A review by wardenred
Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid

challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

What was performance and what wasn’t? What were we doing to sell records and what did we really mean? Honestly, maybe I knew at one time but I don’t know anymore.

This book was a great reminder to venture outside my comfort genres more. Because I absolutely don't do that enough, but so often when I do, I end up really loving the experience—just like this time.

This is essentially a mockumentary in book form. You know all those special features about bands with cult following that used to be legendary, with all the members gathering round to tell stories of their glory days? Exactly like that, except it's a novel and the band is fictional. At times, though, it barely felt like fiction, because the vibes were captured so well. I'm not a big fan of the 1970s music scene in terms of lifestyle and... shall we say, aesthetic, tbh. I mean, I have playlists chock-full of Led Zeppelin and Fleetwood Mac and whatnot, but that whole sex, drugs & rock-n-roll  vibe isn't my thing. But I used to be in a relationship with someone who was a big fan and wished they'd been born a few decades earlier to witness that scene first-hand, so I kind of got well-versed in it by osmosis. And reading this book really brought me back to all the conversations we used to have about it half my life ago, to the point that I kept wanting to turn around and ask, "Hey, have you read this? What do you think about that one part?" even though that someone hasn't been by my side for ages.

I really loved that "mockumentary" format because of the extra distance it gave the characters when they relived past experiences. Some storylines, like the early parts of Billy and Camilla's marriage, would've had a very different effect of me if they played out "in real time," but with Billy describing his experiences with addiction and rock-n-roll scene as a whole through a more mature lens, never shying away from responsibility for the choices he'd made, gave me more sympathy for him. It made me actually enjoy the bits that would've been frustrating otherwise.

My favorite aspect of the book was how it tackled the subject of joint creativity, and shared creative control, and how creative bonds affect people's emotions and feelings. The entire Aurora section that focused on all the work they put into making their hit album was a big hit for me. There was so much feeling there, and a lot of thoughts on creativity that I found highly relatable despite not being a musician. And the narrative was constructed masterfully. There was, for example, the part where one of the members was feeling left out, and his parts of the interview started fading into the background until he sprung up with some really strong "left out" feelings, and I was like, "Oh shit, how did I completely forget about this character? I liked this character!" 

By the end of the book, some story threads did get a bit melodramatic, but I found that forgivable due to how poignant the prose still was and how fleshed out the characters felt throughout their tribulations. That goes for all of them, but my favorites are all the women in the story—Daisy and Camilla and Karen and Simone—and the tapestry of relationships between them. Some of the scenes focused on each of them legit made me tear up.

Definitely bumping up Taylor Jenkins Reid's other books on my TBR!
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