Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Title: Daisy Jones & The Six
Author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
Published: March 5, 2019
Rating: ⭑⭑⭑⭑⭑
Trigger Warnings: Addiction
“Love is forgiveness and patience and faith and every once in a while, it's a gut punch. That's why it's a dangerous thing, when you go loving the wrong person. When you love somebody who doesn't deserve it. You have to be with someone that deserves your faith and you have to be deserving of someone else's. It's sacred.”
The Basics
Daisy Jones & The Six is a fictitious biopic of a 70s rock band as they quickly ascend to stardom. When rising star Daisy Jones collides with Billy Dunne’s established rock band, their fame only skyrockets. But this is the one true account of the mystery behind the band’s breakup at the peak of their career.
Something Different
The narration style is incredibly interesting because the events are conveyed in an interview-style format. This means that each individual event is told through the eyes of each band member. This technique offers honesty, vulnerability, and comedy, as events can often be relayed differently from character to character. What someone remembers one way might be completely different from how another band member tells the story. This unusual format is executed so well here that I wasn’t even positive that it was fiction at first - I had to double-check that I was reading a made-up story.
The reader is also told at the beginning that this is the “only documented account” of the band’s history, so we are given the impression that the characters are recounting their version of things as they happened for the first time.
“I had absolutely no interest in being somebody else’s muse.
I am not a muse.
I am the somebody.
End of fucking story.”
Easy on the Ears
I listened to this one as an audiobook via Libby (If you’d like to know my thoughts on why audiobooks do indeed count as reading, click here) and I want to touch on a couple of things that are specific to this medium.
I recommend this book in general, but if you’re the type who listens to books, I definitely recommend the audiobook experience here. I am going to go ahead and deem this the best audiobook I’ve listened to, hands down. It’s theatrical and beautiful and amplifies the story so much. The full cast of characters was amazing and really made it feel like a true biopic.
The people cast to read this story didn’t at all sound like they were reading from a script or right off the page. There was intention behind the casting of this audio; the people sounded like true actors. Each person reading added depth and personality to their character. Drummer Warren has a gravely, abrasive voice, while Karen (on keys) is soft and sweet, with notes of a valley-girl inflection. Billy has a confident tenor, while Daisy offers a slow, easy alto. The full cast added so much to the reading experience that I would deem the audiobook version almost necessary!
One more thing that definitely added to the auditory experience: since this novel is about a rock band, several of the group’s tracks are discussed throughout the story. To supplement the audiobook, there is a song included at the very end that was composed just for this book. The song is titled “Honeycomb,” a soft love song that’s described in-depth through the novel. This was a cool bonus feature that further pushes me to recommended the audiobook.
To Wrap Up…
This is not only the tale of a rock band, but also of the interpersonal relationships that the bandmates develop with each other and with the important people in their lives. You get your doses of sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll, while also experiencing the emotional complexities that this group of people encountered in one of the most historic times for rock music.
