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Remember how I said I'm hoping to do a post about the influences for Oh, The Lamented? Here it is!
This is going to be a pretty long post, I think, so please bear with me!
When I have a hard time with staying focused on or even just interested in a story, I am bound to play around with the Pinterest board, the playlist, or collages for the story.
I'm very much a visual person meaning it always helps me to get a feel for the image I want to write about...
My brain is weird, at least, I think so...
I think, remember, read some things as images, but I often just have a feel for an emotion and see the memory as pictures that are colored by emotion. I write the same way; I have to at least have some idea of what it would really look like.
And as the emotional side of my thought process goes music is even better to encourage a love for a story. I write my best with background music, and I always go all out on finding the perfect songs for my stories...
But 90% of my stories (the ones I've finished) are based off of a song. Like Oh, The Fallen was started due to the song I Drive Your Truck Fallen Soldier when it was a flash fiction and Fallen Soldier is really the song for the whole series even with each book having a song itself: Oh, The Warring – You’ve Got to Stand for Something by Aaron Tippin
Oh, The Fallen – Fallen Soldier by Nathan Fair
Oh, The Hopeful – The Call by Matt Kennon
Oh, The Lamented – If The Sun Comes Up/I Just Came Back (From a War)
Oh, The Dwindling – God’s Been Good to Me by Keith Urban (and other songs that would give spoilers, the same goes for OTS)
Oh, The Cherished – Hard Days by Brantley Gilbert
Oh, The Slain – God Moves the Pen by Tim Mcgraw
Oh, The Redeemed – This Ain’t Nothin’ by Craig Morgan and so on.
There are so many more songs tied into this series, like so many! More than I can remember or name right now or even in my public playlist.
And as painful as many of these songs are, well, they're just as beautiful too!
I'm fixing up the playlist now as it's kinda a mess, which I'm slowly adding to too, but it is there on my Spotify if you're on there.
Focusing on Oh, The Lamented's theme song though... Have you ever heard If the Sun Comes Up? It is just so heartbreakingly beautiful!
Aside from songs, another way I find inspiration or keep myself interested in my stories is that I read books that I want my story to be like.
Well, okay, not like, but more of with similar settings of the book I'm writing. For Oh, The Lamented, I like reading the following books...
Freedom by Faith Potts for the romance and military themes.
Live Without You by Sarah Grace Grzy for the romance themes.
I Don't Dance by Jesseca Wheaton for the romance and military themes.
Away from You by Jess Mastorkos for the second chance romance, the military themes, and so on.
No Chance Meeting by Jaye Elliot for vibes that are just so good and fill No Cece Meeting along with like half of the themes of it being close to themes that pop up in Oh, The Brave.
Those have been some of my all-time favorite books even before I was writing my military fiction and I've read each of them at least three times. Freedom I've read close to ten times and my brother has stolen my copy multiple times which is a surprise as he commonly reads a book once and is done but he has read it many times... I don't really know how much I can say these books influence my writing as I read them to get a feel for what I want to write and to stay in the mind set needed for the story, but I hope that Oh, The Lamented is half as good as these books are.
So, it's not a secret that this is a second chance romance... But really, it's so much more than a second chance romance. It's really a story of second chances in so many things... Life, faith, family, relationship... Relationships that were broken.
Yeah, that's a big thing in Oh, The Lamented that I didn't expect to write but I am!
One of my favorite relationships in the whole book is Memphis and Frisco. Two brothers were inseparable until things changed in their family which will be a major point in OTL and I'm looking forward to it. But the brothers are just my favorite characters ever along with Trina. The three of them are just so perfect and I can't wait to finish their story.
Another relationship in the series I love is between Savannah (Frisco's sister) and Trina. They're the only two I've written recently that aren't sisters but might as well be... I tend to focus more on brothers-in-arms relationships than sister like ones... No idea why but I'm working on it with Trina and Savannah as a start.
There's also poor Tyler... Savannah's husband, Frisco's brother-in-law and best friend, and Trina's big brother... He's just dragged along behind Memphis in this story no matter what his character was supposed to be and he's a pastor... which is a huge normal no for me.
And there are several other relationships I'm so happy to be writing but mentioning those would give spoilers.
Now, just a few of my favorite snippets from the first quarter of the book.
The flight of corn kernels stopped midair as they coated the tee shirt of the very man who had caused her current condition of anger. “Welcome home, honey.” She ground out, forcing a smile that was sure to show her emotions clearly. Her eyes burned from suppressed tears of anger and joy; joy that he was home safe even if he had changed. She bit her lip to keep from asking about the nightmares that had plagued him the last night they were on their vacation.
“What! I just came back from overseas because you wanted me to retire and now you toss a pot of burnt popcorn on me?” He said in a sarcastic tone with his cocky grin as he leaned against the glass of the door and rested his head on the door frame.
“Uhm, aren’t you going to address the fact your wife is, well, mnhmm, ready to kill you?” Nash asked with the tact that Lando commonly showed. Trina glared at him before slamming the door shut without a word.
“Emotions aren’t reliable,” Trina whispered after Frisco gave her a kiss.
Chuckling, he shook his head, “Not a bit.”
“One man, only one man, seriously, you Friscos are a hard lot.” A nearly laughing voice said from behind Memphis, spinning around he was shocked to see that Sean Bryant wasn't nearly as perfect as he seem with the way his eyes darted back and forth with worry and distrust and there was a scar covering half of his face and there was an eye patch protecting his left eyes and a line of smaller scars on his hand as he held his hand out to shake. “I’m Sean, your brother was my SGT and the best man I know. He's a great guy and really good to his men. He takes care of us.”
“Now, Sarge, he needs to tell you some things face to face, and your family is looking for workers, right? Win-win? Right… I promise he won’t punch you again.”
Frisco clenched his fist, considering smashing it through the cocky kid’s mouth when the words he’d prayed that morning and the night before after dropping the guys off at the hotel came back to him. Show me what to do, Lord, help me see the next step in healing. Rubbing his forehead, he let his fist relax. “I should toss you both off our land, but I’ve missed you big idiots.” He smiled when Sean’s face eased its frown.
Now, that's all for the snippets today... Another thing I've enjoyed doing recently is creating mugs, prints, and such that features quotes or things related to Oh, The Brave... And I'm wondering if that is something that would interest you in my actually selling?
That's all for now,
Talk to you later, booknerds!
Abigail
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