How a rock concert (& a few DMs) made me remember the kind of stories I need to tell.
I recently went to a Shinedown concert on a Tuesday night. The local amphitheater is small & not very well known, so they could only get the band for a weeknight. Normally, I wouldn’t go out for a concert during the week, but I’m trying to get out of the house more, & I ended up paying for it with a terrible neck ache that kept me home from work the next day, but that’s enough about my middle-aged struggles.
When I heard about the Shinedown concert, I thought I recognized some of their songs. Honestly, I only know them from their 2008 album. Before the show, I checked them out on Spotify & was happy to realize I knew a few tracks. Life got busy, though, so I didn’t think much about the concert until the day came—didn’t spend time obsessing as I usually do. Life has been hectic this year.
As I often do at concerts, I kept my phone in my purse for nearly the entire time & just enjoyed being there. The opening band was decent, & the weather was nice & cool. The amphitheater is a great spot for live music, & there really isn’t a bad seat. When Shinedown came on, the whole crowd lit up. Even though it was a Tuesday, it felt like a Saturday night—packed, full of energy. I’ve been to more than a dozen shows at this venue, but I’ve never felt safer or more comfortable. Maybe it was because I was surrounded by people my age or older. We’re tired, we’re genuine, & we’re there for the music.
I didn’t know I was there for inspiration, but that’s what living does, & another reason I need to get out of the house more. LIVING fuels the writing.
If you know me as a writer, you know I love writing about musicians. Two of my three romance series are about them. Muse & Music is about country singers, & Red Note is about pop singers. I’m definitely a pop girly at heart, I adore 90s country & alternative, but I also enjoy rock bands like Bush.
The first thing that stood out to me about Shinedown was Brent’s voice. Hollllyyyyyy shit…it’s incredible—there’s no way to really describe it. It wasn’t just his singing, either; his calm, steady way of talking to the crowd was just as impressive. The band has a great sense of humor, & you can tell they’re close. It surprises me that some people think of rock bands in a negative way. Sure, there are clichés, & I’m sure they’ve seen plenty, but they talked about mental health, family, unity, love, and peace during tough times. I really felt what they were saying.
Every writer needs a muse, & this band definitely inspired a new obsession for me. I’m now working on a rock star romance inspired by Shinedown, & their music has been playing in my car every week since the concert.
I plan to include this book in my Muse & Music series. Though that series has mostly focused on country singers, I have a vision for this story, & I know it will fit in naturally. Each book in the Muse & Music series reflects a part of my life, & as I’ve grown over the ten years since the first book, so have my characters. This next book will have a main male character in his mid-40s.
Now, I usually write reverse-age-gap romances, but after the Shinedown concert, I posted about it on Threads & shared it on my IG stories. Soon my DMs were full of excited messages about me writing an older man, & that’s when I realized I hadn’t been clear enough with my wording. They thought I meant a romance where the man is older than the woman. Oh no, no no no no…
As it has over the past decade, I know my writing will help me explore & heal parts of my past, & learn new things about myself. But one place I know my writing will never lead me is to write a story about an older man & a younger woman. That power dynamic isn’t for me—it honestly makes my skin crawl—but I’m not here to judge anyone’s romantic preferences, since I know mine might not appeal to everyone either.
I’ve had three serious relationships in my life, all with men younger than me, though the age gaps were small. My first boyfriend was a year younger, my second was two years younger, & I married someone two years younger than me. These aren’t big differences; we were experiencing life through the same stages together. And in casual dating, I’ve mostly been with men my age or a bit younger, though sometimes up to seven years younger. My experiences with older men are limited to one guy two years older in high school & a date/one-night stand with a guy three years older in my twenties. That’s it. I’m mostly attracted to men who are not older than me, & there’s a reason for that.
Many of my books explore my childhood sexual trauma. My debut, Burning Muses, touches on it, & Kiss Me Like You Mean It, which is based on my real life, addresses it directly. In that book, there’s a scene where the main character, Gwen, realizes why being stared at by older men—old enough to be her father or grandfather—makes her feel like she’s about to have a panic attack.
As a child, I was sexually abused by a father figure. It took me years to fully understand this, & even now, more than a decade after realizing it, I’m still healing. Therapy, journaling, & writing have helped me understand why I prefer dating men who aren’t older than me. The power dynamic in older-man/younger-woman relationships is something I’ll never find appealing, & whenever I see age-gap romances online, I scroll past them.
To me, the reasons a woman might want an older man are very different from why a man might want an older woman. I find something beautiful in stories about older women & younger men. Society tells women that we lose value as we age, so the idea of a man desiring a woman who feels like she’s losing her spark is intoxicating.
I often notice troubling power dynamics when the man is older than the woman. He might take on both fatherly & romantic roles, acting as the leader or the one who always knows best. While this can also happen in older woman/younger man relationships, I think it’s less common based on what I’ve seen. I’m certainly not saying one dynamic is subject to abusive power dynamics & one is immune to it.
But one is a story I write over & over again, & another is one I will never touch. I am not the one to tell it.
For me, writing romance is about showing that the kind of love you want is real. I write from the heart, about what excites me & what turns me on. So if you’re looking for stories with a daddy kink, that’s not me. I do have a poetry collection called Daddy Issues, but that’s the only ‘daddy’ I’ll ever write about. The shitty ass one.
Though when I’m feeling especially angry, like I often do while writing the Ozark Omens series, that ‘daddy’ character will get the ending he deserves. A very bloody one.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go watch another Shinedown video & crush on this 48-year-old man, which is a first for me.
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