I'll let you in on a little secret: I
can't write without music. Seriously. My brain stops sending messages to my
fingers and I freeze. Sounds crazy, doesn't it? A writer should be able to
write from anywhere...and I can, as long as there is music, too.
I know several writers who listen to a
specific playlist from the start of a project all the way through edits. I
don't do that. My writing process requires different types of music for
different areas: when I'm drafting, it's light classical or jazz. No Muzak and
no instrumentals of popular songs because I'll wind up singing and not writing.
Once the draft is in the can and I'm on to edits, my playlist comes into play,
and it will have a little bit of everything from pop and rock to country and
even some oldies thrown in for good measure. While I'm editing, the songs
on my playlist will help me remember the
mood of a scene or the crux of my hero's or heroine's problem...or the song
will remind me of the book in general.
Here's a sampling of the playlist behind
my Rockers series: Light My Fire, Start Me Up and Call Me.
1985 by Bowling for Soup
Springsteen by Eric Church
Raise Your Glass by Pink
Ring of Fire by Johnny Cash
Light My Fire by The Doors
Dance Forever by Allstar Weekend
Daylight by Maroon 5
Cruisin' by Smokey Robinson
Come Over by Kenny Chesney
(Kissed You) Goodnight by Gloriana
Here Comes Goodbye by Rascall Flats
An Excerpt from Light My Fire:
#1:
“Don’t.” Her words were a
whisper, but still loud in the back of the limo.
“Don’t,
what?”
Finally
she looked at him, her deep brown eyes molten in the darkness. “Don’t be my
brother’s best friend tonight. Don’t be my cheerleader. Just…” Her hand
trembled against his on the cool leather seat. “I’m not America’s favorite
sixteen-year-old any longer. I don’t need to pretend I’m still sixteen, and the
magazines are already burning me at Trey’s sacrificial altar, so why not send
that old image up in flames all the way?”
She
leaned across the seat, brushed her sweet lips across his cheek, and Nate
nearly lost it. He was holding on by a thread. This was Lily.
The
same girl he’d grown up with. The Lily who’d brought him home after school
because she noticed he hadn’t eaten lunch for three days. The Lily who cheered
for him at the high school talent show. The Lily who couldn’t really want him,
because if she did…he would ruin her.
Nate
groaned when her lips brushed against his. A bit of her hair had come loose
from the sleek updo and brushed against his neck, fanning that trickle of flame
even hotter.
Her
hand traced the line of his jaw, and Nate’s resistance burned to the ground. He
pushed her back into the corner and dug his hands into her hair. “You don’t
know what you’re asking for.”
She
panted. “I know exactly what I want, Nate Lansford, and what I want is you.”
Nate
lowered his lips to hers, tasting the sweetness of her lips for the first time.
Her tongue tangled with his, pushing him further, asking him for more. And Nate
gave it.
When
Lily arched her back, Nate reached for her breast, feeling her nipple pucker
beneath the fine silk of her dress. She moaned, a tiny sound, but it was enough
to pull him back into the present.
What
was he doing? This was Lily. The girl who made him want to be more than the kid
from the wrong side of Malibu’s tracks. His friend.
He
couldn’t mess that up.
Nate
pushed away from her, fisting his hands in his hair as he tried to put a few
more inches between them. The back of the limo was too tight. He was too close
to Lily. He needed air. Space.
Distance.
“I’m
sorry.” His voice was rough. “That shouldn’t have happened.”
#2:
Nate smiled at her. “Still
putting on a show?”
She
could only shake her head.
“Because
I’m about through watching it.”
Her
belly twisted at the innuendo. “Sometimes you have to be part of the sh—”
He
put his index finger over her lips. “No quippity-quips. Not now, Lil. Let’s
just dance, okay?”
Her
lips burned under his finger, but she nodded and slid into his arms as the DJ
switched from bass-thumping fun to guitar-sensitive slow.
Nate
slid his hands beneath her coat and reached under the camisole to play with the
sensitive skin at the small of her back. And she melted into him. Lily rested
her head below his shoulder and twined her fingers with his. She sighed at the
rightness of being in his arms, even in the middle of a crowd and fully
clothed.
He
played his fingers along her sides like a piano and then worked his way around to
the small of her back again, burning her from the outside in. Lily swallowed.
She might want Nate, but she wasn’t ready for him.
Wasn’t
ready for whatever this was building between them.
A
small part of her still wanted the Nate she remembered—the boy who stood up to
school-yard bullies for her, who smiled at her and only her while he performed
before the rest of the student body in talent shows. The boy she shared her
lunch with, the boy who took her to the senior prom when Bailey Yeardley stood
her up at the last minute. She had so many memories with Nate, and almost all
of them also involved her brother. What if whatever this was messed up not only
her friendship with Nate, but also Chase’s?
Her
waking up a year ago and realizing the boy she’d grown up with had become a
heart-stoppingly attractive man didn’t mean a thing . He was still her
brother's best friend. He might be the guy who would give the reporter's
something to talk about besides her show being cancelled, but that wasn't a
good enough reason to act. Not if they couldn’t salvage their friendship when
this lust train arrived at the next station.
An Excerpt from Start Me Up:
She sat back, crossing her arms
over her chest. "You can't be serious."
His
posture was the exact opposite of hers. Everything about him was opposite.
Where she wore a pretty Stella McCartney blouse and prim pencil skirt, he wore
ripped jeans and a tight black tee. Her strappy Manolos hadn't a single
scratch. His Dr. Martens had to be from 1999 and looked like they'd cleaned up
after one too many groupies in the green room.
You're
in control here, Nina. You're the professional. He's the client. Shoo him away
like the ass he really is.
Oh,
but what a fine ass he has, the part of her brain she was definitely not
listening to today said.
"I
assure you I'm serious. I need a non-clingy, well-proportioned date for a gala
fundraiser in two days and I'd prefer she have no illusions as to what this is
about." He sat forward in his chair and Nina was sure she saw his abs
ripple. She caught her breath and then forced her gaze from the spectacle and
back to those blue-blue eyes. And promptly forgot to breathe again. "The
money raised will keep music programs in at least fifteen local schools. To
keep the cash coming I need the headlines to be about the event, not my social
life."
"Then you should go
alone."
"Going alone will keep the
gossip rags talking. What I need is a pretty date for a one- night-only
performance."
Nina
blew out the breath she'd been holding. She didn't believe for a second this
was a mercy date situation. More like a mercy hookup. She didn't do hookups.
Her business set up marriage minded people who were matched based on an
algorithm her aunt developed ten years before. An algorithm that had made the
company a go-to in Los Angeles.
She
shot a glance out the window at the press corps on the sidewalk below her
window.
Well,
until this morning, anyway.
"I think you've got my firm
confused with…something else entirely, but for future reference—" she
typed a few words into the search engine on her computer and flipped the screen
to face him "—I am a matchmaker. A noun, meaning one who arranges
relationships or marriages." She opened the next tab and gestured to the
computer screen. "I am not a madam, although madams are also nouns. There
is a very large, very cavernous area between matchmaking and houses of
prostitution."
An Excerpt from CALL ME:
“Hello, Josh,” she said, echoing
his tone from a few minutes before.
He
blinked and then sat up straight. “What the hell are you doing in my car, Kat?”
His smooth baritone slid over her senses and, just like that, she was pulling
herself back from the abyss she’d been in five years before. This was just a
one-night stand. Nothing to get excited about.
Okay,
one thing to get excited about. He knew all her secret places. She knew how to
push him to the edge. And in the past few years, they’d probably both learned a
few new things.
“What
do you think I’m doing here?” she countered, crossing her legs and spreading
her arms over the back of the seat. “You practically invited me.”
The
car began moving. Well, at least he hadn’t kicked her out of the limo.
“I
said hello.”
“You
told me not to leave on your account.”
“And
then you did.”
“I
thought you might want a little more privacy.” She slid across the side bench
to Josh’s seat, bent her leg to sit sideways and rested her head against her
elbow. “This is pretty private, I’d say.”
He
watched her for a long moment. “You’re here for sex.”
Kat
nodded. “I don’t usually go for casual, but since we have a history, this isn’t
your typical one-night stand.”
“This
isn’t what I expected when I came down here tonight.”
“This
isn’t what I expected when I showed up for work tonight.” She reached out to
trace her finger along his jaw. That contact zinged along her nerve endings
straight to the butterflies flapping around in her belly, electrifying their
beat.
“I’m
headed straight to the airport.” He leaned toward her.
“LA
traffic’s a bitch no matter what time of day it is.”
“You’re
not the girl I remember.” This time he reached for her, his hand drawing a path
of fire down her arm. “The girl I remember—”
She
cut him off before he could get started on the girl she used to be. The girl
who was of so little importance he felt no qualms about walking away from
without a single word. Well, she’d grown up since then. Had other
relationships. Sure, none of them as serious or deep as what she thought she’d
had with him.
But then, she’d never really had
him, had she?
Once upon a time, Kristina Knight
spent her days running from car crash to fire to meetings with local
police--no, she wasn't a troublemaker, she was a journalist. Her career took
her all over the United States, writing about everything from a serial killer's
capture to the National Finals Rodeo. Along the way she found her very own
Knight in Shining Cowboy Boots and an abiding love for romance novels. And just
like the characters from her favorite books, she's living her own happily ever
after.
Kristina writes sassy
contemporary romance novels; her books have appeared on Kindle Best Seller
Lists. She loves hearing from readers, so drop her a line!
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