The stories in Puloma Ghosh’s debut collection Mouth are surreal and unsettling in marvelous ways.
Kirkus wrote of the book:
“A unique set of stories that show the promise of a bold new voice.”
In her own words, here is Puloma Ghosh’s Book Notes music playlist for her story collection Mouth:
I find it impossible to write without music. Maybe this is because I’m a fan of movies, and there is a cinematic way that stories unfold in my mind. Or maybe because to write is to drift into delusion, and music helps me achieve that perfect hallucinatory state. Catch me blasting unsettling film, TV, and video game scores at high volume, borrowing their soundtracks for my imagined worlds. Sometimes, a song itself can be the impetus for a story. The music of Mouth is, for the most part, appropriately atmospheric and moody. I’ve listed a track for each story that’s reflective of what I listened to while writing it.
“Desiccation”
The Taste of Blood / SQÜRL / Only Lovers Left Alive soundtrack
I love the film Only Lovers Left Alive because like all of my favorite vampire stories, it’s about sex, love and the inevitable nihilism of eternal life. The film is directed, written, and scored by the same person (Jim Jarmush and his musical project SQÜRL). The soundtrack is a conversation between its two leads, and the sludgy distortion in this track is reflective of Adam’s apathy, which I imagined must be shared by Pritha, this story’s maybe-vampire lurking around a dystopia like she could care less.
“The Fig Tree”
What Went We / Mark Korven / The Witch soundtrack
I first wrote this story 8, if not 9 years ago. In 2015, Robert Egger’s The Witch, an atmospheric folk horror movie set in colonial New England, was probably my favorite film of the year. I listened to the score again and again. “The Fig Tree” is kind of my first gen diaspora take on folk horror. This is the first track in that wonderfully eerie album composed by Mark Korven.
“Leaving Things”
Losing in a Sense / Bandit
This trio released one EP in 2015 that has lurked in my listening habits for years and years. I should send them an annual thank you card for making it. “Leaving Things” was derived from the moody, nighttime feeling of the whole album and a literal interpretation of this song’s opening and ending lines: The wolf of Chicago sleeps with his pride at his side every night on a mattress In the living room of his aunt’s apartment …. The world promised me I’d be something new.
“K”
The Hunger / Bat for Lashes
I listened to this Bat for Lashes album nonstop when I wrote this story in fall 2018. Its breathy, haunting, synth-filled sound puts me in an otherworldly space. “Hunger” in particular escalated perfectly and fed my ears the right words to lead me to the story’s delicious climax. “Jasmine” and “Peach Sky” are also favorites.
“In the Winter”
Eulita Terrace / Really From
This flash piece is quick and dirty. It’s a snapshot of young adult sex and angst, which is for me tied eternally to this Boston-based band active through my twenties. Listening to Eulita Terrace feels intense and visceral, which is how writing this story felt.
“Anomaly”
Bittersweet / Lianne La Havas
In this story I tried to twist together love, grief, and a ripple in spacetime. This song and album, romantic and mournful, swells in a way that helped me converge all of those things.
“Lemon Boy”
Fun Tonight / Macross 82-99
Surprise tone shift. This story is a party. There’s a lot of music in “Lemon Boy”, most notably this upbeat dance song by Macross 82-99 juxtaposed with a bit of brutality.
“Supergiant”
Pied Piper / BTS
I was going to pick a different song here but I have to be honest. Like many millions, I succumbed to BTS fandom some years ago. It was my first time experiencing a parasocial relationship, and I found it very surreal. After spending hours watching their content, I started to wonder how much of idol identity is real and how much is carefully constructed. I love this song because it directly calls out unhealthy fan obsession. It’s both self-aware and eerie—I’m here to ruin you and I’m taking over you.
“Nip”
The Dazzler / Ex:Re
This self-titled EP from a solo project by Elena Tornes of Daughter is also a permanent fixture in my playlists, full of theatrical angst. Before I wrote “Nip” I sat down and typed out the lyrics for this song and recalled a hotel room in Provincetown, MA.
“Natalya”
Two Slow Dancers / Mitski
I listened to Be the Cowboy on repeat the summer I spent time refining “Natalya”. This song’s lyrics and bittersweet tone feel particularly connected to what I wanted to explore with this story—how nostalgia is so tied to death, how heavy and eternal adolescent love feels, and the way memory holds onto people who don’t exist anymore, whether it’s because they’re changed or gone.
“Persimmons”
Thousand Eyes / FKA Twigs
I listened almost exclusively to FKA Twigs’ MAGDALENE while writing Persimmons because the mythic, hymnal, and alien sounds were a perfect match to how this story felt.
Puloma Ghosh is a fiction writer based in Chicago whose work has appeared in One Story, CRAFT Literary, Cutleaf, and other publications. This is her first book.