An inventive and not overly nostalgic Beatles tribute novel.
In Smith’s music-tinged novel, two aspirational young people find love against the backdrop of the late career of a seminal 1960s rock band.
You’ve heard of the Fab Four, but have you heard of TheFab? No, not John, Paul, George, and Ringo—I’m talking about Brash Clannon, Will McNarty, Ralph Betterson, and Clifford Quark. These four lads from TheNorth, inspired by the music of NewWorld, started a band that soon had all the Bloomers of IslandLand shaking and rocking their bodies. It is in this context that Peter Winter, a second-tier copy editor at the Daily Mail and aspiring paperback novelist, meets Ashley “Jojo” Summerfield, a go-go dancer at the Three O’Clock Club. Technically, the precise circumstances of their meeting are that Jojo crawls through the open window of Peter’s flat to escape some sinister men and nearly lands on Peter as he soaks in his bathtub. It’s infatuation at first sight, and Peter is only too pleased to escort Jojo back to her own apartment to ensure her safety. When Jojo’s roommate is attacked—presumably by the men looking for her—Peter and Jojo escape to the countryside until the trouble dies down. As Peter begins falling head over heels for Jojo, another unexpected opportunity presents itself: TheFab are starting a new venture in TheCity called Fab Enterprises, and they are looking for people to staff their publicity and art departments. Peter and Jojo leap at the opportunity to work for “the pied pipers of [their] generation” and are soon participating in the roll-out of instant classic Fab albums like Colonel Curry’s Band of Lonesome Souls, Fantastical Mystery Cruise, and the self-titled album more commonly referred to by its packaging, Brown Bag. But with Jojo’s enemies still out there, and the clashing personalities of the four Fab members threatening the future of the band—and everyone’s jobs—can Peter and Jojo find lasting harmony?
Smith tells the story using pseudonyms for most of the proper nouns, which infuses the tale with a slightly fantastic—and decidedly Beatles-y—whimsy: “A generation (an outsized, blooming generation) birthed in the aftermath of GreatDestruction was coming of age,” narrates Peter. “Now, this onrush of young people—the Bloomers—of whom I was one, wanted to live, wanted to live very badly in its own, youthful way.” (Some places and things, such as Liverpool and the Daily Mail, unaccountably retain their normal names.) The text is littered with references to Beatles lyrics, and the book is just as interested in documenting the various turns of TheFab’s late career as it is in the personal lives of Peter and Jojo. To say that this novel will appeal almost exclusively to Beatles fans is not a knock: Smith’s devotion to the band is apparent in every line of the book, and his pseudonymous games succeed in crafting a universe in which TheFab truly does feel like the axis around which this alternative Swinging ’60s spins. Fellow Beatlemaniacs will enjoy picking out the myriad easter eggs, and many readers will see themselves in this pair of protagonists to whom the music means everything.
An inventive and not overly nostalgic Beatles tribute novel.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 324
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Uneven but fitfully amusing.
Betrayed by her husband, a severely depressed young woman gets drawn into the over-the-top festivities at a lavish wedding.
Phoebe Stone, who teaches English literature at a St. Louis college, is plotting her own demise. Her husband, Matt, has left her for another woman, and Phoebe is taking it hard. Indeed, she's determined just where and how she will end it all: at an oceanfront hotel in Newport, where she will lie on a king-sized canopy bed and take a bottle of her cat’s painkillers. At the hotel, Phoebe meets bride-to-be Lila, a headstrong rich girl presiding over her own extravagant six-day wedding celebration. Lila thought she had booked every room in the hotel, and learning of Phoebe's suicidal intentions, she forbids this stray guest from disrupting the nuptials: “No. You definitely can’t kill yourself. This is my wedding week.” After the punchy opening, a grim flashback to the meltdown of Phoebe's marriage temporarily darkens the mood, but things pick up when spoiled Lila interrupts Phoebe's preparations and sweeps her up in the wedding juggernaut. The slide from earnest drama to broad farce is somewhat jarring, but from this point on, Espach crafts an enjoyable—if overstuffed—comedy of manners. When the original maid of honor drops out, Phoebe is persuaded, against her better judgment, to take her place. There’s some fun to be had here: The wedding party—including groom-to-be Gary, a widower, and his 11-year-old daughter—takes surfing lessons; the women in the group have a session with a Sex Woman. But it all goes on too long, and the humor can seem forced, reaching a low point when someone has sex with the vintage wedding car (you don’t want to know the details). Later, when two characters have a meet-cute in a hot tub, readers will guess exactly how the marriage plot resolves.
Uneven but fitfully amusing.Pub Date: July 30, 2024
ISBN: 9781250899576
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A tender and moving portrait about the transcendent power of art and friendship.
An artwork’s value grows if you understand the stories of the people who inspired it.
Never in her wildest dreams would foster kid Louisa dream of meeting C. Jat, the famous painter of The One of the Sea, which depicts a group of young teens on a pier on a hot summer’s day. But in Backman’s latest, that’s just what happens—an unexpected (but not unbelievable) set of circumstances causes their paths to collide right before the dying 39-year-old artist’s departure from the world. One of his final acts is to bequeath that painting to Louisa, who has endured a string of violent foster homes since her mother abandoned her as a child. Selling the painting will change her life—but can she do it? Before deciding, she accompanies Ted, one of the artist’s close friends and one of the young teens captured in that celebrated painting, on a train journey to take the artist’s ashes to his hometown. She wants to know all about the painting, which launched Jat’s career at age 14, and the circle of beloved friends who inspired it. The bestselling author of A Man Called Ove (2014) and other novels, Backman gives us a heartwarming story about how these friends, set adrift by the violence and unhappiness of their homes, found each other and created a new definition of family. “You think you’re alone,” one character explains, “but there are others like you, people who stand in front of white walls and blank paper and only see magical things. One day one of them will recognize you and call out: ‘You’re one of us!’” As Ted tells stories about his friends—how Jat doubted his talents but found a champion in fiery Joar, who took on every bully to defend him; how Ali brought an excitement to their circle that was “like a blinding light, like a heart attack”—Louisa recognizes herself as a kindred soul and feels a calling to realize her own artistic gifts. What she decides to do with the painting is part of a caper worthy of the stories that Ted tells her. The novel is humorous, poignant, and always life-affirming, even when describing the bleakness of the teens’ early lives. “Art is a fragile magic, just like love,” as someone tells Louisa, “and that’s humanity’s only defense against death.”
A tender and moving portrait about the transcendent power of art and friendship.Pub Date: May 6, 2025
ISBN: 9781982112820
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
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