gnarles Barkley
Ch20/Carla Etude/Elton John
Ch21/I'm Too Sexy for my Shirt/Right Said Fred
Ch22/Isn't it Time/The Babys
Ch23/Harder to Breath/Maroon 5
Ch24/Turn On Me/The Shins
Ch25/I'm No Angel/The Greg Allman Band
Ch26/Silver Lining/Bonnie Raitt
Ch27/Because the Night/Patti Smith
Ch29/I will Follow You into the Dark/Death Cab for Cutie
Ch30/Mad World/Gary Jules
Ch31/Thunder/Boys Like Girls
Ch34/Your Guardian Angel/The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus
Ch35/Some Days are Diamonds, Some Days are Stone/John Denver
End/Best Days/Graham Colton


And for the bonus material,


The Re-Education of the One Trick Pony/Ch1/The Past and Pending/The Shins


Not all the songs start when the chapter begins. But they all pull me back into the scene they represent. I hope you enjoy the soundtrack. 


In case you cannot tell, I really, really love The Shins. And I owe much of the music I use to The Kid, who keeps my musical taste up to date by regularly blasting Indie artists at me. Which is why I know that Vampire Weekend is not a scene from an Anne Rice book. 

The Show's Over. The Party is Starting Now...

After five years my novel, The Carriage Trade, is finally available for purchase.

I started writing it in the spring of 2007 because I had a story in my head and if I didn't get it out of there I would end up in an asylum. Not that I don't belong in one anyway, it's just the packing and moving and all those change of address cards are so much work. And it's no secret how lazy I am.

Anyway, it's done. Except for a glitch in the page numbering  (I can't tell you how many times I re-numbered those suckers) the trade paperback is now available for purchase through Createspace and the Kindle edition is available through Amazon. My short, Splitting the Difference is still free until Monay, June 18, so get that while you can.

Next week I'm going to post about the music I use when I write. It's an important tool I utilize, but today I have to go to work, driving a horse around in circles.

Free Stuff

As a pre-launch sampler, I'm giving away my contemporary short story, Spitting the Difference,  in Kindle format on Amazon. If you do not own a Kindle, you can download a free Kindle reading app for PC, MAC, iPhone, iPad or Android. So, really, you have no excuse not to go and pick it up for free. It's twelve pages. You can read it on your lunch hour. Or while waiting for that lobotomy you've been wanting to get.

Yes, yes, I know, I'm very generous, but  hey, it's .99 cents you can spend on something to nosh on while you're enjoying the story.

So I have the Kindle file uploaded to Kindle and am waiting on their "approval", and I have the Create Space file over there waiting on their approval also. I'm still wrestling with the Smashwords file, because in trying to format to their specifications I had to take out all of the words in italics.

I've discovered I use a LOT of italics. I also use a lot of ellipses... but since the main character has brain damage her thoughts often trail off... you know how it is...

The actual publication day for The Carriage Trade is tomorrow, Friday June 15. So watch for it on Amazon, Create Space and Smashwords (eventually).  Have a great day, and go get the free short story.