Showing posts with label Music Monday. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Music Monday. Show all posts

07 September 2026

Music Monday: SUN of a Son...

Here's something I think you should either already know about me, or you can totally see this as the truth: I'm a gamer. (Hello, World of Arcstone anyone?) Up until a few years ago, my time was focused on either MMORPGs or those little games that become a time sink in one's smartphone. Recently, though, I got to live out a bucket list item that I've had since elementary school: I got to play D&D.

I remember clearly finding some guys playing D&D and asking to play in early middle school. They rolled me a character and then said she fell down into a hole, then asked what I was going to do. I frantically looked at the sheets of paper on the table (I don't even remember what class or race she was) and as I was trying to figure out what to say one of them told me that another rock had closed over the hole and my poor little character was dead.

Boys. I tell ya. 

Anyway, I started playing in my grown up group with a wood elf druid called Lyrei, Rei for short. She is moody and dark, her dad stepped out on her mom, and she has a magical wolfhound that follows her around that's called Aoife. I'd always played the magical casting types that stay out of the melee and hurl lightning bolts and fire from a distance, you see. I love Rei, don't get me wrong...I even added a ranger subclass for her so that she can wield a bow and do cool...ranger stuff. Our DM calls her the group's little Rei of Sunshine but I think that's about 85% sarcasm.

For a one shot that came next, I tried a wood elf rogue named Róisín, but low level rogues aren't much fun really AND people at the table kept calling her Raisin. No more Irish names for my characters, that's for sure. So when we decided to do a one shot with pirates, I went in a completely new direction and tried an artificer gnome who was once in the navy and likes to blow things to bits. Her name is Regretta Y'metme and she is SO MUCH FUN. No one makes fun of her name and everyone begs her to keep her mouth shut in public because she likes to talk about NOTHING just as much as I do...which means she could reveal secrets and not realise it for several paragraphs in her diatribe. She also loves her ship...like more than most people, loves the sea air hitting her face from the crow's nest, and has a clockwork raven called Sprocket that can carry messages and swears occasionally a lot.

What's not to love?

So the music for today is a long time favorite that I usually ignore when it comes on the playlist (along with a few other by Jimmy Buffett because it reminds me of some very awful times and people from a specific time in my past...I'm looking at a Pirate that is Looking at 40, specifically, but one of my sorority jerseys had SOASOAS on the back). But this time, I heard it on the way back from our last session, and found that I'm learning new things about my little artificer that will make her even more fun to play AND potentially write about. 

I told you, she's got a lot to say.

Enjoy the video...it has lyrics on the screen and the background images are also pretty important to my little Sun of a Son of a Sailor and her crew on the Narwhal. 🏴‍☠️

31 August 2026

Music Monday: Mystic Woman

It's really no surprise that this song is my current earworm. It's all over social media, and it's like a southern gothic Hozier decided to write a song about a deconstructed religious journey...or, because it's all about my FMC, Lark. It doesn't hurt that I can see the MMC Connor singing this for her...bless his sweet heart. Hopefully this will get them out of my head long enough to finish Elysiam's novella. Hopefully. Anyway, enjoy.

 

24 August 2026

Music Monday: Is í an teanga mo ghrá.

(Pronounced: Iss ee un tyang-uh muh graw) The title (in Irish) means I love language, specifically the Irish language, also called Gaeilge (pronounced GWEIL-geh). I'm getting very into learning Irish (via Duolingo, best I can manage for now), and one of the easiest ways for me to remember things is singing them. Go figure.

Here's one of my favorite of the Chasing Abbey songs that have become my latest hyper fixation: Arís is Arís (Ah-reesh ish ah-reesh) which is an idiom meaning Again and Again. The words are on the screen so you don't need the automatic captions. I especially like it because it taught me the name for one of my novels, Darkness (Dorchadas). See? Language nerd.🤓Enjoy.

17 August 2026

Music Monday: It's Obvious...Child

There is nothing related to any of my WIP or my published work in this week's Music Monday. What is there is some motivation. I have to go back to the DayJob® tomorrow and to say I'm not looking forward to it is an understatement. For the first time since Eugene pulled up and made my life awful, I actually have to go to campus and y'all...I am not as healed as I like to make people think. But needs must, so I'm sure I will have this one on LOUD repeat in the car. Enjoy.


10 August 2026

Music Monday: Still Uninvited

So, this song by Alanis Morissette has been speaking to me about a big bad fight in an upcoming WIP, but when I heard this version it blew me out of the water. I love Brandi Carlisle and she did this total justice. Rage on, sister. Rage.


Uninvited
Song by Alanis Morissette

Like anyone would be
I am flattered by your fascination with me
Like any hot-blooded woman
I have simply wanted an object to crave
But you, you're not allowed
You're uninvited
An unfortunate slight

Must be strangely exciting
To watch the stoic squirm
Must be somewhat heartening
To watch shepherd need shepherd
But you, you're not allowed
You're uninvited
An unfortunate slight

Like any uncharted territory
I must seem greatly intriguing
You speak of my love like
You have experienced love like mine before
But this is not allowed
You're uninvited
An unfortunate slight

I don't think you unworthy
I need a moment to deliberate

03 August 2026

Music Monday: Elys and Hack

I'm almost to edits on the latest novella in my Orana Chronicles series, and this one focuses on two of my favorite secondary characters, Elys and Hack. Elys is a wood elf druid who prefers burning things to healing her party members and Hack is a gnome warrior that adores her. They go through a lot to be together, and their banter is one of my favorite parts of writing them. This song just made me think of them. Enjoy.


27 July 2026

Music Monday: Summer Memories

Life is always in flux, isn't it? It seems like you get comfortable and then something shifts and CHANGE happens. We are supposed to be able to handle that, right? Adulting, I think we call it.

Sometimes, though, I want to go back to when I didn't have to handle any of it. If you were to ask me if I'd go back to high school, I'd say absolutely not. But some of my youth--lived not as loudly as I would have preferred--comes back to me with this song. I remember listening to it as I was going to my bookshop job in Keighley on the train, and wondering how I ended up there...thousands of miles from that moon and those stars. And here, in the final days of summer, I'm still wondering how I ended up here...so fast.

No regrets, though. No wish to turn back time or be a teenager again. Just...a desire for that feeling, from time to time. I know I'm not alone in that, right? Enjoy.

20 July 2026

Music Monday: No Roots

There is no tie in to a WIP here (unless it is Scarlet who would like to escape the duties that come with her roots...) I just rediscovered this on an old playlist and bopped up the interstate from work listening to it. Enjoy. 


13 July 2026

Music Monday: Thanks ever so much, Bonnie...

This song has been in my inspiration playlist for as long as I've been writing Gin and Sath. I know that I've featured it in Music Monday before, but with her passing how could I not? This lyric video is a little on the bonkers side, but enjoy.


06 July 2026

Music Monday: I'm not saying she's a cousin...

But if I can claim David {McDonald) Tennant...and I do...I can claim Amy MacDonald. I was introduced to her by my other half, and I happened to run across this song in a reel on social media and it made me think...I really need to be writing. It's like all my characters ganged up to YELL at me to get going. And so I am. 

Enjoy. The lyrics are in the video, but I dare you to hear that music and not get up and jump around...and sometimes that's what we need on Mondays, right?

29 June 2026

Music Monday: Familiar...Advice

Yesterday I played Dungeons and Dragons in a one off in between our regular group, Lorem Ipsum's sessions. As it turns out, the real big bad in D&D is scheduling when you are playing as an adult with jobs, side gigs, dog shows, dance gigs, and author signings to try to sort through. So the son of one of my friends from LI (who also runs a character in that current campaign) DM'd for us and our regular DM got to play a character. Very cool.

[Note to self: It doesn't matter how long you have researched to find just the right name for your character...Róisín (Roh-sheen) looks like raisin to everyone that doesn't have any experience in the Irish language, and they will call you that. Anyway, back to the post...]

One of the things we do to frustrate our regular DM is that we keep picking up familiars. Strays, they are. I honestly don't remember how it happened with the first one, Terrence the Wombat, but since then we have another wombat, two goats, and several horses in our group. So this song by Colm R. McGuinness jumped out at me the first time I heard it, and I thought it was appropriate for this week. Enjoy, and remember, a troll is not a familiar.

22 June 2026

Music Monday: Uninvited but still Inspired

On that same drive that inspired last week's post, I also heard a song that has been in Lark's playlist for awhile: Uninvited by the fabulous Alanis Morissette. I have loved this song for awhile now and it has stuck in my head like someone WANTED me to hear it. Apparently that person is Lark. She is a demanding soul, for sure.

Anyway, as I listened to that one in stop and go traffic, I thought of a scene that I've had trouble visualizing: the final battle with the big bad (I'm trying to avoid spoilers, y'all, I really am). Lark has to stare down her mortal enemy and potentially end him, coming out still...alive? on the other side. The tricky thing with writing vampires is that there is SO MUCH lore about what they can do to humans and to each other, and I have been working on not letting one of those...things ruin this scene. 

Whew. I may need to sit down after all that avoiding.

Well, anyway, as I was listening to that song, I was seeing other scenes in my head. Other battles she fights along the way, both physical and mental. And it came to me...the battles we fight lead us to a place where we are strong enough to do the really hard things. They don't "make us stronger," exactly; I'm not a fan of people telling me how strong I am to have beaten cancer and be still standing because I am not strong. It was awful. There were times when I wanted to just give up but I didn't have a choice. Lark doesn't have a choice in the memories coming to her because of the others in those memories and that's what makes her strong enough for that fight. 

Well. We hope so. I mean, it could go sideways. Spoilers, sweetie. Anyway...here's her inspiration--and mine. 


15 June 2026

Music Monday: Carry You Home

I was driving back from an interpreting gig recently and heard a song come on my playlist that I think I added after hearing it in a commercial. Now, y'all know that my style of writing is to watch my characters do whatever it is they want to show me and then write up the incident report, right? Well, sometimes they decide to talk to me when I can't write...like when I am driving. I've tried doing a speech to text note in my phone but the Google is a fickle mistress when I'm stuck in traffic on I-85.

Last week on my way down to see my sister I saw a trailer being towed by a vehicle (because it merged in almost on top of me) that was painted red and had the name Lark in the upper left corner. Lark. Sweetie. Please, I want to hear from you and I want to get you and Connor out into the wild but THAT IS NOT THE WAY TO GET MY ATTENTION. Creole vampires, I tell ya.

Well this song hit me today in almost the same way, so my co-author (bless him) got a speech to text message from me detailing what popped into my mind. I think we have sorted out another bit of our take on vampire lore which is good, but again, NOT IN THE CAR and NOT WHILE I'M DRIVING, PLEASE?

Anyway, here's the song. Might be more like 150 years for Connor and Lark, but it still applies. Enjoy.


08 June 2026

Music Monday: Beauty and the Beast

I'm a long time fan of Beauty and the Beast. I mean, come on...Sath and Gin? Also, the tv show with Ron Perlman and Linda Hamilton? Yes please. So when I heard last week that Greenville, SC native Peabo Bryson died, this was all I could think of. Thank you for this amazing performance.


Lyrics
Songwriters: Howard Elliott Ashman / Alan Irwin Menken

Tale as old as time
True as it can be
Barely even friends
Then somebody bends
Unexpectedly

Just a little change
Small to say the least
Both a little scared
Neither one prepared
Beauty and the Beast

Ever just the same
Ever a surprise
Ever as before
And ever just as sure
As the sun will rise

Ever just the same
And ever a surprise, yeah
Ever as before
And ever just as sure
As the sun will rise

Tale as old as time
Tune as old as song
Bittersweet and strange
Finding you can change
Learning you were wrong

Certain as the sun
(Certain as the sun)
Rising in the east
Tale as old as time
Song as old as rhyme
Beauty and the Beast

Tale as old as time
Song as old as rhyme
Beauty and the Beast
Beauty and...
Beauty and the Beast

01 June 2026

Music Monday: Ghosts...in the Machine?

I am a recent convert to all things Yungblud. I discovered this amazing young artist at the time we lost Ozzy because they had an absolutely beautiful friendship...and I've gradually been listening to his work. This song hit me pretty hard today when I saw a concert clip of him performing it on social media, and now it is in the back of my head singing to me about Sath and Gin, Em and Lex, and Lark and Connor (who you haven't met yet but I hope you will soon). It's is just beautiful, and I hope you enjoy it. Lyrics are in the video.


25 May 2026

Music Monday: Release the ..Florence?

Now, I love Florence + the Machine. Love. Adore. Will stop dead in my tracks if she comes on the radio or playlist. But this new one, Kraken, hit me right in the chest with the first line: "Sometimes my body seems so alien to me..."

Anyone that has had cancer treatment can relate, but I think when your treatment involves an amputation like a double mastectomy, it makes that feeling more vivid. My clothes don't fit like they did. I can't trust that I can put things away in a high cupboard or even do things like brush my teeth. My hair was growing back with luscious curls and then when I started on the next to the last phase, Verzenio, it became thin again. 

"...so when your hand reached out I just pushed it farther down..."

I've reached the point where I'm starting to be okay with me and I'm finding the tribe that buoyed me up during active treatment has gone back to their regular lives...and while that is okay, I mean if course it is, I do feel invisible. A lot. To the point that Florence saves me yet again:

"Do you see me now?"

Enjoy. 

18 May 2026

Music Monday: Relax my Beloved...Ginny

I was hopping around among playlists on a LONG drive recently and found an old one called "Music for Orana." As I was on my way to a book event in Knoxville (hello LONG delays on I40 from Asheville to the Tennessee state line), I put that on to get me in the headspace to sell the stories I wrote about my Orana characters...who have in many ways become more real to me than some real people in my life. Authors, you know what I mean about the voices that wake you up in the middle of the night to deliver a plot twist...

Anyway, the title for this song by Alex Clare slid onto the screen just behind my steering wheel and I took a quick second to remember what part of the books was inspired by this song. Two seconds later I knew... This is what I imagine it is like for Gin to feel the bond in her mind when Taeben is controlling her but convincing her he does it because he cares for her. 

Relax my beloved, don't worry for me
Don't shed a tear for me, always be near for me
Be confident my love, don't bow your head for me
Promise you'll smile for me, don't ever cry for me

He is soothing her and convincing her to let him take care of her. He wants her to be the best version of herself, unlike the Qatu Sath who wants to hold her back so he has to rescue her. He begs her to smile for him, though her smile is the bit that brings into sharp focus what he is actually doing, and it breaks him a bit each time.

Enjoy. The lyrics are in the video.

11 May 2026

Music Monday: Not Irrelevant At All

 I've got nothing to add to this, really, except that this is where I am in this quagmire of a timeline we're living in now, and it helps to remind me what I need to stand for and stand up to...because you can call me irrelevant, insignificant...I won't call on you at all.

04 May 2026

Music Monday: May the Fourth be With You...

 ...and also with you. (I am nothing if not a good UMC preacher's daughter/sister/sister in law/niece.) Enjoy.

27 April 2026

Music Monday: Celts at Faire

This weekend was my first one back at the Georgia Renaissance Festival (spring) and despite the dust and a slightly skittish wolfhound it was glorious. One more Irish tune to play for this weekend of pipes, drums, and Celtic culture, i nGaeilge of course. It mentions Grace O'Malley! How could I not...enjoy.

Lyrics below.


Oró Sé Do Bheatha 'Bhaile 
by Seth Staton Watkins

Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró 'sé do bheatha ′bhaile!
Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh!

Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile!
Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh!

′Sé do bheatha a bhean ba léanmhar
B'é ár gcreach tú bheith i ngéibhinn
Do dhúiche bhreá i seilibh meirleach!
Is tú díolta leis na Gallaibh

Óró 'sé do bheatha ′bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile!
Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh

Tá Gráinne Mhaol ag teacht thar sáile
Óglaigh armtha léi mar gharda
Gaeil iad féin is ní Gaill ná Spáinnigh!
Cuirfidh siad ruaig ar Ghallaibh!

Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró 'sé do bheatha ′bhaile!
Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh

A bhuí le rí na bhfeart go bhfeiceann
Muna mbíonn beo ina dhiaidh ach seachtain
Gráinne Mhaol is míle gaiscíoch
Ag fógairt fáin ar Ghallaibh

Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile!
Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh

Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile
Óró 'sé do bheatha ′bhaile
Óró ′sé do bheatha 'bhaile!
Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh

Music Monday: SUN of a Son...

Here's something I think you should either already know about me, or you can totally see this as the truth: I'm a gamer. (Hello, Wor...