Inklings & Musings

Do Imaginary Friends Have Childhoods?

I've hit the 10k mark with NaNoWriMo.  Feels good.  I am completely wiped out, and I feel like it's finals week in college, but somehow I keep plugging along.  Today, Kendra finally... well, noticed, Dax.  It was sort of cute and fun to write, which was a change over yesterday.  Yesterday's writing just felt like work.  The fact that Kendra thinks of Dax as real reminds me quite a bit of my imaginary friends that I create in my stories when I write.  The longer I work with them, the more real they feel.  I know them better than I know some of the people around me.  I hurt when they hurt.  I know their weakness and their strengths.  I always come away from the story dreaming up more just because I want to know more about their lives, loves, and losses.

Music was a real help today.  I am listening to a collection of tracks from the group Two Steps From Hell.  They write trailer music--for some of the biggest movies out there, actually.  Everything from the Twilight Movies, "Enterprise", and "Prince of Persia" to "Young Victoria" and "Up".   Most of their music isn't available for sale, but you can find a nice selection on YouTube, if you'd like to sample it.

The advantage of listening to soundtracks while writing is that I can get into an imaginative mood without my brain being distracted with lyrics.  Soundtracks are also written to tug at your emotions at critical parts of the movie, and as such make good background music for writing emotional bits of stories as well.  Some favorites:

Little Women, The Secret of Roan Inish, Dead Poet's Society, The Man From Snowy River & Return to Snowy River, New Moon & Twilight, both of the more recent Pride & Prejudice offerings, North & South (the BBC miniseries), anything by Gary Pozner, Patrick Doyle, Trevor Jones, or John Williams, both Narnia soundtracks, and all three Lord of the Rings Soundtracks.

What are your favorite bits of background music?