The Stories Behind The Songs..

I feel a bit like I’m coming out the closet with this confession, but I’ve been writing a book. I’m very lucky to have some great people around me to help me with this process and get it done, but it’s time I stopped doing it in secret.

The book is what it says on the tin. It’s the stories behind the songs of my three studio albums, Beautiful Monday, Fearless and Together, one single Strong, and a new EP Candlelight, in chronological order. It’s more autobiographical than I had anticipated, but since my songs are my life, I should have seen that coming really.

Writing a book, and doing it well, is a huge amount of work, and something I wanted to do my whole life. However, now feels like a good time.

The writing process was hard. I wanted this to be a work of art, which naturally feels self indulgent. I pressed on because I wanted to do it but tinkered here and there, fiddling about with stories when I felt I could justify the time. Then I hit a chapter that really changed my view of it. When I got to Fearless, and Nearby, I realised this is another opportunity to tell Geoff’s story, another way to tell people about his warmth and love, and the positive influence he had on me, despite his life being cut tragically short. Since then, I’ve been hell bent on getting it out for people to read. Every spare moment I had, I wrote until it was done. When it was finished, I did a little whoop, went to my writers’ online support group The Authors’ Journey, and did a little victory lap. “Congratulations” someone said, “now the easy bit it done”. And she was right. There’s so much more to do.

The stage I am at currently is ‘peer review’, where I have sent my script out to a few selected members of my intended audience, who have supported me in this process. They are reading it at the moment, and sending in their feedback. It’s scary. It’s the scariest thing I’ve done artistically for many a year! But that in itself is exciting. Once I get everyone’s feedback, I will make further amendments and corrections, write some sort of conclusion, my thank yous, and then move on to the next step. I don’t currently know what that is, but I will keep you updated.

One thing I am learning is that creativity is a multi-faceted beast, and what she wants continues to grow and change and get more exciting.

Here’s to the next step!

#TheStoriesBehindTheSongs