Here are 61 books that One Dead Jazzman fans have personally recommended if you like
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I started singing and playing guitar in garage bands in high school, about the same time that I began thinking of myself as a serious writer, so for me the two endeavors have always gone hand in hand. Over the decades, I’ve continued to write creatively—while teaching thousands of students along the way—and also to play in a number of bands that have specialized in everything from country-folk to raucous punk. Like many writer-musicians, I love reading good stories about the challenges and joys of people joining together, and falling apart, as they attempt to transcend ordinary life through the power of music.
Taylor Jenkins Reid is not the first or only person to adapt the nonfiction oral history format into a work of fiction, but she does it with the most panache.
Loosely based on the mid-seventies romance between Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham, Daisy Jones & the Six offers a nonstop procession of drama and conflict, but there’s a tender heart beating at its center and a heartbreaking reveal at the end.
I love music and books about the music industry. Fiction or nonfiction–the drama of a musician’s rise and efforts to sustain a career never gets old to me. I can relate to their determination to make a living doing something they love. Also, as a resident of Memphis, Tennessee, I’m fascinated by the musical history here and often meet people that had ties to the music industry and are now “regular people.” My latest novel Intermissionis about a singing group. I’ve read numerous books in this genre, from Motown bios to the five listed. What a great way to combine my two favorite things–music and books!
This book piqued my interest because it was on former President Obama’s reading list. On the surface, this is a story about an interracial rock duo’s rise to fame and their breakup. But it is really about how race impacts black women and the choices we have to make that others don’t.
The story is primarily set in the 1970s, and as a baby boomer, I enjoy reading about this time period. In 2016, they considered a reunion, but of course, secrets and unresolved issues got in the way.
ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S FAVOURITE BOOKS OF 2021 | LONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE 2022
'A thrilling work' TA-NEHISI COATES
'Lovely and lyrical . . . warm and wonderful' KILEY REID
A queen of punk before her time. A duo on the brink of stardom. A night that will define their story for ever.
Opal is a fiercely independent young woman pushing against the grain in her style and attitude, a Black punk artist before her time. Despite her unconventional looks, Opal believes she can be a star. So when the aspiring British singer/songwriter Neville Charles discovers her one night,…
I love music and books about the music industry. Fiction or nonfiction–the drama of a musician’s rise and efforts to sustain a career never gets old to me. I can relate to their determination to make a living doing something they love. Also, as a resident of Memphis, Tennessee, I’m fascinated by the musical history here and often meet people that had ties to the music industry and are now “regular people.” My latest novel Intermissionis about a singing group. I’ve read numerous books in this genre, from Motown bios to the five listed. What a great way to combine my two favorite things–music and books!
This story about a female country singer spans her coming-of-age during the Depression and her struggle to make it as a country musician. Hearing this story from a female point of view is different and interesting. Much of the story is also about her life as a “regular person” after her heyday.
As she embarks on her “farewell tour” she must face the choices she’s made. The story is a good reminder that fame and glamour often come at a great cost.
From the author of the New York Times bestseller Everybody Rise, a “shimmering” (New York Times Book Review) novel with the exquisite historical detail and evocative settings of The Cold Millions and Great Circle that tells the story of one unforgettable woman’s rise in country and western music.
It’s 1980, and Lillian Waters is hitting the road for the very last time.
Jaded from her years in the music business, perpetually hungover, and diagnosed with career-ending vocal problems, Lillian cobbles together a nationwide farewell tour featuring some old hands from her early days playing honky-tonk bars in Washington State and…
I love music and books about the music industry. Fiction or nonfiction–the drama of a musician’s rise and efforts to sustain a career never gets old to me. I can relate to their determination to make a living doing something they love. Also, as a resident of Memphis, Tennessee, I’m fascinated by the musical history here and often meet people that had ties to the music industry and are now “regular people.” My latest novel Intermissionis about a singing group. I’ve read numerous books in this genre, from Motown bios to the five listed. What a great way to combine my two favorite things–music and books!
This is the biography of blues legend and multiple Grammy winner Bobby Rush. He grew up in Arkansas and was not an overnight success. Blues and R&B fans will appreciate the stories he tells about well-known musicians and life on the road.
His is not a hard luck story, although it is about hard work, including how he supported his family when music wasn’t paying the bills. Great to hear from someone who lived to tell the story. I am glad he is finally getting his just rewards.
This memoir charts the extraordinary rise to fame of living blues legend, Bobby Rush. Born Emmet Ellis, Jr. in Homer, Louisiana, he adopted the stage name Bobby Rush out of respect for his father, a pastor. As a teenager, Rush acquired his first real guitar and started playing in juke joints in Little Rock, Arkansas, donning a fake mustache to trick club owners into thinking he was old enough to gain entry into their establishments. During the mid-1950s, Rush relocated to Chicago to pursue his musical career. It was there that he started to work with Earl Hooker, Luther Allison,…
I became a young man near the end of the sixties, and I have always been enthralled by the era's various idiosyncrasies, both good and bad. For instance, I loved the complex yet pleasant rock music and the freewheeling lifestyle. On the downside, the war in Vietnam cast its pall over the times, and I narrowly escaped being drafted and sent off to Southeast Asia. Overall, it was an era in which good and evil were starkly defined, and many people were attempting to create a better, more peaceful world. There is still much we can learn from this time.
This memoir paints a vivid picture of the sixties due to its author's excellent writing style and his immersion into the important events of the era.
One of the key factors for me and many other young people at the time was the war in Vietnam, where Stone served as a reporter. Later, he was closely associated with the sixties counterculture, including the exploits of Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters, which he describes in this absorbing and fascinating book.
From the New York City of Kline and De Kooning to the jazz era of New Orleans's French Quarter, to Ken Kesey's psychedelic California, Prime Green explores the 1960s in all its weird, innocent, turbulent, and fascinating glory. Building on personal vignettes from Robert Stone's travels across America, the legendary novelist offers not only a riveting and powerful memoir but also an unforgettable inside perspective on a unique moment in American history.
Early in my career, I attended a writer’s conference in southern Louisiana. During a discussion of the best-selling Louisiana-based novels of Vermont-born author Francis Parkinson Keyes, a local historian said with great ire, “That woman came down here and picked our brains for her books!” As a follower of my state’s incredible past, I immediately saw the attraction. Since then, I’ve written more than 65 historical and contemporary novels, most set in New Orleans and broader Louisiana. Hours have been spent at the famed Historic New Orleans Collection, talking to people and walking the streets of the French Quarter—and, of course, collecting a library of famous Louisiana histories.
I came across this book as a young teen and was riveted by the colorful, behind-the-scenes depiction of Mardi Gras in New Orleans, as well as the intimate stories of three generations of star-crossed lovers.
The characters were so well drawn that they seemed real, as if they must have loved and grieved, lived and died, as given. I felt as if I had walked the streets of the city and could recognize the places described.
I was also impressed by the Author’s Note detailing Keyes’s exhaustive research; reading it allowed me to accept the story as being as true to its place and time as possible. Years later, I followed her fine example, adding an Author’s Note with research details to my own books.
The first of Keyes' novels set in Louisiana was Crescent Carnival, which tells the story of three generations of two intertwined families. The Breckenridges are Protestants, while the Fontaines are Catholic Louisiana Creoles. The plot hinges on the way that pride and misfortune conspire with cultural and political differences to keep prospective lovers from marrying. The cycle of failure only ends when two people have the courage to defy the odds and accept their love for each other. Carnival celebrations and Mardi Gras parades form the backdrop of many scenes. Captures the social mores, Carnival season, and the French Quarter…
My love of mysteries began with Nancy Drew books. As I read more mysteries over the years, I finally decided it was time for me to write my own. A setting came to me immediately—New Orleans. I fell in love with the city through the Anne Rice and Julie Smith’s books. To write my cozy mystery series, I read all kinds of books. I read them for pleasure, but to make sure the details are correct in my books, The French Quarter Mysteries. I’m able to enjoy New Orleans through my sleuth, Samantha. It’s the next best thing to being there myself.
No matter where I visit, I always try to buy a book about the town.
I never come home from a trip to New Orleans with one. It doesn’t matter whether it’s non-fiction or fiction, novels or short stories. French Quarter Fiction is a collection of short stories featuring my favorite part of the city, The French Quarter.
The variety of authors and stories is incredible and features such different views and aspects of this amazing neighborhood.
"Branching across every genre, from mystery and romance to flash fiction and prose poetry, this anthology of works by preeminent writers on the heart of New Orleans features a previously unpublished story by Tennessee Williams, as well as stories by Richard Ford, Ellen Gilchrist, Robert Olen Butler, Andrei Codrescu, Barry Gifford, Poppy Z. Brite, Julie Smith, John Biguenet, Nancy Lemann, and Valerie Martin, among others. The characters in these works find themselves everywhere from Sarajevo on the eve of the First World War to Algiers Point just across the Mississippi River, but their stories are all anchored in the French…
Early in my career, I attended a writer’s conference in southern Louisiana. During a discussion of the best-selling Louisiana-based novels of Vermont-born author Francis Parkinson Keyes, a local historian said with great ire, “That woman came down here and picked our brains for her books!” As a follower of my state’s incredible past, I immediately saw the attraction. Since then, I’ve written more than 65 historical and contemporary novels, most set in New Orleans and broader Louisiana. Hours have been spent at the famed Historic New Orleans Collection, talking to people and walking the streets of the French Quarter—and, of course, collecting a library of famous Louisiana histories.
Though a seventh-generation Louisianian, I was born and raised in the northern portion of the state. When I decided to write about early New Orleans, I realized deep research would be required. The first book my local librarian recommended was Saxon’s Fabulous New Orleans.
I was enthralled, not least because I discovered he was also not a native of the city, though he lived in the French Quarter for many years and was instrumental in preserving many of its historic buildings from demolition.
With a style that immediately draws you in, this book is filled with pageantry and grandeur, personality, and rich detail, which makes researching the Vieux Carré a pleasure rather than a chore.
This classic reprint evokes a city steeped in the traditions and idiosyncrasies of three cultures--French, Spanish, andAmerican. Known widely as one of Louisiana's great writers, Lyle Saxon documented many of the quirks and mysteries of New Orleans. His narratives include a vivid picture of Mardi Gras as seen through the eyes of a young boy, a brief history of the city, and accounts of strange and remarkable events, including the great Mississippi flood of 1927, the year of the great plague, and a voodoo cult ceremony.
By any standards, New Orleans is a unique city, and Saxon depicts it unadorned,…
My love of mysteries began with Nancy Drew books. As I read more mysteries over the years, I finally decided it was time for me to write my own. A setting came to me immediately—New Orleans. I fell in love with the city through the Anne Rice and Julie Smith’s books. To write my cozy mystery series, I read all kinds of books. I read them for pleasure, but to make sure the details are correct in my books, The French Quarter Mysteries. I’m able to enjoy New Orleans through my sleuth, Samantha. It’s the next best thing to being there myself.
In New Orleans, police detective Skip Langdon searches for the killer of Rex, King of Carnival for this year's Mardi Gras, a member of the powerful but tragic St. Amant family
Vampires are the coolest monsters. Change my mind. Actually, forget it – you can’t change my mind. Because I’m right. I have always – I mean always – loved vampires. Reading about them, watching them – all the things. The first time I read Interview with a Vampire changed me forever as a human. There’s something so universally appealing about these immortal bloodsuckers. Maybe it’s because they stay forever young. Or maybe it’s because they look like humans, therefore, they can often hide (or lurk) in plain sight. As an author of my own monster stories, I find them inspiring. So, here’s a list of my recent favs that you can sink your own teeth into.
When I was in middle school, middle-grade fiction didn’t really exist in the way it does now. There weren’t a ton of options for a young person who loved horror. So once I outgrew Goosebumps and Fear Street, I started reading adult horror. Stephen King. Dean Koontz. Anne Rice. I’ll never forget reading Interview with a Vampire for the first time. I had never been to New Orleans, but I was instantly transported. It was magical – electric. I could feel each word in my bones. Thus, you can only imagine my excitement discovering The Beautiful by Renée Ahdieh. To that point, I hadn’t read anything that reminded me more of Anne Rice’s writing style. Just like the title, this book was beautiful. And haunting. With a New Orleans setting, a forbidden love trope, and lots of animated characters that I immediately fell in love with. If you…
#1 New York Times bestselling author Renee Ahdieh returns with a sumptuous, sultry and romantic new series set in 19th century New Orleans where vampires hide in plain sight.
'Incredibly ornate [and] lush . . . nail-biting and swoony and satisfying and tense all at the same time' Sabaa Tahir
In 1872, New Orleans is a city ruled by the dead.
But to seventeen-year-old Celine Rousseau, it's also a safe haven after she's forced to flee her life in Paris. Quickly enraptured by the vibrant city, from its music to its extravagant soirees and even its danger, she soon becomes…
