Trainsong

by Jan Kerouac, Gerald Nicosia (Introduction)

Poems and reminiscences accompany the author's chronicle her picaresque experiences on the road to self-discovery, from Colorado, to Europe, to Mexico, and back again

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, Biography

240 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1988

About the author

Janet Michelle Kerouac was the only child of Jack Kerouac and his second wife, Joan Haverty Kerouac. Jan only met her father twice, the first time at age 10 when he took a paternity test in an attempt to avoid making child support payments.

Reviews

[Joe Mossa · Rating 4 out of 5]

she wrote better than her father cause she was a 'linear' writer. her father whom ignored her used stream of consciousness writing which style i hate. i study literature as a hobby but maybe i shouldn t cause i don t get many of the classic books that are supposed to be so great. i wasn t an english major so i guess i will suffer infinitely due to my ignorance but i for some reason still enjoy the challenges.

[Chris Bogardus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Janet puts Daddy Jack to shame. Read this, a wild life story written by someone I would love to drink coffee with.
Jack, you drunken lazy B####, how could you run out on this girl?

[Marcus (Lit_Laugh_Luv)]

I have no idea how I'll ever track down this book — but I can only hope NYRB republishes it after the success of Baby Driver: A Story About Myself.

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[Nate Jordon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This picks up where Baby Driver left off, chronicling Jan's adult life. Here is a more mature Jan, writing this memoir later in life - she comes to grips with her lineage and the absent love of an absent father. That is basically what Jan's two books are about - they are very honest stories about a woman searching for love, acceptance, and approval from men because she never received it from her father. It's tragic that she died in her mid-forties with only two books published and one on the way - she was definitely on her way to defining her position in the literary world as a unique, original voice.

[Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book confirms what you probably already knew: Jack Kerouac wasn't Father of the Year. He denied Jan, but I think he would have liked her. She grows up to be like one of his characters; her memoir shows her to be as zany and adventurous and damaged as any of them. Part bullshit artist, part explorer, she tells a story that is always just this side of believable. I really liked it.

[Kennedy Spitzer · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s better than Babydriver, but she’s just not coherent.

[Juls · Rating 3 out of 5]

As an avid Jack Kerouac fan I was compelled to learn about his only child and in that learning I was left with a deep sympathy and disappointment in Jan's outcome. Her life was riddled with filling a void left by her famous father that I feel if he was not famous her adult life would have been much brighter. It's a story of a little girl in an adult body constantly blaming her father for her unhappiness and displacement in life. Her attitude for her father flip-flopped constantly, as if she was still the angry child left behind who desperately needed a hug.

[Jeff Tucker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jan was a beautiful, intelligent and adventurous woman who had a difficult childhood and tragic life. She only met her father, Jack Kerouac, twice. He showed no interest in her either time. Jan had some great adventures but drug use and difficulty with relationships were her downfall. I liked this book and her first book "Baby Driver". Her mother, Joan Haverty, also wrote a book called "Nobody's Wife".

[Sian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such great writing with a bit of a loose, rambley plot - travelling, bad guys and drinking and reading - meeting up with Allen Ginsberg and a super drunk Richard Brautigan. Why isn't this in print??

[Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.25 I love hearing about Jan's travels and her adventures, although I wish she could have found some peace and stability later in life. Her writing stands on its own.

[Janet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Better than her dad, I’m surprised this has so few readers tbh, deserves way more - well written and interesting (and she doesn’t come off like an asshole)

[Mat · Rating 4 out of 5]

In some ways, Jan Kerouac's second novel, Trainsong, is similar to her first novel, Baby Driver. Like her famous father's (Jack Kerouac's) novels that formed part of his great vision of a mythologized autobiography, written in the style of Proust's A la Recherche du Temps Perdu (In Search of Lost Time), which he called the Duluoz Legend, this book continues on from where the first novel left off.

However, in this second novel, we encounter a different novelist - she is more confident, more measured and the writing is more mature, despite the continuing restlessness, jumping from one lover's bed into the next, desperately seeking some love to fill in the void that her absent father sadly left behind for her. Jack Kerouac may have been a great novelist, but he was a terrible, let's say non-existent father for Jan. And he of all people should have known that you reap what you sow.

Her powers of description reach their peak in this second novel and at times her prose is so beautifully descriptive, it becomes poetic. I also enjoyed reading about her travels to Europe in this book and the people she encounters.

One major similarity to her father's writings is how her memoir is traced out by recounting certain stories or adventures along the way, without a focus on any clear plot or goal.

The only reason I docked a star from this novel is the last few chapters, while beautifully written, were confusing - I got a little lost and felt that the ending kind of disappointingly 'fizzled out' right towards the end, just like the end of Kawabata's Snow Country and Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49.

However, in some sense this was also fitting, because going back to the point I made earlier about no clear plotline in this story, someone writing a memoir must decide where to bring the novel to a close, somewhat arbitrarily, and Proust and Kerouac Sr. are very similar in this regard.

If I were to recommend either Baby Driver (her first book) or this one, Trainsong (her second novel), I would recommend this one because the quality of the writing is top shot. I hope her father, who was "safe in heaven dead" by this time, could look down and observe proudly how good a writer his own daughter was.

[Richard Martinez · Rating 3 out of 5]

I feel like she has so much potential and writes some lines that truly invoke absurdly vivid imagery. But she falls short when she remembers who her father is, and when she tries to imitate his writing. The last few pages become Jack Kerouac slop that doesn’t translate into anything that anyone would care about.

[Donald · Rating 3 out of 5]

A great read the daughter of Jack Kerouac second book about her life and misadventures

[Richie Arvidson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Exploring Jack’s hangover. Uses and discards men- men as little boys. Bullshit buddhists. Freedom in tension of the cold war. Aftermath of beats and hippies- modern counter culture, punks.

[Sara · Rating 3 out of 5]

First volume, "Baby Driver", was leaps better.

[Ionanbd · Rating 3 out of 5]

2,5
T'apporte rien mais les vibes sont sympa

[beeshaimatles · Rating 1 out of 5]

this is already a shitty book but i wanted to give jack kerouac's daughter a chance. then she tried to normalize israel. no thank you