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libraryleopard · 1 year ago

Text

Adult historical fiction novel

Charts the rise and fall of a famous interracial rock music duo, Opal Jewel and Nev Charles, who hit it big in the 1970s and were then immortalized in a famous photo when a riot broke out at one of their concerts

In 2015, a journalist begins writing an oral history about Opal and Nev and unearths dark secrets about what really happened at that infamous concert

Told in transcripts & news articles

Explores music, race, family secrets, and fame

Black main character with alopecia

#this gets compared to djats for obvious reasons (oral account of a fiction 1970s band) but i think the comparison does it a disservice tbh #it's more about racism in the music industry and america more broadly and opal as a iconic figure #very engaging and immversive!#opal felt like a very real and interesting figure #the blurb does kinda tell you exactly what is going to happen for the first half of the book #but the second half does go to some unexpected places #the way the author engages with reals 70s music and politics while creating a fictional band felt very authentic #the only thing i really didn't like #was the bit where the author inserts quotes from real figures like janelle monáe #talking about how cool opal is #and that felt silly to me!! we should be able to understand opal as a character w/o putting words in real people's mouths #this would make a great tv show honestly #the final revival of opal and nev #dawnie walton #2023 reads #lulu speaks #lulu reads #lulu reads the final revival of opal and nev

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