My Rating: 5 Stars
Goodreads Summary
Trigger Warnings: drug/alcohol addiction, domestic abuse
I don’t know how this happened, but I fell in love with this book. This is my second time reading it. My first read of this book happened almost immediately after finishing “The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo” and I believe that I read it around its release date.
The main reasons I didn’t love this book as much as everyone else is because:
But now, a couple of years later, I decided to pick this book up in preparation for the TV show’s release and I genuinely feel like a different person after reading it. There’s just some tangible quality of the not so tangible art of literature that when the storytelling is so immersive and unforgettable, it touches your soul or heart and gently molds it a bit to make itself at home. Now when you’re walking down the grocery store, you’re not thinking about the laundry detergent you keep forgetting to buy, you’re thinking about the way Daisy and Billy look at each other even when they don’t notice it or how strong Camilla is in fighting for what she deserves, something so many of us are afraid to do. Books like “Daisy Jones and the Six” aren’t just a read and set aside kind of experience. It’s an experience that lingers for a long time and has you listening to music a bit differently and live life with a more watchful eye.
“Daisy Jones and the Six” follows the stories of Daisy Jones and a 70’s rock band called The Six. We watch as the different band members and Daisy Jones grow up in what feels like the Renaissance of Rock music and how they fight to make it onto stage and live out their dreams, all while doing all the drugs, having all the sex, and jamming out to all the rock songs in an undeniable 70’s flair.
I love how flawlessly and easily TJR (Taylor Jenkins Reid) is able to draw readers into the 70’s era. Even in an interview styled narration style, TJR does an excellent job feeding into the plot the visual of the booming city that was Los Angeles in the 70’s. We’re introduced to different night clubs where bands would visit for a couple of sets, recording studios, red rocky cliffs where celebrities like Mick Riva or Evelyn Hugo may live in, but also a sprinkle of the quiet suburban life of a woman married into the world of rockstars. ****************************************
Just like the different shades of the 70’s setting, TJR explores a wide cast of characters including a group of woman who are strong in very different ways. We’ve got a woman who wants to make it in the rock world by taking away all attention form her body, a woman who fights for the life she deserves with love, boundaries, and self-respect, and a woman who’s on fire from her inner demons she likes to drown out with drugs and alcohol and who is desperate to pursue her equally fiery passion for creating music. With a cast like this and the slowly coming of age kind of story, we get to see how the book starts to bubble in anticipation of the band’s memorable fallout the author’s been building up to since page one. With a cast of characters with personalities as big as those in the “The Six” and Daisy and Camilla, we already know the fallout’s going to be big and loud.
It wouldn’t be a good review if I don’t mention how much I love Daisy Jones as a character. Unlike Evelyn Hugo who is fearless in her pursuit of her passions, Daisy lives in chaos to feel a drive to fight for her passions and not sink in to the constant fear and dread that follow her like a shadow. I could see a lot of myself in Daisy. The biggest thing about Daisy that’s plagued all her ups and downs in both her career and personal life is her unshakeable feeling of loneliness. She grew up in a world where she had absolutely everything but never the one thing everyone deserves the most, a sense of love and validation. That’s why I love the relationship between Simone and Daisy. It’s in those few scenes between Simone and Daisy where readers can see how much Daisy can flourish and succeed if she just realizes that she doesn’t have to be lonely all the time and that there are people who care for her. Sometimes, your blood can’t give you the kind of love and validation you’re looking for. Sometimes you have to find it in a friend like Simone.
Billy is the second main lead of the story, both in the interview but also in the band. We see him as the center point of “The Six” and while every band member of “The Six” respects him, we also see them grapple with some of his less desirable characteristics. From a high level overview, Billy does occasionally come off as an arrogant prick, as Eddie, one of the band members, constantly likes to remind the readers. But at the same time, Billy is put in a far different position than the other band members. He’s basically been pushed as the frontman of the band and also carries a lot of the weight of working with the record company to ensure their band’s success. Outside of the band, he’s dealing with exploring his relationship with Camilla that quickly turns down a road he’s never been down before and one he’s not sure he can handle.
The thing about LA in the 70’s is that it’s fast. The thing about rock bands in the 70’s is that they’re super fast. Everything is go, go, and go. There’s not much down time in the world of rock and roll because people want more and especially in the 70’s, when there’s somewhat of a modern entertainment and music renaissance, you have to be producing more to stay on top. Bands fall apart just as quickly as they gain popularity.
The similarity between Billy and Daisy is that they speak and work through life through their music. There’s a difference between enjoying music and breathing, speaking, and writing music. Daisy Jones and Billy Dunne breathe, speak, and write music. So when Billy’s personal life starts to challenge him, it ricochets into his music. His life bleeds into his songs and this quickly becomes a problem when Daisy Jones comes along and challenges him in a way no one ever has before.
The relationship between Daisy Jones and Billy Dunne was electric from their first meeting. I think that no one will ever understand Billy the way Daisy does and no one will ever understand Daisy the way Billy does. As tragic as it was to see the band fall apart, it was beautiful to see how tragic and messy Billy and Daisy’s relationship was. It was the perfect definition of meeting the right person at the wrong time and how it feels meeting the one person who can see right through you.
Camilla is an unforgettable character who’s taught me so much about life. I love her involvement in the band, in pushing Billy towards his dreams all while making sure that she’s living out her dream. I feel like I keep using this word in this review but Camilla taught me how to navigate a world that’s incredibly messy. She knows and has seen with her own eyes what it means to be with a man who travels the world as a rockstar with copious amounts of drugs, alcohol, and women. I think that handing a piece of yourself to someone in the name of love and trusting them to take care of that exchange of love is terrifying. Camilla showed up and showed me what it means to be a badass bitch. She taught me that life is uh, yes, messy and that trusting someone and protecting your peace are two synonymous things and you have to set your own definition, even if no one else can understand it. She taught me that life is hard but we deserve good things and we deserve to fight for those things.
All of the characters in this book taught me a lesson or two about what it means to live your life the way you want to and how to come back up when life brings you down. I think that it’s extra impactful to read and learn these messages in the context of a 70’s rock band because there’s nothing mellow about the lifecycle of a 70’s rock band. It’s all real big highs or real big lows. I feel like the lifecycle of a 70’s band is a microcosm of life. We’re able to see and study the birth of a band, the struggle to rise, the rise to fame, the downfall, the fallout, and the recovery all in a few years, maybe even a couple of months rather than studying a group fo people across an entire lifetime.
Aside from all the deep stuff, there was some humor in this book that always left me grinning. I really do love the formatting of the book. I have yet to read the book via audiobook and can’t wait to get my hands on it. My favorite thing about the interview style formatting about this book is how TJR set up the transitions between the different members’ answers. I love how we explored the same scenes from the perspective of different band members. This way of building the scenes and plot points really added to the ever present tension of the looming fallout of the band by getting into the minds of all these different characters and breakdown the misunderstandings and individual journeys these members were going on while they’re lives became extremely public and busy. As much as this back and forth answer style added to the levity of the plot, it also added to the humor. Warren was one of my favorite band members. He seemed the most down to Earth and I loved seeing the world of rock and roll through his eyes.
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[…] Daisy Jones and the Six is, feel free to check out the full length goodreads summary of the book here. In short, this book is structured in an interview, documentary style format, where an interviewer […]