Bliss: A Novel

by Danyel Smith

Danyel Smith is one of the most acclaimed music journalists of her generation, a prose stylist who “writes with music in her language” (Quincy Jones). In Bliss , a thrillingly sensual tale drenched with love and music, Smith dives deep into an intriguing set of characters facing life-changing choices in the swirl of the music industry at its decadent peak.

At a glossy gathering on Paradise Island, record exec Eva Glenn—soulful, sexy, powerful, and possibly pregnant—is hosting a comeback showcase for her singing sensation Sunny Addison, a barefoot diva with a poet’s heart and the voice of a lion. At the event’s high-strung peak, however, Eva begins to sink beneath the waves of anxiety washing over her—anxiety about a confusing sexual triangle, a career at a crossroads, and choices to be made about her possible pregnancy—and decides, in a blink, to flee. She leaves Paradise for the petite, pastoral island of Cat, accompanied by her sometime-lover D’Artagnan Addison, an earnestly crazy mystic looking for answers of his own. What begins as an idyllic break quickly turns into an intense sojourn that brings Eva to terms with the crises closing in on her.

Smith casts a wittily skeptical eye on the absurd drama of the music industry, but infuses every page with an infectious, bracing, unashamed passion for the power of pop. Her language matches the spirit of the music she writes about, echoing everything from throaty blues shouts and hip hop menace to the transcendent joy of a perfect R & B love song. This is a novel about the real rhythm and blues of life, about pain and loss and why we hold tight, in the end, to the sex and music and love that offer us a fleeting glimpse of bliss, even when the price is steep.

Genres: African American, Fiction

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

DANYEL SMITH is completing Shine Bright: How Black Women Took Over American Pop and Changed Culture Forever (One World / Random House, 2020). Until recently, Danyel was a senior editor and producer at ESPN, and before that, a 2013-14 John S. Knight Journalism Fellow at Stanford University. She has served as editor of Billboard, editor-at-large at Time Inc, and as editor-in-chief of VIBE in its classic era. Danyel is cofounder of HRDCVR, a design-centered hardcover media project created by diverse teams for a diverse world. She has written two novels—More Like Wrestling (Crown, 2003) and Bliss (Crown, 2005). Among other outlets, her profiles and other nonfiction has appeared in ESPN The Magazine, the Guardian, NPR, CNN, Rolling Stone, and The New York Times. Danyel lives in California.

Reviews

[Erika · Rating 3 out of 5]

Halleluah! I thought I'd never finish this book. However, I was GOING to finish this book because I probably bought it when it came out in 2005 (I have a tendency of buying books and putting them in line to read) and more than likely I paid full price for it $23.95 (I was young and dumb back then). Usually you can tell when something just pulls you in that you can finish it in a day or two. Most of us on this site are avid readers and know that feeling.

However, that being said, this book was confusing and otherwise a wast of what 2 weeks of my life? It did two things I hate, it did flash backs throughout the chapters and the main character would go pages talking to herself (you know that italic wording that makes you think that the character is having some deep feeling). If the main character was going to have that many conversations, why not make the book in first person.

This book dragged on and on. The first few chapters, I felt like I needed to not only know how the music business worked, but also the history of hip hop since there are a lot of references to older songs (way before my time and I'm not a hip hop head). This book was clearly in the running for a one or two star for me.

But then it happened. Finally it picked up pace. After two hundred pages (I would read a few each day if you look at my statuses) I finally started to WANT to hear this character's plight. I wanted to find out what was going to happen to her. So because Smith was able to tie things together and give me the happy ending that I would want, I added another star.

So if you're really into music or hip hop, this is a great book to read. But I'd also love for you to read it just so I can see what your take on the book was.

[M R · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really loved how prominently music is featured in this book. Although it wasn't my favorite book - I had a love/hate relationship with it the entire time I was reading it for various reasons (the pacing of the story, how the book negotiated time without always saying what the time was and some weird grammatical quirks, but I loved how Eva's mind thought about and catalogued music - my mind works in a similar way minus the entirety of the liner note credits). I did however, in the end, find the ending pleasing. I liked that Eva had a hard outer shell that she desperately wanted someone to crack and live inside of her with and we see her struggle with that throughout the book. There were so many points of understanding and knowing that comes from understanding and loving music that this book showed.

[Ryan Waduge · Rating 3 out of 5]

So this was a book about a record label executive/promoter. The characters where poorly defined and I had a hard time getting into the plot line. Had a lot of references to music lingo and old school rap/RB, not really my cup of tea. Part of the book was quite bizarre and unbelievable, but at least it was a happy ending!

[Susan Treat · Rating 5 out of 5]

LOVED IT LOVED IT LOVED IT

[RK Byers · Rating 5 out of 5]

geez, i didn't even realize i read this!