The year’s best and most interesting year-end book lists.
“Writing fiction has always been a matter of psychological survival for me—as has listening to songs repetitively, obsessively.”
“I managed to write a novel set in the decade (the ’90s) when I was in high school and college without including any of the music I listened to over and over back then…”
“I can see my characters tapping their feet to their chosen song or going through their day while ‘Organon’ or ‘All Alone’ plays as incidental music.”
“A lot of the book was written while my firstborn, Rosie, was first discovering their love of music, and it was so lovely to be brought along for that ride.”
“I’ve talked before about how, as a writer, music is for me an emotional signpost. With a book like Menewood—huge in every way; dense, wild, and contradictory—music becomes not just useful but vital. A lifeline.”
“No One Gets to Fall Apart is a memoir about the year my mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia at the age of 53.”
“Music—and this is probably plain from the title—is key to my novel The Naming Song. When the setting of this book revealed itself as a place that had lost all language in an apocalyptic event, the logic followed that music (along with theater) might serve as a tool for preserving the precious words and stories that are gradually reintroduced into the world.”
“The Lee family are left to encounter music by accident, almost as reluctant recipients, when they are in the car and tuned in to the radio. And yet, these are also the moments when Amy and Jin are the most reflective and nostalgic, when they are most likely to be moved to tears—of sadness, of course, but also of joy.”
“Many of these songs make me want to dance. The selection process was a deeply personal one, with each song chosen for its ability to amplify the emotions and themes of the poems. The songs capture or shed light on the emotional landscape of my poems.”