How novel!
As a way of discovering music, fiction is often overlooked. True, a band you read about in a novel will never be the newest undiscovered big thing and there aren’t too many books out there with music at their heart, but fiction excels at giving you a flavour of what’s gone before and at giving you sense of social context. Below are two of my favourite fictional books about real-life music – and I’d really like to hear from anyone with a recommendation.
‘Accordion Crimes’ by Annie Proulx
An often-grim yet fascinating story, following one green push button accordion through various groups of American immigrants, spanning around 100 years and covering a bewildering array of music. I’m re-reading this at the moment and using eMusic to listen to the music described – traditional Italian songs, zydeco, polkas, conjunto.
‘Twelve Bar Blues’ by Patrick Neate
A story about storytelling and the search for identity, with a great deal of jazz woven throughout it. I learned more about trad jazz from this novel than I have from any other source.
Over to you.
First thing that comes to mind is Oscar Hijuelos’s ‘The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love.’ You can almost hear the music of Tito Puente, Tito Rodriguez, etc. playing in the background as you’re reading the book.
I for one have gotten many a song, or at been least introduced to new music, through many fiction books. The ones that immediately come to mind are High Fidelity (Nick Hornby), American Psycho and Less Than Zero (Brent Easton Ellis).
You’re right MiDoJo - I should have thought of those three. And Generation X which introduced me to the Violent Femmes.