Mark Athitakis
Romantic tension isn't necessary to make great rock music, but it's been known to help: Think of Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks transforming their resentment into song on Fleetwood Mac's "Rumours," or Richard and Linda Thompson breaking lyrical bottles over each other's heads on "Shoot Out the Lights." With that in mind, Pagan Kennedy's second novel, The Exes, is a simple story about love colliding with rock-and-roll: Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy starts a band with girl, because the concept of a group made up entirely of exes is so brilliantly high concept that Phil Spector would kick himself for not thinking of it first.
"We'll have the gossip factor," Lilly, the vocalist, tells her ex-boyfriend Hank, the band's guitarist. "People are going to go nuts trying to figure out how ex-boyfriends and -girlfriends can stand to e around each other enough to be in a band -- that will make us instantly intriguing." And in the rock world that Kennedy creates, they do become intriguing. With another broken couple -- Shaz and Walt -- on bass and drums, the Boston-based Exes get the "buzz" they hoped for and a small taste of success. By avoiding gimmicks, Kennedy comes up with a breezy work that is a knowing and smartly conceived examination of relationships in general, which can be as uplifting as a Motown drum fill or as clumsy as a teenager's first attempt at bar chords.
As befits someone who's written loudly and often on such topics -- Kennedy has also written books on zine-making, '70s kitsch and other hipster talismans -- The Exes is propelled by a healthy dose of hip references, from Snoopy blankets to Star Trek episodes to "Superfly." But Kennedy's finest passages uncover the emotions the band members go through, stripping off their poses and gas station-attendant jackets to reveal their insecurities. Lilly, talented and slightly neurotic, struggles to understand Shaz, a bisexual Pakistani who fears success, and is thrilled when she makes a breakthrough. "You couldn't tie her to you with heavy ropes; you had to use hundreds of spiderwebs instead. You had to sew her to you with invisible thread and a needle made of glass."
The typical story-of-a-rock-band themes do crop up: Egos swell and get smashed, tour-van claustrophobia kicks in, an A&R rep from The Evil Major Label promises too much, and on occasion the relationship between Lilly and Hank becomes so tangled that The Exes tend to be, well, not exes. Kennedy puts a fresh face on those clichés. What Nick Hornby did for the insufferable record geek in High Fidelity, Kennedy does for the touring rock musician: makes him (and her) real and layered. It offers a basic 4/4 beat, something you can groove to, but underneath is a lovely swirl of counter-melodies and sounds that are unfamiliar but engaging. --Salon
Publishers Weekly
- Publisher's Weekly
The fights, friendships, loves and breakups of a modestly up-and-coming Boston band, The Exes (so named because they are all ex-boyfriends and -girlfriends), come to light from the perspective of each band member in Kennedy's hilarious, smart second novel (after Spinsters). Rock-snob Hank wants the group to be "so obscure and brilliant that just knowing the name of this band would be like saying a password." Lilly, on the other hand, wants to be famous and has what she calls "the stink," which Hank recognizes as the soul and genuine talent he lacks. Shaz is a mystery to the rest of the Exes: she grew up in a devoutly Muslim, Pakistani home but gained her reputation as the bassist for a lesbian punk band. Drummer Walt dropped out of Harvard grad school after a nervous breakdown and has been working in dead-end jobs and struggling to hold on to his sanity ever since. As the band gains a reputation and starts to tour, old romances rekindle and bridges burn, and Kennedy gives us our own insider tour of the indie music business. Yet the hip trappings are just that, trappings: Kennedy captures the voices and the spirits of these young musicians with depth, originality and an imaginative scope that transcends their tiny, incestuous world. FYI: Pagan Kennedy was the editor of the popular zine Pagan and was dubbed "the queen of zines" by Wired magazine.
Library Journal
One week after songwriter Lilly and guitarist Hank break up, they start a band called The Exes. Next they recruit bassist Shazia, a bisexual Muslim. She in turn brings in Walt, a drummer on Prozac. Lilly hopes that the gimmick of having former girlfriends and boyfriends in the same band will intrigue their intended listeners. What she doesn't foresee is the chemistry that will brew among the unlikely foursome. In the next year or two, she and Hank become closer to each other than to their new lovers. Caught up in a musical crush, the four Exes learn to think and play with one mind. In many ways, however, their success threatens to undo them, especially when the group faces the challenges of a tour. Set in Boston, and told from the different band members' points of view, the novel bounces along with many moments of contagious creative synergy. Kennedy is well known among the Gen X crowd not only for her previous novel, Spinsters (LJ 6/15/95), but also for her many nonfiction works on alternative culture. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 3/15/98.]--Keddy Ann Outlaw, Harris Cty. P.L., Houston
School Library Journal
YA-Why would four bright, creative, and independent young people voluntarily spend weeks in a broken-down van, traveling to out-of-the-way towns and sleeping on the floors of friends or in cheap motels? Each of these appealing characters has a different reason, but the result is a winning and knowing examination of young adults groping toward maturity. The story ostensibly tells of the formation and growth of an independent rock band called the Exes-because each of the members was once romantically attached to another member-but there is much more. Kennedy is wise to the ways of this scene-based here in Boston-and is sympathetic to the various motivations of her characters. Hank, the organizer, is perhaps the only one who wants the band to succeed, but for him success is intangible and fame and fortune quite possibly might ruin his feelings of accomplishment. His ex, Lilly, is an attractive, scatterbrained artist taught guitar by Hank. Shaz, a bisexual Pakistani American, and Walt, a depressive ex-grad student, are the other couple and they, too, come to fear the band's success as they become more self-aware. In the end, all four discover their own abilities and learn to "play well with others"-even ex-lovers. This short tale should appeal to the dreamers as well as YAs seriously interested in indie bands and their music. A funky and vivid story, told in each character's own voice.-Susan H. Woodcock, Kings Park Library, Burke, VA
Stephen J. Dubner
Kennedy, whose writing is at its loveliest when at its simplest, too often plies the reader witht seemingly innocuous details. . .that she inevitably turns into strained metaphors. . .Still, Kennedy's writing rarely flags, and you can't help falling for her characters. -- The New York Times Book Review
Kirkus Reviews
Kennedy (Spinsters, 1995, etc.) makes much of the GenX scene she knows well in this witty, sincere, if fluffy saga of four musicians who form a band with a shot at the big time—if they can only surmount their utterly snarled lives. Hank is a purist, having played his guitar in various groups around home-base Boston until decamping, miffed that perfection's so hard to find. His musical vision begins to take shape, however, when he teams up with his ex-girlfriend Lilly: her lyrics contain flashes of genius that he can fine-tune. Together they dream up the idea of a band comprised solely of people who used to be lovers, just enough of a hook to get them gigs until their sound can make its own reputation. So bisexual bassist Shaz is recruited fresh from another band she's soured on because it's about to sign a record company contract. She brings with her one of her exes, Walt, a gawky Harvard biochemistry grad student, ace drummer, and recent head case. The team in place, Hank and Lilly make the most of it, practicing and promoting until the band is a hot item. But Hank and Lilly become an item again as well, which adds to the stress of pushing the band, and no sooner do they choose to cool it than Lilly decides to get pregnant by her regular boyfriend. When the band goes on its first extended tour, Shaz, ever-wary of being compromised by commercial demands, balks. Hank moves quickly to find a replacement, alienating Walt—and so it goes, four paths diverging along the rocky road to success. Touchingly open and amusing, though the story, barely distinguishable from standard sitcom fare, suffers from a cloying feel-goodness. Every character's so likable, and soconventional, that Kennedy defeats her own purpose.
