In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Kathleen Rooney’s novel Man Overboard! is insightful, moving, and funny.
Booklist wrote of the book:
“Each of Rooney’s enthralling novels are shaped by her astute insights, poetic descriptions, and sharp wit. This bravura survival tale is endearingly suspenseful, touching, and hilarious.”
In her own words, here is Kathleen Rooney’s Book Notes music playlist for her novel Man Overboard!:
My fifth novel, Man Overboard!, is a dark comedy—kind of a beach read about a guy who has no beach. It’s the story of a 33-year-old dude from Nebraska, a former college swimmer named Kick Kilpatrick, who falls (or jumps?) into the Gulf of Mexico while on a Thanksgiving cruise with his extended family and then has to spend the next 20 or so hours treading water and hoping to be rescued. It’s in the first-person present tense to maximize the tension and uncertainty of his survival. Each chapter of the book chronicles one hour of his time in the ocean. Thus, I present a 20-song playlist, one for each of Kick’s hours.
“All the Young Dudes” by Mott the Hoople (1972)
Bowie’s lyrics open with, “Well, Billy rapped all night about his suicide” and Kick is suicidal. Moreover at 33 he is a relatively young dude. The lyrics also ask “Hey dudes! Where are you?” and that’s a question this novel explores: where are dudes at these days, literally and metaphysically? What is going on with them?
“Tread Water” by De La Soul (1989)
The connection here is probably obvious—treading for hours is what Kick must do. But the song begins, “I was walking on the water when I saw a crocodile / He had daisies in his hat, so I stopped him for a while / He delivered me a message, a massage to soothe my stage.” Kick encounters a lot of sea creatures during his ordeal—whale sharks, jellyfish, seahorses, and more—and he talks to and receives messages from all of them.
“Pool Party” by Rudy Willingham (2019)
This self-released single is catchy, charming, and joyful. A competitive high school and college swimmer, Kick loves the pool as much as the kids in this song. But he is terrified of the ocean—he needs four sides and a bottom or else he panics.
“U Got the Look” by Prince (1987)
I thought about adding Prince’s song “Dolphin,” but sadly it’s not that good. (Even the greats falter.) Instead, I’m including this one because Kick thinks of it in his own quest for women, noting that sometimes just walking up to someone and hitting them with a compliment (“your face is jammin’ / your body’s heck-a-slammin’”) gets you far.
“Fuck the Pain Away” by Peaches (2000)
Kick struggles with real intimacy and uses sex as a distraction. Everybody sees him as a hot jock, and he is, but he has an inner life too, and he’s struggling.
“Mannish Boy” by Muddy Waters (1955)
This is one of the best blues songs ever, and Kick has the blues. Kick’s dad is emotionally constipated and has imparted a limited idea of how to be a person to his son, in large part because of his own limited ideas about how men should behave.
“What’s My Age Again?” by Blink-182 (1999)
Like many men raised in a culture that teaches boys to suppress almost all emotions except for anger, and maybe irony and silence, Kick is emotionally stunted. But on the flipside, he’s also boyish and fun; he’s studying in secret to become a clown. This exuberant song captures both sides of Kick’s age coin.
“Dolphin” by Linda Perhacs (1970)
“Dolphin, take me with you,” Perhacs asks in this beautiful psychedelic folk song, and in the novel, Kick asks the dolphin he meets to do the same thing. But his dolphin says no, you have to sort this out yourself.
“That Was the River, This is the Sea” by the Waterboys (1985)
Kick has to figure out if he fell or jumped into the Gulf, and if it was the latter, why he did so. The lyrics of this song capture that retrospective sense of a person trying to determine what exactly has gone wrong: “Now if you’re coming undone / Maybe been alone too long / Or just you’ve been suffering from /A few too many / Plans that have gone wrong / And you’re trying to remember / How easy your life used to be.” Kick has a lot of time in the ocean to think about how his past led to his present and what he wants his future to be, if he gets to have one.
“La Mer” by Nine Inch Nails (1999)
La Mer, of course, is French for “the sea.” Trent Reznor has said that he wrote this song during a difficult period. While renting a house on the coast of California, his intention was to make music, but he ended up spending most of that time contemplating suicide.
“Mr. November” by the National (2005)
The whole novel takes place in November, on a single day, in fact: Thanksgiving. This song is so November-y! “I won’t fuck us over / I’m Mr. November”—Kick wants to get his act together and thinks a lot about what that will entail if he’s able to survive.
“Hello” by Poe, the Nevins Electronica Remix (1995)
The remix aspect of this song is crucial because by this point in his ordeal, Kick is tripping out. He has no idea where he is or who else might be out there and if or when he’ll be found. The lyrics, “Mothers are trails on stars in the night / Fathers are black holes that suck up the light” reflect his contemplation of his family’s struggles with abandonment and grief and how those might have contributed to his current situation.
“Hey, Ma” by Bon Iver (2019)
Kick has not seen or spoken to his mom in over two decades, so a central conflict is whether or not, now that he has the opportunity, he should call her.
“Immer Lustig” by Guru Guru (1972)
This krautrock song’s title translates to “always funny,” “always cheerful,” or maybe “always merry.” Kick has been trying to seem okay for years, and the façade has finally cracked. The song is also over 15 minutes, and it would be fun to trance out to while you were floating in the sea, barely clinging to reality.
“Don’t Give In” by Steel Pulse (1984)
Survival stories are riveting: will this person give up and die, or will they keep fighting and make it? This song is about keeping at it:
Let faith be your shield
Let truth be your sword
Arm yourself with love
In this, mystical world of ours
Kick is seeing how mystical the world can be and that arming oneself with love is probably the best plan.
“Weird Fishes/Arpeggi” by Radiohead (2007)
Kick has conversations with many weird fishes. But the book is suspenseful and I want the reader to wonder if he’s going to make it. The lyric, “Yeah I, I’ll hit the bottom / Hit the bottom and escape” speaks to what escape might be for Kick: death or rescue.
“The Dolphins” by Fred Neil (1966)
This is the second dolphin song on this playlist because Kick encounters his dolphin twice, and both times the dolphin shows him tough love. Neill’s lyrics posit that “this world may never change,” and one of the things Kick starts to realize is that even if that’s true, he can change himself. According to Wikipedia, Neil spent the last 30 years of his life working on dolphin conservation. This book has an ecological theme—it grieves the damage we are doing to this planet—so Neil’s efforts are apt.
“Shine a Light” by Spiritualized (1992)
The first time I heard this song I thought it sounded like dying in a dissipated and protracted way. This is for when Kick’s been in the ocean for hours and hours and is drifting in and out of consciousness, really close to death.
“Leave the Light On” by Chris Smither (2006)
This song hits me in my reptile brain and makes me cry every time I hear it—it’s a gorgeous meditation on life and time, sweet, defiant, and anthemic. “I’ve been left for dead before, but I still fight on”—hell yeah. I love my characters so much, even when they’re being assholes, and this is a song that loves people in all their complicated, frustrating glory.
“Ocean” by Tomo Nakayama (2025)
According to KEXP, the radio station where I first heard this song, Nakayama wrote this in a workshop with producer Brian Eno. “One of the assignments was to write a song of revolution,” Nakayama says. “He told us to imagine what kind of world you want to live in.” Kick has the chance to reimagine his world. “Who says it’s a crime / To seek a place to belong / A future worth saving / And a land to call home / I’m not gonna turn / I’m not gonna turn away.” If Kick gets to return to land, he’s going to face what needs facing—no more hiding, no more fear.
also at Largehearted Boy:
Beth Rooney and Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for their children’s book Leaf Town Forever
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her novel From Dust to Stardust
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her poetry collection Where Are the Snows
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her novel Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her novel Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her book René Magritte: Selected Writings
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her novel O, Democracy!
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her novel Robinson Alone
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her essay collection For You, For You I Am Trilling These Songs
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her memoir Live Nude Girl
Kathleen Rooney’s playlist for her poetry collection Oneiromance
Kathleen Rooney is the nationally bestselling author of Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk, as well as Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey and From Dust to Stardust. She has won the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize from Poetry magazine and the Adam Morgan Literary Citizen Award from the Chicago Review of Books. Kathleen’s criticism can be found in The New York Times, The Minnesota Star Tribune, The Brooklyn Rail, Chicago magazine, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and beyond. She lives in Chicago with her spouse, the writer Martin Seay, and teaches English and creative writing at DePaul University.