The Soundtrack of Your Story

Sensory Tools & Other Writers’ Tips (2 of 2)

In an earlier post, I described how mood boards and visualising character attributes can help with writing inspiration and authenticity. In this post, I’ll explain how music can also help shift writer’s block while giving your MC a bad characteristic is necessary to keep your reader invested.

Create Writing Playlists

Some people believe they need silence to concentrate, but I suggest that utilising unobtrusive music is more helpful. For writing new content, I have created several playlists of songs I like, compilations of tracks that are very familiar to me. If I listen to them while I am working through something, their familiarity positively influences my mood without breaking into my thoughts.

When crafting something new, there is a benefit to setting the tone of what you are writing, in a similar way that you did when creating a mood board. Try creating a playlist that’s tailored to your work in progress; find music that evokes the mood, theme, or genre of the fiction you wish to write. For instance, a list of dance floor bangers would be great for working on contemporary stories that feature younger characters with a pack mentality or a dating / hook-up vibe. If your story is packed with high drama and adventure, choose tracks that take you on a rollercoaster or maintain the feeling of tension for you. Perhaps you are crafting a story set in a bygone era, if so identify music from that century / decade for some playlists to shape your mood and keep your brain sparking. Music stimulates your auditory senses to keep your thoughts in the zone while you write

Stephanie Meyer claims that she listened to mostly indie music by Muse when she was writing the Twilight Saga. I read Stillhouse Lake by Rachel Caine and was delighted to find (at the end) a Spotify playlist of the dark and moody songs this author enjoyed while crafting her thriller.

The power of music to influence mood, attitude and imagination is undisputed so why not harness it? If popular music isn’t your thing, perhaps soundtracks from films, folk songs or classical music are a better fit, so try them out.

I’ve mentioned Spotify because it’s popular, but there are many other places to download music into a playlist:

• LiveXLive (Slacker)
• Apple Music
• YouTube Music
• SoundCloud
• Deezer
• Pandora Radio
• Amazon Prime Music
• Saavn

An adage about writing which warns authors: readers won’t care about a story if they don’t care WHO it happens to, hence my next tip:

Your Hero / Heroine Needs a Flaw

The advice I’m quoting illustrates how plot and characters go hand in hand. It is also a reminder that it is vital to make your characters appeal. To be likable and believable, your protagonist needs to be imperfect.

It is not a contradiction to urge you to give your characters the ‘likeability factor’ while also making them flawed. Honestly, we all have our faults or bad habits. To make a key player in your fiction fully rounded and believable, they ought to have something about them that needs improvement / therapy. If not, your reader will soon tire of the ‘perfect icon’ you have created and put your story aside.

• Arguing
• Bad manners / bad attitude
• Casual clumsiness
• Cheating
• Impatience
• Interrupting
• Inability to read the room
• Jumping to conclusions
• Lying
• Nosiness
• Noisiness
• Quitting too easily
• Rudeness
• Selfishness
• Showing off
• Tardiness / no concept of time
• Untidiness
• Vulgarity / unguarded speech

These are just a few examples of faults you can weave into a character’s whole without turning a good person into a bad guy. The other advantage of attributing your hero / heroine with one or two of these faults is that it helps introduce conflict into the action — because every scene needs conflict.

Cast your mind back to books, films, and plays you’ve enjoyed. Did you root for the perfectly mannered, chaste, shining-example character in the cast? I’m willing to bet you found that goody-two-shoes annoying. More often an audience is drawn to the player who is a little naughty and slips up sometimes then berates themselves, misses opportunities and planes. A hero / heroine with flaws is more engaging.

There’s no disputing the popularity of characters in children’s fiction, such as Just William and Horrid Henry. They are always in trouble, as far from role models as you could imagine, but because we can relate to them, we make allowances. Rebecca has shopaholic tendencies and a weak relationship with the truth, similarly, Bridget Jones is judgemental and prone to blurting. These fictional characters have quirks that make them imperfect, yet these faults are what make such protagonists seem real.

Endearing faults spice up the action, introducing conflict in large and small measures -they will help you with your task as a writer

An Achilles’ heel

This has more impact than a fault. It is something irrational in a person’s makeup, a weakness despite their overall strength. As a literary example, I cite Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy [fictional characters in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice] — both are quick to judge which, compounded with Darcy’s pride, becomes the chink in his armour. In the Back to the Future trilogy of films, Marty McFly reacts badly to being called ‘chicken’. Goaded in this way, Marty will take risks and act out of character. James Bond [fictional intelligence officer from Ian Fleming’s books & later blockbuster films] is unable to resist charming a pretty woman into the sack. It’s nearly his downfall because, despite his overall sharp thinking, his love interest frequently puts him and the female in greater danger.

Try using the sensory tools and hacks I’ve described, they may assist when writer’s block strikes, preventing you from looking at the screen or feeling nagged by the incessant blink of the cursor. Now you have a constructive distraction. Opening a new tab or browser to create mood boards for your characters or compiling several music playlists will keep you on task, while tricking your brain into thinking you’ve taken a break!

Anytime you are watching films or shows, or socialising with friends and relatives, you can calm your anxious conscience if it is berating you for not writing. You are researching character development! Maybe now you’ll notice these tools when other writers use them, such as speech tags or chinks in the protagonist’s armour.

Now I’ve shared the secret of mood enhancement via music you may begin to view songs in a different way: Hearing tracks and thinking how you could use them for your own purposes. Music in films and shows is never thrown together, which of course you knew, but a great test is to occasionally ask yourself, “if I was watching on mute, would the action on screen be as chilling / thrilling / poignant?”

My final tip for you: Ask “What’s my positive soundtrack — tunes that invoke a positive, productive attitude?” Go and make yourself a long playlist of those and crack on.

Posy Churchgate is based in the UK & writes |Fiction : Romantic, Erotic, Fantasy, YA |Non fiction : sexuality, relationships |Editor for Tantalizing Tales, she supports new talent. More stories can be found on FrolicMe.com & Tickle.life | Using this link for Medium membership will support her directly, plus giving you access to all Medium’s great content. Use this link to receive an email ensuring Posy’s latest stories come directly to your inbox.