songs and stories | the bibliomaniac book blog

I’m so excited to see what people think of this post 🙂 A few months ago, I wrote Songs and Stories, in which I paired some of my recent favourite reads with songs I loved that bore similar meanings or messages. It was really fun to do, but I’d only ever intended it as a one-off post. However, over recent months, I’ve been scribbling down some more ideas for book and song pairings. I came up with quite a few more, so I thought, why not make a Songs and Stories #2?

THE FAULT IN OUR STARS by John Green // Soil, Soil by Tegan and Sara

“All you need to save me
Call (call)
And I’ll be curled on the floor
Hiding out from it all
And I won’t take any other call.”

This song is probably Tegan and Sara’s saddest, and to me some of the lines really resonate with John Green’s story – the sorrowful yet romantic lyrics go perfectly. The mood of the song is just right!

THE MISEDUCATION OF CAMERON POST by Emily Danforth // Girls Like Girls by Hayley Kiyoko

“Isn’t this why we came? Gotta get with you
Girls like girls like boys do, nothing new”

Cameron Post is about a gay teenage girl who grows up in a very conservative town and is sent aweay for being who she is. Girls Like Girls goes with the book for obvious reasons – especially because the message of the song is that being different is nothing new!

OFF THE PAGE by Jodi Picoult & Samantha Van Leer // Believe by Mumford and Sons

“I don’t even know if I wanna believe
Anything you’re trying to say to me /
So, open up my eyes
Tell me I’m alive.”

Off the Page is all about Delilah and her boyfriend Oliver, who is literally a prince from a fairytale. I love it because it’s a story about how much people believe in childhood stories and writing. This Mumford and Sons song is perfect.

THE NEXT TOGETHER by Lauren James // Someone New by Hozier

“Don’t take this the wrong way,
You knew who I was with every step that I ran to you”

In The Next Together, two characters fall in love. They will die – but they’ll be reborn again, years into the future, and the cycle will repeat – except they don’t remember their past lives. This is one of my favourite Hozier songs and it’s about someone falling in love with a different person, every day, and I think some of the lyrics fit Lauren James’s story quite well!

Do you agree with any of the pairings I made? Do you have any songs and stories suggestions?

And, of course – would anyone like to see a Songs and Stories #3? 😀

My favourite songs are ones I find relatable or with beautiful lyrics. Occasionally, I’ll listen to a song and not attribute its lyrics to my own life, but to characters in books. I may be the only person who does this… XD

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been jotting down book titles, alongside the titles of songs that fit the stories. Rather productive procrastination, seeing as it might by worthy of a blog post…

It took me a while to get widgets working for Spotify (and I’m not 100% sure these widgets will work…) but now I’ve finally managed to put together a list of songs and stories! Here’s hoping my music taste isn’t that bad…

#1: ALL THE BRIGHT PLACES BY JENNIFER NIVEN

“If you’re ever feeling lonely, if you’re ever feeling down, you should know you’re not the only one ‘cause I feel it with you now…”

I was listening to Kodaline’s new album while revising and I’d just finished All The Bright Places – a story of a girl coping with the death of her sister, and a boy coping with depression, who form a really strong bond. The chorus reminded me of the book so much ~~and what no I definitely didn’t cry at the song.~~

#2: WHERE SHE WENT BY GAYLE FORMAN

“Love is a game that we could play, even only for today, I don’t wanna lose you, we’ve been apart for far too long, now we only have a song, let the music move you, there was a part of me that never left a part of you, I wish I could be everything you wanted…”

If I Stay Spoilers?? >> I love Neon Trees lyrics and when I listened to this immediately thought of Where She Went! I felt like the lyrics could have been from Adam’s perspective as he meets Mia again for a day, and how he doesn’t want to lose her again, and about the music guiding the relationship… Uch my feelings.

#3: LIES WE TELL OURSELVES BY ROBIN TALLEY

“We are surrounded by all of these lies, and people who talk too much, you got the kind of look in your eyes, as if no one knows anything but us…”

The verse I copied above is exactly why I chose this song for Lies We Tell Ourselves, which is a story about a gay teenage girl in the ’50s who falls for another LGBT* girl: All through the story, they have to keep everything a secret because of the people around them. The chapters in Robin Talley’s début all begin with a lie Sarah says to herself – which is why the first line of the verse above clicked with me straight away!

#4: THE BUNKER DIARY BY KEVIN BROOKS

“I feel you in these walls, you’re a cold air creeping in, chill me to my bones and skin…”

Though the song’s called My House and obviously the people who are so inhumanly captured and locked away in this book are not in their house, I found the lyrics could be attributed to the story. There’s a lot in the song about a person who the singer’s afraid of, who is in the house somewhere, and the singer can’t run away.

#5: ARISTOTLE AND DANTE DISCOVER THE SECRETS OF THE UNIVERSE BY BENJAMIN ALIRE SÁENZ

“Oh and the answer, well, who would have guessed, could be something as simple as this…”

It was easy to pick a song for this book! I had to go with Simple as This. The novel is about Ari and Dante who are both taking very different pathways in life – yet eventually gravitate towards each other again: And the Jake Bugg song is about trying lots of things but coming back to what the narrator couldn’t believe he’d missed.

What did you think of the songs I picked? Are there any songs you can relate to a favourite book? 🙂