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May 19, 2022
Umar Turaki's Playlist for His Novel "Such a Beautiful Thing"
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, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Umar Turaki's debut Such a Beautiful Thing is an imaginatively told and engrossing dystopian novel.
Colleen van Niekerk wrote of the book:
"There is an aching beauty woven into the lyrical prose of this novel that lingers with the reader beyond the last page. Against the richly drawn canvas of a landscape rendered vividly and with meticulous detail, a story unfolds of a family and community faced with both outward and inner desolation. Compelled to untangle the difficult questions of what it means to be both human and humane in the face of unspeakable cruelty and horror, one is drawn in and held by their resilience, courage, vulnerability, and tenderness and the inimitable power of the ties that bind."
In his own words, here is Umar Turaki's Book Notes music playlist for his novel Such a Beautiful Thing:
“Snow (Hey Oh)” by Red Hot Chili Peppers
As I often do with random favourite tracks, I had this song on repeat at work the day I received an offer by an agent to represent Such a Beautiful Thing to Behold. My workplace at the time had become a stifling and depressing place for me. Reading the email with this song in the background intensified my feelings of relief and triumph that I may have just found a potential escape route. In that moment, the song became an anthem to the joy of sheer possibility and boundlessness because if I could actually secure an agent (a wild, wild dream), then anything seemed possible.
“Hey Now” by London Grammar
Mid-2020. The euphoria of finding representation has matured into a relaxed optimism. The pandemic has taken over and the world is in lockdown, including Jos, where I live. Freshly out of a job (laid over, like so many), I’m also in the middle of a major revision of the novel. A friend puts up London Grammar’s If You Wait album cover as a Whatsapp status and I remember listening to it many years ago upon my sister’s recommendation and not caring much for it. I decide to try again.
The title track comes on. It’s moody, restrained, and full of atmosphere. It feels like a gateway into a strange, private world. It reminds me of the world I’m grappling with on the page, how secluded and otherworldly it is. In the coming weeks, the music will become a cocoon for me as I imagine and build my world out.
“Stay Awake” by London Grammar
A big chunk of If You Wait could easily feature here, but I’ve limited it to the first three tracks. While I was revising Such a Beautiful Thing to Behold and listening to the songs, the rainy season had arrived and the fields were wet and green. The songs and the season began to blur, increasingly coming to resemble each other. And this song in particular. It had a resonance for not only its mood, but also the calm propulsion that builds and builds right to the end. As I wrote, it would remind me of my designs for my own story, of how I wanted it slow-fast (or is it fast-slow), how I wanted introspection alongside action and that page-turning quality that some of my favourite books have. The track also served as satisfying accompaniment to the writing of a particular climactic scene in the novel that features a sunrise and a herd of goats.
“Shyer” by London Grammar
Like “Stay Awake,” this track became so emblematic of both the natural season and the season of writing that the two songs now share a permanent kinship to my mind. It almost feels like they’re two halves of the same song. In the structure of the album, “Shyer” continues with the energy introduced by “Stay Awake,” building up and up to a haunting yet soothing wail that could be either a celebration of unrestrained love or a lamentation for the loss of it. Or both.
“Home Free” by Lindsey Abudei
This song, for me, is soundtrack to a particular chapter in the book that follows the rebirth of one of the characters after an unimaginable dark night of the soul. Like the chapter – and the book as a whole – the song is an ode to resilience and the hope that yields daylight out of darkness. This chapter was a last-minute addition that almost didn’t happen but is probably the one I’m proudest of – I’m proud of this character’s strength, and I’m proud of how I wrote it. Quite by accident, this song provided the atmosphere of solitude I needed to do the actual line-by-line writing once I had understood what this character’s arc needed to be.
“The Chain” by Fleetwood Mac
I had originally planned on having the first line of this song serve as an additional epigraph because it so perfectly expresses what I was trying to say with this novel. That is where the connection to the book begins and ends. My editor and I eventually agreed to leave it out. But it’s a favourite and how could I pass up the opportunity to include it on a list like this?
Umar Turaki is a writer and filmmaker whose work has been short-listed for the Miles Morland Scholarship and long-listed for the Short Story Day Africa Prize. For more information, visit www.umarturaki.com.
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