All my projects have a dedicated playlist. Not only because I love listening to music while I walk or make dinner or just about any time, but because a song can really help me focus or fall in or out of a certain mood/scene. Most of the songs on one of my writing playlists are for brainstorming, meant to evoke a feeling for me about a certain character or certain scene while I chew on problems, but a few are the kind I put on repeat for hours at a time while I draft. These I’ve chosen to share are a mix of the two!
Bleeding Love by Leona Lewis — Blood & Fury is at its heart about a handful of very, very melodramatic, passionate teenagers having to be bigger than they know how to be, fix huge problems they didn’t even make in the first place (except Caspian, he also made several of the problems). To draw that out in the playlist I wanted several big bold love ballads, and this one is sooo so melodramatic I am not sure I could love it more? www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_weSk0BonM
Fire for You by Cannons — This was the first song on my B&F playlist that I didn’t pull directly from the original C&F playlist. It came up on a pop shuffle I was listening to and I instantly thought Caspian you bastard so I downloaded it and listened to it on repeat the whole time I
wrote the original prologue for B&F. When we first were drafting, the prologue was a scene from Caspian-as-dragon point of view. That scene is no more, because of the needs of the story, but I kept the song, and listened to it while writing several scenes. www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4HQevc9JE0
Going Down Fighting by Phlotilla (feat Andrea Wasse and Topher Mohr) — This is the song for the worst times, the low points, when our characters are feeling at their lowest. It really invokes grief and endless war to me, especially the part where you have to just keep going after the world has fallen down, and you don’t know if you’re going to survive. But it’s either fight or everything dies. www.youtube.com/watch?v=efZDxIswmBc
So Alive by Love and Rockets — I’m a huge fan of 80s music, the music of my childhood, and this song came on the radio one day I was singing along, and at the lyrics “don’t know what color your eyes are baby” I started laughing and didn’t stop until the song was over and I’d moved it onto my playlist. Like “Fire for You” it has a really nice slow, seductive repetition that makes it soothing for me as I write, and evokes a feeling of momentum for me. Plus, the lyrics are so suited to Talon/Darling. www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L41MhFPU9s
Wherever This Goes by The Fray — the lone “Talon is a sappy soft teddy bear actually and gently longs for peace and also to divest himself of his family/father’s reputation and choices and just be himself with the girl he loves” song on my playlist. If Talon wrote music, he would be a gently emo guitar boy and sing songs just like this one. Especially the rough back beat that really evokes trudging along, never giving up, toward the distant horizon. www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgqhWqD1qe8
Phoenix by Dawn Richard (feat Aundrea Fimbres) — I like Dawn Richard’s music a lot, and from the moment we started working on Chaos & Flame, I knew this song needed to be on my playlist. I imagined it as if this story was a huge epic movie and “Phoenix” was the big end credits song. I didn’t listen to it while working on book 1, but the second Justina and I began outlining B&F, I blasted this on high like it was a promise. www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFMlQNon7Jk
BLOOD & FURY by Tessa Gratton, Justina Ireland
Bloody magic. Ancient fury.
Prepare for the gripping conclusion to the Chaos & Flame saga, the “fast-paced, action-filled fantasy that reads like a mix of Game of Thrones and Avatar: The Last Airbender” (BCCB) from two beloved New York Times bestselling authors.
A single kiss set Chaos ablaze.
Picking up months after betrayal transformed Darling Seabreak into the long-lost Phoenix and every House regent into their empyreal form, Darling struggles to make sense of her destiny as a legendary creature. How can she, an orphan with no family, be the one to reunite the fractured houses and bring about peace, if she can’t control the magic of her new Phoenix body?
Talon Goldhoard, still in love with Darling but wounded by her betrayal, is tasked with ending the vicious war that his family instigated. With the Phoenix reborn, Talon is hopeful that the bloodshed will end swiftly. Instead, the kingdom grows more fraught, with the threat of violence ever present – especially from dark, conniving forces within the walls of his own House Dragon.
As Chaos reigns, Talon and Darling must find their way back to each other – not only to survive but to save the kingdom. Can Darling harness the power of the ancient magic that runs through her blood to bring about a new peace? Or will the fury that House Dragon fueled for a hundred-year war be too strong to break?
Fantasy Dark | Young Adult Fantasy [Razorbill, On Sale: May 14, 2024, Hardcover / e-Book, ISBN: 9780593353356 / eISBN: 9780593353363]
Buy BLOOD & FURY: Amazon.com | Kindle | BN.com | Apple Books | Kobo | Google Play | Powell’s Books | Books-A-Million | Indie BookShops | Ripped Bodice | Walmart.com | Target.com | Amazon CA | Amazon UK | Amazon DE | Amazon FR
About Tessa Gratton
When Tessa was a kid, she wanted to be a wizard. Or a paleontologist. Maybe both. She’s neither now, but magic and monsters are still her favorite things. Born in Okinawa, Japan, while her Dad was on duty with the US Navy, Tessa moved around throughout her childhood and traveled even more. She’s lived in Japan, California, Kansas, and England, and visited 4 continents. After graduating from the University of Kansas in 2003 with a degree in Gender Studies, she went on to graduate school for a Master’s in the same. Halfway through, she ditched the program in favor of the blood, violence, and drama of Anglo-Saxon and Germanic epic poetry and to focus on my writing. Tessa doesn’t have a graduate degree, but she did translate her own version of Beowulf! Despite having traveled all over the world, she settled in Kansas where the sunsets are all in Technicolor, with her partner, two cats, and a mutant mutt named Grendel.
WEBSITE | TWITTER | GOODREADS | BOOKBUB | AMAZON | INSTAGRAM | BLOG
About Justina Ireland
Justina Ireland is the author of Dread Nation (Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins), a New York Times bestseller as well as the sequel Deathless Divide. Her earlier works include the fantasy young adult novels Vengeance Bound and Promise of Shadows (both Simon and Schuster).
Justina also writes for the Star Wars franchise, including the books Lando’s Luck, Spark of the Resistance, and the upcoming A Test of Courage, part of the High Republic publishing initiative.
She is the former co-editor in chief of FIYAH Literary Magazine of Black Speculative Fiction, for which she won a World Fantasy Award. She holds a BA from Armstrong Atlantic University and an MFA from Hamline University
No Comments
Comments are closed.