Frankly Speaking

by Anna Campbell

When I was recently in New York (now, how's that for a way to start a blog?), I was lucky enough to get a ticket for the musical COME FLY AWAY. My first Broadway show (well, on Broadway!).

This combines Twyla Tharp's classical given a modern twist choreography with the beloved songs of Frank Sinatra. Basically we're talking a ballet. Frankly (yeah, I know, pardon the pun!), I was in heaven!

They had a big band on stage and a female singer who would occasionally duet with Frank but mostly it was just Frank. His voice floated above the beautiful, original arrangements in all its rich baritone richness. I'm not quite sure how they did it technically but it was very effective. The only thing better would to have been have Frank himself - but that would, sadly, have involved a seance. John Edward? Are you in the house? There's an opportunity here for you!

The musical was about love in all its various permutations from hot and sweaty and passionate to sweet and innocent. Appropriate when some of the greatest love songs ever written formed the score. The dancers were mainly from classical companies and were spectacularly good.

But the best bit was still the music!

As you'll probably have gathered by now, I love Frank's voice. I love his way with a lyric. Just check out how beautifully he delivers the story behind "I Get a Kick out of You" in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmLXch5277I

There's been a lot of imitators but I don't think anyone comes close to the combination of worldly sophistication and weary romanticism he conveys.

One of the things I loved about COME FLY AWAY is that they concentrated on the later, swinging Sinatra (not often you can use 'swinging' without irony, is it?), the Chairman of the Board days. The 1940s Sinatra who the bobbysoxers lined up to see was just a bit too vulnerable for my tastes. While the voice was effortlessly brilliant and he delivered those lyrics like Shakespeare, the unrestrained emotion of his early performances doesn't strike my heart the way his more restrained later work does.

By the late 50s and 60s, he's a guy who's been around the block a few times and he knows if he wears his heart on his sleeve, someone's going to rip it to shreds, then throw the bloody remnants into the mud and stamp all over them.

But he's still got a heart and much as he tries to pretend he can roll with the punches, love and life hit him hard. Sigh! Adore those songs.

One of the most romantic songs I know is "Fly Me to the Moon". Listen how he delivers this beautiful lyric with a jauntiness that somehow underlines the deep emotion the man is expressing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9h0MNMfKuQ

By the way, check out that groovy Orrefors-glass style backdrop on that video! Wow, baby!

Another breathtakingly romantic song is "Strangers in the Night". Listen to the crackle of emotion in his voice as he sings this. He's getting old in this recording - finding videos for this piece ended up being quite hard - but you get that emotional punch in spades, don't you? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tU8iJXPU9vA

Have you heard the joke?

SOCRATES: To be is to do.
ARISTOTLE: To do is to be.
SINATRA: Doo be doo be doo.

One of my favorite songs is one you don't hear so often but it's on a beautiful compilation CD I own called MY WAY: THE BEST OF FRANK SINATRA. It's "A Very Good Year". I couldn't get a video of Frank singing this but here's a compilation of evocative photos from his life that go beautifully with these lovely lyrics:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwv-DxOPhSc

I think the first time I heard this I was a very little girl and it was in a tire ad (might even have been for Goodyear!). It's always made me want to cry - that yearning reedy oboe in the introduction cuts right to the quick.

Sinatra always used amazing arrangers (Nelson Riddle is the one everybody mentions). The way the orchestra or the big band weaves around his voice or answers back or comments on the action creates sonic magic. This arrangement for "A Very Good Year" is one of my favorites - it's quite subtle but so beautiful. For example, listen to the way the pizzicato strings echo champagne bubbles when he likens his memories to vintage wine. Or in that last verse again, how the grim march of time is subtly alluded to in the slow throb of the woodwinds. Magnificent!

"A Very Good Year" is very beautiful but rather melancholy. So I thought I'd finish this rave about Mr. Sinatra with the very upbeat "New York, New York"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WV02nP9PLnQ&feature=fvsr

This song has special significance for me because before I was published, I used to press repeat on my stereo and lie in the bath and sing it over and over. Always cheered me up! Not sure the neighbors felt the same! They probably wished me in New York, New York!

So to me, Frank is A number 1, top of the list, king of the hill!

Any other Sinatra fans out there? What are your favorite Sinatra songs? Do you prefer another singer of the golden age? I know Dean Martin and Tony Bennett and Perry Como and a host of others have their admirers. Let's go old school for the day! Source URL: https://idontwanttobeanythingotherthanme.blogspot.com/search/label/Inspiration
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Getting Inspired

by Christie Kelley

One question every writer gets asked is: Where do you get your inspiration for stories? I get ideas from everywhere…a story in the news, a movie that didn’t take a plot where I thought it should, or a walk in the park. It’s easy to find something that will inspire me to write a story but it takes more than just a quick thought to make it into a plot. That’s the hard part. So, I thought I’d share my favorite way to mull over a plot.

I spent yesterday painting the outdoor bar on our deck. Sorry I couldn’t post a picture but the camera battery needs to charge. I’m a little sore and still a little tired but I feel great. I got so much done! And I don’t mean just painting.

I know so many people who hate painting and part of me understands that. I truly hate the prep work involved in painting, the cleaning of the area, the taping, and putting down cloths. But once I finished the prep work, I spent four hours by myself, thinking about nothing. It’s amazing how productive my mind is when I’m doing something tedious.

After only a few minutes of painting, I had finally figured out the plot for the second book in a series I will be proposing to my editor soon. The whole book suddenly made sense. And the bar was getting painted too!

My husband’s theory on this is it’s the paint fumes. He might be right.

It’s interesting how the mind works (at least my mind). I can be sitting in front of my PC with a blank page in front of me and nothing comes to mind. But when I get my body working on something where I don’t have to think, suddenly the plots start come to me.

Of course, now I have a problem. My house is painted and I can’t think of a thing in it that needs paint. But I still have another book to plot!

Help me come up with mindless things that I can do to help me plot!

And for the writers, how do you plot for your synopses? For the readers, what do you do when you need inspiration for something?

Source URL: https://idontwanttobeanythingotherthanme.blogspot.com/search/label/Inspiration
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The Why of Stories

Today, we welcome Claudia Dain back to the lair. Using her wonderful Courtesan Chronicles as a framework, Claudia will chat with us about writer inspiration and advice. Welcome, Claudia!

So many people want to know where a writer gets her ideas and most writers I know have no idea how to answer that. Ideas just come. They come in a rush; they come in a trickle; they come in the dead of night; they come while stirring the cheese into the macaroni. They just come.

A better question is why tell that story? Why create that character? That’s a question I know how to answer.

As an author contemplating the idea for a new book, there is something that I want to say, some point I want to make in the strongest way I can. What I need is a character that can make that point for me, logically and organically within the framework of the story.

Thus was Sophia, the central character in The Courtesan Chronicles, born. I needed a character who was worldly-wise, who knew everyone worth knowing and knew where all the bodies were buried. A courtesan.

She had to be able to move in the right circles, to be both feared and admired. A courtesan who married an earl.


She had to be free of the rigid social standards of the Regency. She had to be able to think like a British aristocrat yet think beyond their views, their prejudices, their training. She had to be a rebel, but an acceptable rebel. A child of an Iroquois father who spent her first ten years in the forests of America.

Sophia’s backstory is complex, but creating complicated characters is my meat and drink. Her backstory is also shrouded in mystery. Bit by bit, book by book, Sophia is revealed. It’s like working a jigsaw puzzle. Piece by piece, the reader learns more about her. I’m having a lot of fun with that, teasing you with tidbits, luring you deeper into the fascinating woman Sophia is.

You have to be careful when reading about her. Sophia is not going to lay herself out for you to examine. She doesn’t actually lie, but if you have a misconception, she’s not going to jump in and correct it. She has conversations in the books where she allows someone to think the wrong thing. She’ll make a quick quip, a throwaway line, yet it’s a gigantic window into who she really is. You have to put it all together yourself. Discard some things as inaccurate and realize other things, things she’d rather you didn’t know, are true.

I know. It’s not usual romance novel fare since most of the time any secrets about a character or the plot are revealed within the pages of that book, and many times before the halfway mark. I can’t help it. Now that I’ve created her, she can only be who she is. Look at her backstory! Would an Iroquois/courtesan/countess let you dig through her life with a shovel? Of course not. She knows she’s a mystery to you, and she delights in that.

The one thing that is no secret is what she’s telling you about yourself. She was created to do this very thing. I created her to say these words, and she says them often in each and every book.

You have the right to ask for what you want. You have the right to get what you want. You deserve to be loved. You are incredibly valuable; never forget that.

That’s the idea behind The Courtesan Chronicles. That was the idea I had to voice. That is the purpose in each of the books in the series. Too many women, too often, behave as if asking for what you want is a cheat.

If I have to remind him it’s our anniversary then it won’t count when he remembers it.

If I have to tell him I want a gift for my birthday then it doesn’t count when I get it.

If I have to ask him to open the door for me or take out the trash or change the oil in my car then it doesn’t count. He doesn’t love me because he didn’t think of it all by himself.



Huh? When did asking for what you want, and then getting it, become a losing scenario? To take the passive role is to take the victim role. You wait silently, hoping, and you don’t get. Who’s to blame? You or him?

You.

You have the right to ask for what you want. You have the right to get it. You deserve to be loved. ASK to be loved. Demand to be loved, cherished, valued. This is what Sophia does daily, even hourly, and she gets everything she wants, on her own terms. She does it with a smile, and leaves you smiling.


From The Courtesan’s Secret:

“…I should not enjoy causing Lord Dutton any…unpleasantness.”

Sophia’s left eyebrow rose fractionally. “Surely Lord Dutton can tolerate some unpleasantness in his life. He is a man, after all, and men are rather good at tolerating unpleasant things. The same should never be said of women. We may occasionally be required to endure unpleasantness, but we should, at all costs, avoid becoming adept at it”

Louisa could only gape. She had never in her life been exposed to such a philosophy.

As philosophies went, this was by a wide margin the most sensible and appealing one she had ever heard. She planned to adopt it immediately.

Sophia is speaking. Are you listening?

What is the best advice you ever received? Did you follow it?

Claudia's giving a signed copy of The Courtesan's Secret to one commenter today.Source URL: https://idontwanttobeanythingotherthanme.blogspot.com/search/label/Inspiration
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