Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Final Revival of Opal & Nev | 2021 | Dawnie Walton | Buy |
The Final Revival of Opal & Nev (2021) is Dawnie Walton’s debut novel, a fictional oral history that chronicles the rise of an unlikely 1970s rock duo. Opal Jewel, a bold Black woman from Detroit, and Neville “Nev” Charles, a gentle Englishman, became collaborators in New York around 1970 and shot to fame before a violent incident changed everything.
Decades later, music journalist S. Sunny Shelton seizes the chance to curate an oral history about her idols as Opal considers a 2016 reunion with Nev. The novel moves between eras through interviews, press clippings, and commentary, exploring race, white privilege, art, and the cost of speaking truth. It won the Aspen Words Literary Prize and the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award.