Who Put this Song On? is a memoir-type book about a girl who lives with depression at the time Barack Obama was elected president. I have to thank Netgalley and Delacorte Press for providing me with an Advanced Reader Copy. While overall, I enjoyed this book, there were a few things that I found a little distracting.
The themes in this book had a lot of promise. Depression rep? I have a family member dealing with depression. Music? Hey, the girl on the cover is listening to music! There’s a lot to be excited about with this book.
What I Liked
Who Put This Song On? was well-written. I liked the main character, Morgan, who has been having difficulty with depression. Everybody experiences depression in different ways (my family member’s experience is different than Morgan’s) but Morgan’s experience seems realistic. I would expect that, considering that the author went through it herself.
I like how Morgan’s friends stick by her as she goes through this difficult semester. They seem to have a typical teenage friendship, hanging out in school, talking about their experiences with boys, and passing around a notebook where they all write down their thoughts. Morgan experiences setbacks in life, but that happens.
The community where Morgan lives seems to be full of ignorant people. While they probably aren’t actually as stupid as the author portrays them, since we are seeing them through her eyes, her perspective of them seems realistic. The world she lives in is well-described and thought out.
The book goes a little into racism and the lack of knowledge that a lot of people (of all races) that a lot of people have about the Civil Rights movement and about groups like the Black Panthers. Who Put This Song On? does a good job about making race a part of Morgan’s experience without making the book an issue book. Not that there would have been a problem if it had been an issue book, but that would have detracted from Morgan’s main struggle, which was depression.
What I Didn’t Like
While overall I liked Who Put This Song On?, there were a couple things that I didn’t like. The story doesn’t seem to have an overarching plot. Morgan does one thing, then she does another thing, then she does another thing. The story didn’t seem to have a climax or inciting incident or anything that most stories have. I think I would have liked it better if it didn’t seem like Morgan was always waiting for her life to begin.
The other thing that I didn’t like was the anachronisms in the story. It takes place in the fall of 2008 when Barack Obama gets elected. The high school students make mix CDs and reference a specific Saved By the Bell episode. Who was making mix CDs in 2008? ITunes came out in 2001, and from what I remember, nearly everybody was listening to their music via MP3s at this time. Saved By the Bell ended in 1993; assuming the characters were 17, they would have been two years old when that show ended. There was nothing, other than this reference, to indicate that they were ’90s television aficionados.
While Who Put this Song On? does mention a lot of songs, music didn’t have as much of a role in the book as I thought it would.
Conclusion
Who Put This Song On? was an entertaining book, but I did have a few issues with it (most of them were minor though). It’s a book that deals with the important topics of depression and racism through characters that are realistic and relatable. It’s not going to make the list of my favorite books of the year, however, it’s a book that might be really helpful to some people. If not, it does provide entertainment.