Music Behind The Story with Jen Trinh
Greetings Rock 'n' Rollers! I'm excited to share with you the latest release from a new author pal, Jen Trinh! Check out this very groovy post she wrote on the Music Behind Her Story!
Hi, all! Thanks for having me, RL, and for the chance to share a little bit more about my book with you!
I LOVE wordplay and puns. My husband and I come up with at least a couple each and every day. Hi, all! Thanks for having me, RL, and for the chance to share a little bit more about my book with you!
I LOVE wordplay and puns. My husband and I come up with at least a couple each and every day. (Ex: we saw a headline that mentioned the “Trump Trap.” My husband turned to me and said, “The worst kind of hip hop coming out of Atlanta.”) We both also love music and dancing, and our overlap in musical tastes is maybe 90%. We enjoy going to music festivals together and never have to fight for the aux cord / radio station on long car rides. We’re in total harmony!
Well, they say that you should write what you know. So, music and puns and romance? Right up my alley.
In Falling for You, Asher is an electronic music artist and DJ, while Lina is a PhD student in Chemistry who loves to read and rock climb. Lina’s husband passes away a year and a half prior to the start of the book, and she’s still processing her grief, so she can be pretty closed-off at times. But Asher discovers that a good pun will always make her smile, so he uses his lyrical skills to punnel his way into her heart. And her pants.
He even writes a flirtatious song for her that is full of climbing puns, which you can listen to here (note: the release date in the video was 5/1, but it’s actually 6/1). I don’t really sing or play the ukulele, so excuse the many mistakes! But composing and practicing the song was such a nice break from writing. It also nicely demonstrates just how sweet and playful Asher is. That’s one of the things that my beta readers really loved about him: he’s so consistently goofy and adorable. For example, he sends a postcard with the following line:
"The Nawlins music makes me dance, but it's you who makes me jazz in my pants."
Yup.
During the course of my writing, I did a lot of research into music and the NYC music scene. One of the musical acts that I studied was Washed Out. Like Asher, Ernest Greene is self-taught, and he composes all of the music for Washed Out himself. He also DJs and performs live with other musicians, just like Asher does in the book. They even kind of look alike! It’s funny—I wrote into the book the fact that Asher’s favorite composer is Erik Satie, and I put a Satie song and an Aphex Twin song on my official Falling for You companion Spotify playlist weeks ago. Well, for the past two Saturdays, Washed Out has posted videos on Instagram of him playing a Satie song and an Aphex Twin song on piano. Clearly, I was right on the money. (I’ve tried to get him to read my book, but he hasn’t responded LOL.)
By the way, Falling for You is book two in the Burlfriends series, but music also plays a big role in the first book, Crushing on You, where one of my main characters (Asher’s ex!) is a music journalist. She does a writeup of a show by her favorite band, The Llama People, that is full of emotion and llama puns. Readers are often disappointed to find out that The Llama People are not a real band (...yet?). But there is a companion Spotify playlist for Crushing on You, too.
I love how music is universal, how it transcends all languages. The more dimensions we can add to our characters and our stories, the more we can empathize with them. That’s why, even though the characters in book three aren’t explicitly in the music industry, I will likely still create a playlist for them, too.
I hope that readers have as much fun with the book (and all associated media) as I had in creating it!
You can find Jen and her books at the following places:
Website: https://www.jentrinhwrites.com/
Social handles: @jentrinhwrites
Sale links: https://www.books2read.com/ffy
Thanks so much for checking out this new-to-me author and welcoming her to the Rock 'n' Romance blog!
NEWS! The pre-order link is just about LIVE for Gator Me Twice! You can visit www.magicandmayhemuniverse.com for the latest and Stay Tuned...
