It’s time for #6degrees. Start at the same place as other wonderful readers, add six books, and see where you end up.
This month we begin with Shirley Jackson’s short story, The Lottery.
Stick with me while I explain my first link. When I think ‘lottery’, I immediately think of family friends who won the lottery in the eighties. They lived near Byron Bay at the time. I recently watched the TV series, Nine Perfect Strangers, based on the book by Liane Moriarty, which was filmed near Byron Bay. Coincidentally, one of the characters in the book had won the lottery.
Hallucinogenic drugs are used in Nine Perfect Strangers as ‘therapy’. This links to Ayelet Waldman’s memoir, A Really Good Day, which recounts her experience with micro-dosing LSD.
Waldman is half of a ‘literary power couple’ – she’s married to Michael Chabon. I rushed to buy Chabon’s 2012 release, Telegraph Avenue, and I still haven’t read it. The record-store setting was what attracted me.
Think fictional record stores for the link to The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce.
A character in The Music Shop is distinguished by her pea-green coat. Likewise, the titular character in Virginia Feito’s novel, Mrs March, is distinguished by her mint green gloves.
Mrs March was a striking and unreliable narrator, much like Rose in Suzanne Rindell’s The Other Typist.
From lotteries and LSD, to record stores and unreliable narrators – where will other chains go? Link up below or post your link in the comments section.
Next month (November 6, 2021), we’ll start with Sigrid Nunez’s What Are You Going Through.
