In Their Lives: Great Writers on Great Beatles Songs

Description

Blauner anthologises essays from 30 authors, actors, and musicians reflecting on their favourite Beatles songs, creating a monument to the enduring impact of the most popular band of all time. The diversity of favourite tracks and the variety of reasons contributors love them speak to the range of the Beatles' catalogue and the power their music still has. Whether readers remember the Beatles' music as a solace in times of trouble or as a celebration, in their lives, they've loved them all.

ANDREW BLAUNER is the founder of Blauner Books Literary Agency. His other anthologies are Coach, Brothers, Central Park, Our Boston, The Good Book, and (coeditor) For the Love of Baseball. A graduate of Brown University and the Columbia University School of Business, Blauner is a member of PEN American Center and the National Book Critics Circle, and a former intern at Rolling Stone.

"In Their Lives is full of pleasant surprises."-New York Times "So many of us learned the basics from the Beatles: how to listen, what longing feels like, the pleasure of loving and thinking about art. Here a stunning array of writers shares how that process worked in childhood and youth, and still works within memory and cultural history. Some first-rate music criticism's in here, too." -Ann Powers, critic for NPR Music, author of Weird Like Us "Sharp, witty, incisive, revealing. I must have read millions of words on the Beatles, but there is always room and scope and desire to write even more as every generation discovers them. The writing, all the way through is, terrific. I enjoyed In Their Lives-and learned some new things about the ever-lasting appeal of the Beatles and their music." -Hunter Davies, author of the New York Times bestseller, The Beatles "How lovely to have gifted writers put into words what I've been struggling to express for fifty years. The essays are as heartfelt and high-spirited as the songs themselves. As the Beatles would say, 'I was gobsmacked!'" -Bob Spitz, author of The Beatles: The Biography "The Beatles-their music, their style-had an atomic effect on the old romantic traditions of the West, and Western civilization. hasn't been the same since. Here and now some of our best modern writers tell their fascinating stories of what the Beatles meant to them, and to those whom they loved, and everything rings so true. Yeah Yeah Yeah!" -Stephen Davis, author of Hammer of the Gods and Jim Morrison "A perceptive, heartfelt collection. Though the anthology is tinged with affection, it's no mere love letter to the group. [In Their Lives is] bound to appeal to serious Beatles aficionados, longtime followers of the group seeking a nostalgic walk down 'Penny Lane,' and casual music fans." -Library Journal "A charming, delightful collection for Beatles fans and music fans in general." -Kirkus "The brilliant and varied essays pull the tablecloth from under so-familiar songs, revealing bits and pieces in new configurations, and in contexts that are personal, technical, social, and universal. A collection that music fans and fans of music writing will love." -Booklist "The collection serves as a miniature history of the Beatles. The essays are uniformly excellent and informative." -Publishers Weekly