“”Whatever the case or occasion, music holds my emotional memory. Known songs aren’t just melodies but rather life’s bookmarks, bookmarks that evolve and change with each listen…”
“Novels take me FOREVER to finish. I keep a running playlist in my head that fuels the spirit or, as the kids say, the vibes of the book. This changes the more I begin to see the world through characters’ eyes, and songs seemingly unrelated ear-worm their way in. “
“I wrote If You Leave from a place of unknowing, groping in the dark for a story. What carried me were settings, Washington, DC, and rural North Carolina, with their textures of sounds and sights that I collaged into a character-driven novel.”
“Every long project I work on has its own hyper-specific soundtrack, and one of the most enjoyable parts of the writing process is finding out what songs work for each book”
“In Bloom explores the redemptive power of friendship for a group of disenfranchised young women. It’s also a story about being the biggest Nirvana fans in THE WORLD.”
“Music can act as a time machine…”
“Soundtrack or not, some of the songs below were on my mind in the making of certain characters, in writing specific scenes, lines of dialogue, little images. The songs refer to three different landscapes, as the novel is set between the South of Italy, London and Morocco, and are often intertwined with specific memories of my own.”
“Charli xcx’s album Brat was released on June 7th, 2024. I sold my book on June 20th. By mid-summer, the album was everywhere. And its angry-funny swagger seemed to mirror exactly what my protagonist Dell Danvers wanted: to be seen entirely and exactly on her own terms.”
“Music, then, is not just the cultural capital and fabric of Jean’s world, but a conduit to deeper human interaction: it is through music that Jean feels.”
“While writing The Death of a Jaybird, I listened to a lot of gospel music. Writing about illness and grief is emotionally demanding. Because I grew up in the church and sang in choirs for years, gospel music feels like home and a warm hug.”