Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A “humorous, heartbreaking, and heroic” (Entertainment Weekly) memoir of one man’s passionate relationship with an unforgettable woman, from their first meeting to her untimely death, told through the songs on fifteen mix tapes
“The happiest, saddest, sweetest book about rock ‘n’ roll that I’ve ever experienced.”—Chuck Klosterman
“A memoir that manages, no small feat, to be funny and beautifully forlorn at the same time.”—The New York Times Book Review
Mix tapes: We all have our favorites. Stick one into a deck, press play, and you’re instantly transported to another time in your life. For Rob Sheffield, that time was one of miraculous love and unbearable grief. A time that spanned seven years, it started when he met the girl of his dreams, and ended when he watched her die in his arms.
Using the listings of fifteen of his favorite mix tapes, Rob shows that the power of music to build a bridge between people is stronger than death. You’ll read these words, perhaps surprisingly, with joy in your heart and a song in your head—the one that comes to mind when you think of the love of your life.
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Community Reviews
This is a book for anyone who loves music, for anyone who has been madly in love, for anyone who has lost a loved one and suffered unspeakable grief -- pretty much anyone who has a pulse should read this book.
I'm not giving anything away by saying the girl dies in this one. Sheffield's wife, Renee, dies suddenly of a pulmonary embolism at the young age of 31. This is his tribute to her, and the music they loved to listen to together, and the life they had together. They were a quirky young couple still trying to make their way in the world and figuring out what it really meant to be "Married" when suddenly he had to figure out how to be a widow, or, more correctly, a widower. He dissects that word and tears it apart.
So how could a book written in grief make me laugh out loud? It did in some parts, as I was sitting on the subway, or sitting in the courtroom waiting (and waiting) for proceedings to start. This is not a sappy, weepy, "feel sorry for me and cry your eyes out" kind of memoir. He nails it in every way when describing daily life with this wild country girl, and without her, and his life leading up to the moment he met her.
So whatever happened to mix tapes? I guess we still have some form of them. Some people (my husband) are still making mix CDs, some of us just throw up a video or a link on our Facebook pages that we want people to check out (which are usually ignored - oh well). But nothing can compare to the old mix tapes. Sheffield starts every chapter by listing the songs in one of his old mix tapes, BR and AR (before Renee and after Renee). How can you not love a guy who breaks the making of mix tapes down into categories:
The Party Tape
I Want You
We're Doing It? Awesome!
You Like Music, I Like Music, I Can Tell We're Going to Be Friends
You Broke My Heart and Made Me Cry and Here Are Twenty or Thirty Songs About It
The Road Trip
No Hard Feelings, Babe
I Hate This Fucking Job
The Radio Tape
The Walking Tape
I had such a great time going down memory lane with the songs he references. (It helps that he's of my generation. OK, he's just a LITTLE bit younger...) I'm still going through and listening to them all. I'm going to keep this one as a musical reference book.
I'm not giving anything away by saying the girl dies in this one. Sheffield's wife, Renee, dies suddenly of a pulmonary embolism at the young age of 31. This is his tribute to her, and the music they loved to listen to together, and the life they had together. They were a quirky young couple still trying to make their way in the world and figuring out what it really meant to be "Married" when suddenly he had to figure out how to be a widow, or, more correctly, a widower. He dissects that word and tears it apart.
So how could a book written in grief make me laugh out loud? It did in some parts, as I was sitting on the subway, or sitting in the courtroom waiting (and waiting) for proceedings to start. This is not a sappy, weepy, "feel sorry for me and cry your eyes out" kind of memoir. He nails it in every way when describing daily life with this wild country girl, and without her, and his life leading up to the moment he met her.
So whatever happened to mix tapes? I guess we still have some form of them. Some people (my husband) are still making mix CDs, some of us just throw up a video or a link on our Facebook pages that we want people to check out (which are usually ignored - oh well). But nothing can compare to the old mix tapes. Sheffield starts every chapter by listing the songs in one of his old mix tapes, BR and AR (before Renee and after Renee). How can you not love a guy who breaks the making of mix tapes down into categories:
The Party Tape
I Want You
We're Doing It? Awesome!
You Like Music, I Like Music, I Can Tell We're Going to Be Friends
You Broke My Heart and Made Me Cry and Here Are Twenty or Thirty Songs About It
The Road Trip
No Hard Feelings, Babe
I Hate This Fucking Job
The Radio Tape
The Walking Tape
I had such a great time going down memory lane with the songs he references. (It helps that he's of my generation. OK, he's just a LITTLE bit younger...) I'm still going through and listening to them all. I'm going to keep this one as a musical reference book.
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