Hi, hello, and welcome to the annotated playlist for Seven Rules for Breaking Hearts!
I am always a little nervous about sharing playlists. There’s no telling whether you guys will interpret the songs the same way I interpret them, so maybe they won’t feel as relevant to you. But it felt like a fun idea to share a playlist for this story—Margo majored in music and there are a lot of song references woven throughout. At the same time, that almost made it harder to curate a playlist, because I feel like Margo would listen to a bit of everything and would probably have way better taste in music than I, a thirty-something perpetually stuck in her emo phase, do.
Ultimately, this isn’t necessarily Margo’s personal playlist. It’s more songs that touch on some of the themes and character development and just overall ✨vibes✨. It’s pop-y and mostly summery and hopefully captures the spirit of the novel. I’d also love to hear if you have any ideas for songs I should have included!
You can preorder Seven Rules for Breaking Hearts pretty much everywhere books are sold or grab your copy in stores on May 16th! 💙
TRACK LISTING
“26 Miles (Santa Catalina)” – The Four Preps
Stylistically, opening with this song is maybe a little out of place with the rest of this
list, but when a song is literally about the setting and famously calls it “the island of
romance,” how could I resist? It was written much closer to Catalina’s Hollywood heyday and really captures the vaguely nostalgic feel that the island has to this day.
“Primadonna” – MARINA
You could probably take almost any song off the Electra Heart album and it would work.
There are a couple artists on this list whose songs about rules helped inspire the podcast
in Seven Rules for Breaking Hearts, but including those would feel repetitive and a little
on the nose, so I’ve gone with other songs by the same artists. Marina Diamandis said
herself that this song is about “not needing anybody when it comes to love,” but there’s
also an undercurrent of the narrator not being totally satisfied with the attention she’s
receiving.
“Blow Your Mind (Mwah)” – Dua Lipa
Dua Lipa is another artist whose lyrics inspired the basic premise of this story. This song
really fits with Margo’s mindset at the beginning: putting on a confident front and
pretending not to care what everyone else thinks.
“Anti-Hero” – Taylor Swift
The writing on this song blows me away. It really captures that feeling of grappling with
your own insecurities, worrying about whether you’re presenting yourself in the most
honest and authentic way, and I feel like that’s one of the core themes in this book.
“Touch and Go” – Ed Sheeran
If, hypothetically, this playlist was pieced together by Margo, there would 100% be an
Ed Sheeran song on here just to annoy Declan. But also, I think the lyrics of this one
really fit his side of the story—wanting to hold out for a deeper connection.
“Bad for Business” – Sabrina Carpenter
This song was used in a TikTok book trailer that @love.s.stories created for Seven Rules.
It never would’ve been on my radar otherwise and I was just amazed by how well the
lyrics fit.
“Kiss Me More (ft. SZA)” – Doja Cat
Doja Cat is one of the artists that’s actually mentioned by name in-text, so it feels
appropriate that she gets a song on here. The lyrics for this one are pretty self-
explanatory.
“I Think He Knows” – Taylor Swift
One of my amazing ARC readers, @sheisntyou on Instagram/@ROMAJULlETTES on Twitter, made her own playlist
inspired by Margo and Declan. I didn’t want to steal all the songs off her playlist (though believe me… I was tempted because I think she did an amazing job) but this is one is just perfect, so I couldn’t help but include it.
Plus, can you ever have too much Taylor Swift on a romance novel playlist?
“Break My Heart” – Dua Lipa
This song’s all about realizing that loving someone is giving them an opening to hurt you,
wanting to pull back, but realizing there’s nothing you can do about it. Future Nostalgia
is another album where I probably could’ve picked almost any song, but I like this one especially because of how the power dynamic is flipped compared to the earlier songs on this playlist.
“Believe in Love” – MARINA
It was very hard to whittle a lot of these artists down to two songs each because they
have so many songs that could fit this story. This one’s on MARINA’s Love + Fear album,
which pretty much sums it up. It’s about fear holding the narrator back from love.
“Wasteland, Baby!” – Hozier
This song pretty much compares love to the apocalypse, but I think it’s the perfect note
to end on—here again, there’s that theme that love can be scary and destructive, but
there’s also so much good to be found in it, and you don’t want to miss out on the good
because you’re afraid of the bad. It’s about embracing the scary parts and letting
yourself love.
That’s what I was able to come up with! After reading, do you have any suggestions for expanding the playlist? Let me know in the comments! 👇
Kristyn J. Miller 