Daisy Jones & the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid
- Finished on May 2, took 9 days to read
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3 stars on Goodreads
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Genre: Fiction
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Rating 2/3 Fiction
There were so many reasons why I was excited to read Daisy Jones & the Six. Several of my favorite blogs, podcasts, and friends recommended this book. I loved the author’s earlier novel The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo. And most notably, earlier this year Daisy Jones got the ultimate bump when it got picked by Reese Witherspoon’s book club, and now the book is being made into a TV show on Amazon Prime.
However, the story of rebel wild child Daisy Jones and her tumultuous relationship with the band named The Six never grabbed me. Several items irked me:
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The entire novel is in the form of oral history, taken by an unseen author of an upcoming documentary or tell-all about this wildly famous band from the 70s. Because of this, there is very little dialogue and only memories of stories. It was interesting to hear different band member perspectives on the same incident, but ultimately I think this method of storytelling kept me from fully connecting with the characters.
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Speaking of the characters, there were WAY too many of them. We have the Six, we have Daisy, we have love interests outside of the band, plus stage managers, band managers, studio executives…phew. Perhaps my lack of connection from the characters kept me from remembering what each character did. This prevented me from developing a relationship with the characters as well.
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This will be a better tv show than a book. A lot of the book were actual lyrics to songs, which got rather boring to read. Hearing the actual music plus lyrics will make them come alive and perhaps shed a better light on character intentions (and make me care about them more).
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I was very disappointed in the ending. It was so…anticlimactic? Boring? Snoozefest? Predictable? The ending left me wondering what the point of was the novel. Perhaps if this was a real band I would have cared more. But again as I didn’t have enough of a connection with the characters when I finished the book I was left with a resounding “Meh.”
I gave this book three stars on Goodreads since Taylor Jenkins Reid is a talented writer. I liked her first book so much more because we were seeing the events through the eyes of the main character, even though it was still a series of interviews. In this book, the “interviewer” does not have the same connection to the reader, and it really affected my enjoyment of the book.
I’m going to enjoy watching the show as both Amazon and Reese Witherspoon have a good track record on adapting books. At least I have low expectations going into it!
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