In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Hillary Behrman’s story collection Lake Effect is a brilliant debut with characters drawn empathetically and always surprisingly human.
Kirkus wrote of the book:
“Behrman masterfully crafts characters who feel believable, who garner empathy and understanding in spite of their flaws. Equally rooted in the natural and human worlds, the stories reveal the ways that healing, forgiveness, and escape can be found in the most unexpected places. Tender, messy, and supremely human.”
In her own words, here is Hillary Behrman’s Book Notes music playlist for her story collection Lake Effect:
The stories in Lake Effect span the decades from vinyl, 45’s and FM radio to cassette mixtapes, to CD’s, to streaming. Music is always playing on the car radio, in roadside diners, on clunky boom boxes, and in the heads of many of the characters, giving context and texture to their lives. Songs help the characters explain themselves to themselves and to each other. But I can’t listen to music when I am writing. Even now, while I am writing these notes, I have to turn off the music. There is something about my music listening brain and my writing brain that don’t function at the same time. I am too porous and the music seeps in too directly, influences, distracts, and derails. But I like to listen to music just before I start writing and when I am thinking about writing. Lake Effect has always had an internal soundtrack.
Paula the narrator in the story, “Winter’s Barter” explains it this way. “All night we played tapes on the boom box, fast forwarding to the track that illustrated every important point you wanted to make. The way we spoke to each other made our lives into stories, interesting, like we had never heard them before.” So, this playlist is an attempt to do what Paula and Anika are talking about. Some of the songs have a direct connection to the text. One of the boys in “The Lotus Eaters” taps out beats with a drumsticks on the gunnels of his canoe and sings Neil Young’s “Helpless.” Other songs on the playlist are more about the vibe of a particular place or time. Of course, each song is its’ own unconnected and wonderful story, but I hope the stories in Lake Effect are in dialogue with some songs. My son, Arlo, says not to over think this, not to worry if the songs are too tender or obvious or silly, that anyone listening to a playlist on Largehearted Boy won’t mind.
“Make Me A Pallet On Your Floor” by Gillian Welch
Gillian Welch’s voice and music are a tonal touch point for the book and in particular for the first story, “The Alvord,” and one of the last stories, “Their Arms Spread Wide.” The song is compassion made palpable. And like the book, makes us question what extending care for one another actually looks like. There is such a deep longing for connection in the song, something the characters of Day, Viv, Dale, and Jesse want so badly, but have trouble making happen.
“Water of Love” by Dire Straits
This song is so Cleveland to me, so late night FM radio. It’s Paula’s Cleveland in “Trouble in Mind” and Sam’s Cleveland in the title story, “Lake Effect.” Song and place can’t always be teased apart for me in life or in these stories. The beat of the song captures the beat I sometimes feel when writing about some of the girls and women in the book.
“I Want You” by Tom Waits
I debated whether or not to include this Tom Waits love song. It has been an important song to me and resonates with the experiences of two of the mothers in the book, Marcie in “12th and McGraw,” and Missy in “The Jungle.” Marcie and Missy’s connection to their children defies language. Waits’ paired down lyrics and melody seem to be reaching for this same phenomena.
“Trouble in Mind” by Marianne Faithfull
Marianne Faithfull’s “Trouble in Mind” is another song I debated including. It shares a title with one of the stories and links the story to the Alan Rudolph movie, Trouble in Mind. I’ve always been aware of Marianne Faithfull as an artist, but I haven’t listened to her very much. So, it’s interesting to rediscover her now with greater attention. The song, a part of the movie’s soundtrack, plays as Paula sits in the Cedar Lee Theater in Cleveland Heights watching the movie with her parents.
“Shakedown Street” by The Grateful Dead
There had to be a Dead song on the playlist. And this song is so Cleveland in my mind, even though it is actually about San Rafael. I bought the album used at Record Revolution on Coventry Street in Cleveland. I listened to the album over and over again along with Skeletons in the Closet when I was thirteen or fourteen. The song animates the place, giving life to the city, making it a living, breathing thing. This is how I hope to make the reader feel about the cities and towns in the book. This is how I feel about Cleveland and Seattle in Lake Effect and in real life. Day in “Seattle, 1986” and Sam in “Lake Effect,” experience the pulse under each city street in a similar way. And Oliver in “Map Travel” begins to sense the same life under the pavement in Istanbul.
“The Last Chance Texaco” by Rickie Lee Jones
Like The Dead, Rickie Lee Jones had to be included. As mentioned, I often listen to music before I start to write and Rickie Lee Jones is an artist I turn to in these moments. She also provides a referential soundtrack to the three stories: “The Jungle,” “Sand,” and “Now.” I doubt these character’s would have ever listened to Rickie Lee Jones, but who knows, maybe.
“All The Way From America” By Joan Armatrading
This is road trip music. This is mixtape music. This is 80’s music. And Paula and Anika would have listened to lots of Joan Armatrading in the story “Winter’s Barter” as they drove from Ohio to Wisconsin. They did so love a strong woman singer-songwriter.
“Because the Night” by Patti Smith
Another road trip tune, a favorite of Paula and Anika’s in “Winter’s Barter.”
“Night Moves” By Bob Seger
Bob Seger makes an appearance in this passage of “Winter’s Barter.” “We had no plan for where we would crash the second night. All that day you kept me alert, playing the same tape of women’s music over and over until neither of us could bear to sing along with another wobbly line. We were howling and laughing and spinning the FM dial in search of anything with a bit of an edge, seeking guilty comfort in Bob Seger and Jackson Browne…”
“As Soon As I Find My Shoes I’m Gone” by Ferron
Yeah, Ferron had to be on the women’s music mixtape too. But also, it calls out to Day and Beth’s love affair in “Seattle, 1986.” As someone who came out as lesbian and queer in the 80’s, the sound of Ferron’s music and voice is unique to that particular moment in time. And I imagine that Day’s character shares some temperament with Ferron.
“Talkin’ Bout A Revolution” by Tracy Chapman
Chapman, a Cleveland artist, will always haunt my writing and music listening consciousness. She is a consummate storyteller and a voice that calls to action. In many ways she provides more of a soundtrack to my day to day working life as an advocate, public defender and civil rights attorney than to this book. But she has to be on this play list because of the moment we are living in and all the ways we as humans can’t stop ourselves from fucking up everything in the world, over and over again, in ever more extreme ways.
“Wildflowers” by The Wailin’ Jennys
I started listening to this song after all of the stories in the book were written, when I was deep in the editing process. I was introduced to The Wailin’ Jennys’ music by my daughter, Willa and her partner, Drew. “Wildflowers” sounds like it could be another one of those love songs that should be sung by a mother to a child. And maybe this is what Emma in the story, “Muskeg” is trying to imagine for her daughter, Ruby, as she sets off on her fraught and dark adventure.
“Carry Me Over” by R.O. Shapiro
“Carry Me Over” is another newer addition to the playlist.” I love the feel of the song, Shapiro’s voice, his story making. The song helped me to lighten up a little bit or at least have a lighter touch in the final stages of the revisions to Lake Effect.
“Hammond Song” by The Roches
This is the only song on this playlist where I can draw a direct inspirational line from the song to the writing of a story. The line “Where is on down the line, how far away?” was an epigraph in an early draft of, “On Down the Line.” Both the song and the story center relationships between sisters. And I wanted to explore the relationship of two sisters in the wake of a shared loss.
“Helpless” by Neil Young Cover by K.D. Lang
I love all the versions of this song, but the K.D. Lang cover is one of my favorites. The song is quoted in “The Lotus Eaters.” I am interested in the shifting nature of memory and this song goes right there.
“Across the Great Divide” by Kate Wolf
“Across the Great Divide” had to be here and toward the end of the play list for all the obvious reasons.
“Dog Days are Over” by Florence + The Machine
The end of Lake Effect and the end of this playlist necessitated a banger, an anthem, something steeped in movement. This song seemed perfect. Most of the character’s in Lake Effect are restless, on the move, or running. They aren’t always headed to where they want to go, but they can’t stop moving. And this song moves.