Read Women discussion

I'm opening both of our July group discussion threads a little early as a prompt to get your copies in hand if you plan to participate. 1 July is going to catch me by surprise next Tuesday, I just know.

Our July fiction theme is Music and the Arts and after a fierce run-off, we chose The Final Revival of Opal & Nev, a debut historical fiction novel by Dawnie Walton. It came out in 2021 and received multiple awards and mentions.

From the Wiki article, Entertainment Weekly explained, "Walton's debut novel uses oral history as the form for her kaleidoscopic tale, though she can hardly be contained by it. The book bursts with fourth wall breaks and clear-eyed takes on race, sex, and creativity that Walton unfurls in urgent, endlessly readable style." Library Journal said, "Walton has a true storytelling voice, and her writing is impeccable. The New York Times Book Review said the book is "[i]ngeniously structured."

From The Coachella Review comes this summary (no spoilers): In the book, Sunny, a music journalist and the novel’s protagonist, sets out to report a definitive oral history of the moment that claimed her father’s life before she was born––which also happens to be one of the most famous moments in the history of rock and roll: a record label showcase in New York which later becomes known as Altamont East....an oral history––in this case recounting the fitful rise, tragic peak, and abrupt dissolution of Opal & Nev, a duo whose fictional star sits somewhere in the firmament of rock and roll near The Velvet Underground & Nico, Nina Simone, and Leonard Cohen. The utter readability of the form disguises the scope and ambition of the novel, which tours the worlds of fashion and rock and roll in 1970s New York while grappling with the commercial, political, and geographic forces shaping the intersection of race and popular music in the United States.

I will find and share more info on the author later this week. For now, I'm looking forward to this read and discussion.

Let us know if you plan to participate or if you've read Opal & Nev and want to share your thoughts.

I just got my copy from the library and will be starting soon. I knew nothing about this one beforehand. Thanks for sharing, Carol!

I will be joining this one as well.

I started it last evening. I loved starting with an Editor's Note that made me think it was an actual editor's note and not a part of the creative work. The content of the EN immediately intrigued. I don't know why, but I didn't expect the book to center on Opal so early, given she's the MC's dad's old fling, but making the MC a journalist was just the right explanation for where we start, in terms of the plot. (I started work super early yesterday so went to bed early - it's not the book's fault that I was yawning and gave up.)

I'm only about 60 pages in and already I'm loving it! I too was thrown at first by the beginning Editor's Note - don't skip it. It's part of the story. I didn't think I would like the back and forth with the initial interviews, but I really do. It works well in the plotting and the narrative, It just seems to be the right "fit".

Just finished it! Enjoyed it very much. Listened to the audiobook which was great, but this one may be one of those to read as well.

I read Opal & Nev a few years ago but don’t remember much about it so decided to reread it. It’s coming back to me as I progress.
I do remember that my initial reading was right after reading Daisy Jones and the Six which I loved. I think I couldn’t help comparing them. I caught the adaptation of Daisy Jones and found it disappointing.

I finally caved and bought the audible version, knowing that I'll be in the car for 12+ hours this weekend. My "work month" has been challenging enough to reduce my night-time reading and this book has suffered from it, so that'll give me the juice to consume many pages at once. I really like the structure of incorporating many voices and sources in short-er snippets, but - on the other hand - it is less easy to consume for a bear of very small brain than a continuous flow from one character.

The style put me in mind of watching a documentary, where there is some narration interspersed with interviews of various people "in the know" in specific topics. When I started to look at it that way, the flow moved much better for me. And I've been racking my brain for an example and can not think of a single one even though I have watched quite a few of this type!!!

I really enjoyed this!

GailW wrote: "The style put me in mind of watching a documentary, where there is some narration interspersed with interviews of various people "in the know" in specific topics. When I started to look at it that ..."

That's a great description, GailW. Virtually every true crime or athlete documentary on Netflix has this structure.

I’m up to chapter 13. I’m impressed with the author’s ability to give so many characters completely different voices. It feels like a super long Behind The Music episode, for those who remember when VH1 used to aired them. The pace is great. The only thing I’m missing from this documentary-like approach - everything is in first person as participants are interviewed by our journalist daughter - is the ability to get close to the characters. I’d like to be more in Opal’s head and heart, or give the author more of an opportunity to write luscious sentences, but that’s not possible with this frame.

Virgil’s my favorite character. Of course.

I’ve recently started this on audio and I can totally see the comparison to Daisy Jones and the Six with the narrative and documentary/interview style. That’s a good thing, imo, because I really enjoyed it and am enjoying this one so far. I don’t think I’ve met Virgil yet, but Opal is a fun character already!

Anita wrote: "I’ve recently started this on audio and I can totally see the comparison to Daisy Jones and the Six with the narrative and documentary/interview style. That’s a good thing, imo, because I really en..."

The narrator who plays Virgil gives him a cadence akin to James Baldwin. Classic 1970s gay best friend creative New York guy.

I’m about halfway through. This narrative style really gives the author freedom to drop bombshells on us, huh? Like a plot twist in the middle of a true crime documentary - oh yeah, and they were sleeping together all along. Like, hello motive?! Very controlling of the narrative, but it makes for a fun read because I have no idea what twist is coming next. I’ll admit I’m a little curious as I’m only halfway through and in the thick of the events leading up to this penultimate riot. Thoroughly enjoying it and already wishing for a VH1 style behind the music doc movie

Anita wrote: "I’m about halfway through. This narrative style really gives the author freedom to drop bombshells on us, huh? Like a plot twist in the middle of a true crime documentary - oh yeah, and they were s..."

It does! But it's also a way to avoid telling us much in the way of how everyone interacted, was it always just a fling on both sides, propinquity? other? how did Nev and Opal interact making the first album, deciding on show set lists? I have so many questions. I think we were told early on in the novel that Nev loved Opal or at least had a crush on her. Was that still how he felt by the time of The Incident or had it faded? How are we to interpret his motivation for the actions he took? He's largely pretty much of a blank for me as a character.

I am 50 pages or so from the end, and feel like my reading experiences divides this novel into before the night of The Incident, and after, the energy and storyline changes so vastly. Neither is better than the other, and the change isn't bad. It's just super different. I was very ready to be past The Incident when I got there. Revealing the fullness of that night's events felt like a bandaid she kept waiting and waiting and waiting to rip off.

I like how Walton weaves into the fictional story so many real-life events, like the Altamont murder of Meredith Hunter, and references to real actors (Swoozie Kurtz) in a play Opal performs in; it's a chance to see historical events often retold purely through the official white-lens-depicted narrative instead through our narrator's lens and see them shift into a more complete set of facts.

This is a super-short video of Walton describing her inspiration for Opal & Nev and how she thinks about Opal.

https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview...

This is a transcription of an interview with Walton that I found really interesting, too.

https://www.oprahdaily.com/entertainm...

The more I think about this novel and why it hasn't seemed to get the play amongst readers that its originality and Walton's talent merited, I think it didn't squarely fit any of the boxes that might have made marketing more easy. We can't really talk about it without acknowledging race and how books are targeted and selected by many readers. If you listen to Walton and read the Oprah interview, she's very much grounding her story of Opal & Nev in the (white) rock world of the 1970s vs R&B. She's watching the Talking Heads documentary, Stop Talking Sense, when she's initially inspired. When she's working on the book, she describes it to friends as, "imagine if David Bowie and Grace Jones made music together in the 70s." Placing Opal in the rock genre vs. R&B or Gospel might have lost Walton a big passel of readers who would have been rooting for Opal's success in genres they love and recall fondly. If Opal had opened for Maze featuring Frankie Beverly back in the day? That's an event I would be enraptured to imagine. And the white people who want to wax nostalgic about 1970s rock? Are they pining to experience Opal? A subset of them are, but not the critical mass I might like to think exist.

Carol wrote: "
Placing Opal in the rock genre vs. R&B or Gospel might have lost Walton a big passel of readers who would have been rooting for Opal's success in genres they love and recall fondly. My take was that Opal was an original hardcore punk rocker while Nev was more like Barry Manilow—Snooze crooning. I had a difficult time visualizing them collaborating with their diverse musical styles. The comment about imagining David Bowie and Grace Jones making music together made it much clearer for me.


This was a re-read for me so I took my time and have finished it. It is strange the things I did not remember from the first read. I definitely enjoyed it.

Sophie wrote: "Carol wrote: "
Placing Opal in the rock genre vs. R&B or Gospel might have lost Walton a big passel of readers who would have been rooting for Opal's success in genres they love and recall fondly. ..."

I imagined him more like Gordon Lightfoot, not Bowie, that’s for sure. Opal was so original with her wigs and energy and charisma. I agree I could never really imagine them as a duet act given their very different musical styles, as you say.

I finished this evening and am so impressed with how unique this book was, both for Walton's ambition and also the many risky choices that worked. It had none of the tentativeness or miscues I often find in debuts. The ending was not its strongest element but it was fine.

What did you all think of the ending? Momentum-wise, I was ready to wrap it up, but felt like it was a bit flat.

It definitely felt rushed to me. There was a lot of speculation left to the reader as to how the aftermath of the last evening on stage played out. THAT could have been a whole other book.

I finished today. I totally agree with the change in tempo/gears in the second half but I don’t hate it. I loved the exploration of Opal and her activism and the use of real life figures like Gloria Steinem and Flo Kennedy. I was a little frustrated initially at the lack of development on Nev, but it tracks with the story. Opal held him in high regard and their relationship was behind closed doors, mostly following the documentary/interview narrative. There’s just so much we don’t know because people didn’t share those details. I enjoyed the open ending for the same reason - I felt that it was true to the flow of the book. Really enjoyed this one.

Anita wrote: "I finished today. I totally agree with the change in tempo/gears in the second half but I don’t hate it. I loved the exploration of Opal and her activism and the use of real life figures like Glori..."

Me, too. I would like to read a novel about our MC's mom. Neither Opal nor Nev intrigued me as much as the small cast of secondary characters that took life in Walton's hands. But it wasn't necessary that they do to make the novel work well.

I felt that the ending was fine. I thought that Sunny got her answers to her questions about Opal and her father's relationship as unsatisfying as it was.