In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Hanif Abdurraqib, Andrew Sean Greer, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Laurie Petrou’s novel The Rayburn Affair is a compelling novel of art, friendship, and ambition.
Laurie Elizabeth Flynn wrote of the book:
“A delicious, addictive cocktail of intimacy and ambition.”
In her own words, here is Laurie Petrou’s Book Notes music playlist for her novel The Rayburn Affair:
I love an Ontario cottage. I grew up going to camp and visiting the cottages of friends during long, lazy summers in those preteen years before jobs and relationships gobbled up free time. My memories are of screaming as we jumped in the lake, piles of Archie comics, dark wooden cupboards, pilled curtains, and lying on the dock with my girlfriends. As an adult, cottages contain the same allure: an escape, not just away from a place or to somewhere else, but back in time. For me, the best cottages are those that have been passed down within families, that have resisted renovation and updating and contain the sensory hallmarks of their pasts. My latest novel, The Rayburn Affair, has such a cottage. Despite the affluence of Shelby Rayburn, by way of her successful writing career, her family cottage is frozen in time: dark browns and mustards, large rugs, and the perfect amount of summertime nostalgia. In the corner of the large family room, I can picture a record player surrounded by dozens of records that have been loved, danced to, misplaced, and put back in the wrong sleeves by all those who have passed a summer within the walls of the place. It is from this imaginary collection – a hearty mix of old classics inherited from parents, albums obtained during Shelby’s younger years, and some newer vinyl (maybe something Shelby heard in a Toronto shop or that Oliver learned of from a student) that I’ve dreamed up this playlist. I like to imagine thumbing through this collection during a summer thunderstorm at the cottage. Feet up on the arm of a worn couch, only getting up to choose a new track.
These Days – Nico
Is there a better opening to a song? I can imagine coming in from a walk in the woods as the rain just begins to make its way across the lake, stretching out on an old couch (chesterfield if you’re of my Canadian vintage) as rain patters on birch trees outside open windows and listening to this song.
Brand New Key – Melanie
The foot-tapping piano in this upbeat winner is straight out of a saloon, maybe with a shaggy bear at the keys. I’d be hard-pressed not to turn it way up and dance around the cottage to this.
Bring on the Dancing Horses – Echo and the Bunnymen
I love a late ’80s song that leaves nothing to chance. Bring on the Dancing Horses doesn’t flinch, doesn’t demure, doesn’t shy away: it is a bold, dramatic declaration that gets bonus points for being from one of my favourite soundtracks: Pretty in Pink.
Always on my Mind – Pet Shop Boys
One of those songs where the cover is every bit as good as the original. This is the kind of song you listen to while making dinner in a rustic, outdated, perfectly ’70s kitchen at a cottage, complete with retro melamine plates with orange flowers. You know the ones.
I Fall to Pieces – Patsy Cline
I have such a soft spot for poor Patsy Cline and her beautiful voice. Her songs are short, tragically melodramatic heartbreakers, and I’ve been listening to them my entire life. Perfect for anywhere, including warbling through the battered screen door up North.
You Send Me – Sam Cooke
I started listening to Sam Cooke in high school and have never stopped. His voice is smooth, comforting, and makes any moment and any memory better. Put him on while you wash up. There’s no dishwasher at the cottage.
Blackbird – The Beatles
It’s so dark out you can’t see your hand in front of your face, but the sky is an absolute riot of stars. This is the song for you, you skinny-dipping rebel.
Both Sides Now – Joni Mitchell
One of my favourite writers is Joni Mitchell. Every line is magnificent. Lay back in the darkness of the dock, and let the words spill over you.
Ron Sexsmith – Brandy Alexander
You have a second wind, someone pours another drink, puts on another record and tells another story. This track is a late night tumbler of a song.
Shady Lane – Pavement
It’s morning at the cottage, and some organized person put the coffee on a timer and the smell is wafting through rooms. A record goes on the player and it’s this peppy 90s track, urging you to get out of bed and greet the day.
Lazy Line Painter Jane – Belle & Sebastian
Belle & Sebastian are a perfect band to listen to on the dock as the day kicks off. Nostalgic, twee, warm and sunny, with excellent lyrics to boot. Put your feet in the cold lake and turn your face up to the rising sun.
Switch Over – Horsegirl
Yes to the strumming, the repetitive call of Switch over (switch off), to the invitation to do what we all need to do when we leave town: switch off. Take the first outdated magazine off the stack on the coffee table and give yourself over to relaxation.
Jackson – Johnny Cash
Afternoon shenanigans at the cottage: cornhole, swinging from a rope into the lake, taking out the canoe or paddleboard for a toot around the water, waving to the neighbours. Hotter than a pepper sprout. Let this happy ditty wash over you.
Souvenir – Boygenius
Naps at the cottage are vital. On a couch indoors, on a chair on the deck, or even better, in a hammock. There are murmurs of conversations and laughter just out of earshot, and the breeze in the birch trees is a lullaby. So is this track.
Nothing Compares 2U – Sinead O’Connor
There are hundreds of break-up songs. This will always be the winner, hands down. When you have gone up North to get away, to give your heart a break, to distract your mind with pine trees and fresh air, you may still find yourself under a blanket listening to Sinead perfectly describe how dull the world without the love you lost.
People Everywhere (Still Alive) – Khruangbin
This song is summer: it is the sunny glare off your glass, it is your ice cubes melting, it is sunscreen and heat and the exuberant relief of the cool lake when you finally give yourself over to it with a cannonball off the dock. We know when winter arrives in Ontario, it can be punishing, and so we soak up summer like season insurance when we can. It’s all the more precious when it’s fleeting.
LAURIE PETROU is an award-winning and internationally published author of young-adult fiction, short stories and commercial literary novels. She is a professor at Toronto Metropolitan University, and lives in Niagara, Ontario.