Resurrection Blues

Dave Jenkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba and the author of the “Portraits” section of Emergency Librarian.

Spanning January 11 to July 20, Resurrection Blues is narrated by Flynn
Robinson, an 18-year-old guitar player who shares his experiences of
being on the road with the Sawyers, the top A-circuit band on
America’s east coast. By age 15, Flynn had known he wanted a life in
music, but his decision to abandon school in the middle of his final
year to join the Sawyers full-time greatly displeases his parents and
his girlfriend, Julianne.

Flynn’s role model in life is his sexagenarian great-uncle Ray,
ostensibly once a well-known guitarist and the person who gave Flynn his
first guitar. Flynn dreams of living like his uncle, “setting my own
agenda, like Ray. Living outside the walls.” Flynn experiences
everything that being on the road has to offer, including its
temptations: groupies, alcohol, and drugs. Along the way, he falls in
love with Allie, a 20-year-old singer with another band, but he does not
break up with Julianne.

The book’s only false note is struck when Flynn, while in a bar in
his hometown of South Fork, somewhat unbelievably encounters not just
Allie and Julianne but also his long-lost great-uncle. The simultaneous
meeting of the two women results in Flynn’s being left by both, and
his interactions with his uncle reveal Ray’s life to be unworthy of
emulation.

Ultimately, Flynn, after quitting the Sawyers, does not return to
school but instead seeks a break in which to resurrect himself by having
time to write and perform his own music. Tanner, having personally
experienced life on the road as a young professional musician, writes
with authority. Highly recommended.