Road Trip Wednesday: If Your Book Were Music…

Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway’s contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question that begs to be answered. In the comments, you can hop from destination to destination and get everybody’s unique take on the topic.

 

This week’s topic:

 

If your WIP or favorite book were music, what song(s) would it be?

 

“Finding Kate” is a reimagining of Shakespeare’s “The Taming of the Shrew.”  Nick Lowe’s “Cruel To Be Kind” is just too damn easy.

 

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Sadly, it’s not particularly accurate to my version of the story — or even Shakespeare’s.  What Petruchio (my Sir William) does, he does, as he says, out of “true and perfect love”:  out of a desire to help Kate transform herself from the shrew she has been forced to become while living in poisonous conditions with  her family into the witty, out-going, loving person he knows she truly is deep inside.  Theirs is not a twisted relationship; in fact, it’s the only healthy one in the story.  It just takes a while — and some unconventional courtship — to get there. 

 

A song that captures the essence of what I’m trying to do is Mumford and Sons’ “Sigh No More” for which *sigh* there is no official video. 

 

 

“Sigh No More” is the opening line of the song that repeats throughout “Much Ado About Nothing” (my next Shakespeare adaptation, publishing gods willing).  The Mumford and Sons song begins with Benedick’s comforting words to a troubled Beatrice:  “Serve God, love me, and mend.”  I went head over heels instantly.   

 

These lines from “Sigh No More” cut to the heart of all the Shakespeare’s romantic comedies.  

 

Love it will not betray you, dismay or enslave you, it will set you free

Be more like the man you were made to be

 

Or the woman.  For Shakespeare, it is only true love that reveals the true self.  THAT is the essence of “The Taming of the Shrew.”  THAT is the true story of my Kathryn and Sir William, and of Petruchio and Katherina.

 

Do you have a song or playlist for your novel or WIP?  Add to my comments below or head over to YA Highway:  We’d love for you to participate! 

 

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