The Singer Sisters

(Paperback)

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Description

It's 1996, and alt-rocker Emma Cantor is on tour, with her sights trained on a record deal. Emma's got no lack of inspiration for her confessional songs, chief among them her mother Judie, a 1960s folk legend who is bitterly disappointed by Emma's choice to skip college.

Emma is baffled by Judie's coldness. Judie herself was only eighteen when she ran away to New York to pursue music, ahead of forming the influential folk duo the Singer Sisters with her sister Sylvia.

But Judie has a long-kept secret about why she abandoned her music career at the peak of her success, which is about to unravel.

This is an epic family saga that follows mother Judie and daughter Emma as they navigate the ups and downs of music stardom - asking what women artists must sacrifice for success.

Reviews

What a pleasure to read this book! A delightful journey through the folk and rock scenes from the 60s through the early aughts, told through the kaleidoscopic voices of one family. I loved dipping down into the early folk scenes of Cambridge and New York, the feminist rock of the 90s, the pop industry of the 2000s, and seeing how a family can be torn apart, and stitched back together, via the miracle of song -- Robin MacArthur, author of Heart Spring Mountain
In prose as musical as its subject matter, Sarah Seltzer takes us into an unforgettable family of singer-songwriters, exploring maternal ambivalence, the call of art, and the messy, vibrant, ever-changing state of family life. I was sad to reach the final page -- Elizabeth Graver, author of Kantika
A superb novel - inventive, original, and extremely intelligent. It is also fast-paced, absorbing and full of heart, with a well-drawn and appealing cast of characters whose fates the reader comes to care about deeply. I felt bereft when it was over -- Adelle Waldman, author of The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P
An expertly-imagined family drama, suffused with hard truths, deep betrayal, and a most generous, surprisingly steadfast love -- Elisa Albert, author of After Birth
"You'll be drawn in by the music and the free-wheeling folk scene Seltzer so deftly and convincingly creates, but what will stay with you long after the novel's end are the main characters-Judie, Emma, Sylvia and Rose-four vibrant women bound and sometimes tormented by their fierce family ties and yet who find their way to a most glorious harmony -- Kitty Zeldis, author of Not Our Kind

Author Bio

For more than a decade, Sarah Seltzer has been a feminist journalist and cultural critic. Her writing for publications including The New York Times, TIME, Jezebel, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, The Nation and many other places has earned her an online following - and shaped the discourse on subjects ranging from Hollywood casting, to abortion rights, to the death of department store shopping.

Sarah received an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts, wrote a creative thesis as an undergrad at Harvard, and has had fiction published in The Normal School, Joyland, and elsewhere. Currently, she's the Executive Editor at Lilith Magazine. This is her debut novel.

Find her on Twitter @sarahmseltzer