Our Kind of Music

Lindsay Grattan Cooper creates a strong sense of place with her new novel, which takes the reader on a journey not only across the world but over four ever-changing decades. Our Kind of Music begins in 1937 and culminates in early 1982, less driven by the events of those years than merely touched by them, just as world events are experienced by ordinary lives. But always, always running through her story, there is music...

Much as the story transforms throughout the four decades over which it takes place, Lindsay’s book has also been through a metamorphosis, growing from its beginning as hasty jottings when allowed by her demanding toddler (who is now grown, charming and notably undemanding), through copious handwritten pages to an electric typewriter and eventually, at the dawn of the home PC, through floppy disks and finally to the USB stick where it resides today.

Set against shifting backgrounds – some as exotic as the Seychelles and Tahiti, some as safely domestic as New England’s Vermont and old England’s Dorset, and others as vibrant as Sydney and New York, the novel follows one man’s journey along a highway initially perceived to be clear of obstacles but which, inevitably, presents hurdles he could not anticipate. It is also the story of his son, whose bravado leads him along a different path to the soul-searching that this ultimately entails. Not all characters they meet are liked, but some are so deeply loved that they linger in the senses, and by the end you might almost expect to bump into them, like old friends, on Main Street.

Though it is not without its doses of light trauma, Our Kind of Music offers a romantic read free of the blood, guts and violence in today’s media, with a nostalgic musical theme running throughout.