I really enjoyed "Daisy Jones and The Six", so this sounded promising. Oh, Lord! What a really grand surprise. It was a terrific book, and so well done, I had to keep reminding myself it was fiction.

Nothing in the narrative was contrived or forced. Each event was what it needed to be, and each character, no matter how minor, did what they needed to do.

This is a fictional account of an unlikely duo’s rise to stardom as told by a veteran journalist, S. Sunny Shelton, whose deceased father once had an affair with Opal herself. Having spent the bulk of her career closely guarding the secret of her proximity to Opal Jewel, Sunny finally gives herself permission to tell the story of her “most complicated idol” after winning a hard earned promotion - and with that promotion, unabated creative freedom.

There will be the inevitable comparisons to Daisy Jones and the Six, and that’s a very fair comparison. They are structurally identical. What Opal & Nev brings to the table is female-centered oral history with a civil rights era twist. This is so much more than a tale of sex, drugs and rock n’ roll. Its not even about a band - by all accounts, Opal & Nev were not a wildly successful musical act. There was no meteoric rise to fame. Their most popular album peaked at #45. The novel focuses on the aftermath of a riot that occurred during their most high-profile gig, which was at a defunct playhouse - showcase for industry executives and media. The fact is, Opal Jewel is no Daisy Jones.

This is a timely story of an industry dominated by white men - some of whom were the type who could justify the glorification of the Confederate Flag. Walton does an excellent job of highlighting the fact that the rampant racism of the 60s and 70s is still alive and well today. In the age of “wokeness” it’s easy to overlook how little progress we have actually made.

My biggest gripe about the novel is that there was little to no character development when it came to Jimmy. I also wish we had more insight into the relationship between Opal and Jimmy. It came off as a casual fling, and not a torrid love affair. For a character whose life and death affected everyone involved in this oral history, I wanted more.

Overall, a great read. Put this one on your TBR list!

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the ARC of this fantastic novel.

what a novel! The Final Revival of Opal and Nev had very similar vibes to The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones and the Six. so that to say, i loved it. the storytelling was so creative and compelling, despite being very similar in structure to those mentioned — it was still new and exciting and kept me engaged the whole way through. it weaved in important topics and made you think about what society has demanded throughout the decades, how that’s changed, and how people who don’t fit into that norm were considered outsiders and radicals.

the story starts in the 1970s with British boy Nev. when he starts to inch his way into the music biz, people at the (struggling) label decide he’d be better as one half of a duo. so they set out to find the other half, and they find that in Opal Robinson from Detroit. Opal was a fabulous Black woman — enticing, fascinating, perplexing, different. she was such a complex, riveting character — watching her evolve throughout the story was perhaps the best part of this book. we didn’t see as much development in Nev’s character, but i honestly didn’t even care, and i doubt you will either.

like our dear Evelyn Hugo, the format of the book, is the writing of a book. there are interviews with pretty much everyone involved, article clippings, press releases, and more. our narrator throughout, Sunny, is the EIC at a top magazine and has been given the green light for a book all about Opal and Nev. this situation is made complicated and emotional by the fact that Sunny is the daughter of Opal and Nev’s drummer who died in a racist incident at one of their concerts, provoked by Opal in protest. the effects of this event on Sunny, and Opal, and their trajectories, are palpable.

Opal is fiercely passionate about justice, freedom, independence, her own worth, doing what’s right, protecting others. and this book is a perfect example of the societal repercussions for that, especially for women, especially for Black women.

this book shows the importance of following your truth — how that’s not always an easy road, but is always worth it. highly recommend hopping on the roller coaster that is Opal and Nev — out march 30!!

The Final Revival of Opal & Nev
by Dawnie Walton

I am not really sure how I feel about this book. The interview style is interesting and keeps the various voices relatively short and contrapuntal. This style has an almost musical feel to it, which ties in with the story line about musicians back in the 60's and 70's.

Having been young in the era of Opal and Nev's story, I can relate to much of the angst around race and gender which really came to the forefront at that time. Amazingly these topics - and many others which are extensions of them - are still plaguing our society today. It says something about who we are that we cannot seem to come to grips with these issues and find some meeting of the minds. Instead, as Ms. Walton points out, we are becoming more alienated from each other and seem to have less and less understanding of where the "other side" is coming from.

While her points are well made and presented, I find it hard to read yet another rendering of what is going on every day in this country without any thought provoking ideas as to how to come together and rescue ourselves from the mire we find ourselves in. I would like to think that there is still hope for us, but books like this make me not so sure.

I have not finished reading this book.

I thought Dawnie Walton knocked it out of the park with this book. It covers some very hard topics about systemic racism, BLM , white supremacy, white vs black society/culture, and it was so believable it seemed like it could have been a nonfiction biography. The main characters were believable, and the most important was a daughter wanting to know the truth about her father and his relationship with Opal. Opal, wanting and needing to be back in the spotlight.

I think I would have been a fan of Opal & Nev's music since it was somewhat punk rock. Kept my interest from start to finish. I think I will buy this at publishing date.

Definitely some similarities to Daisy Jones, how it was written through interviews and observations, but this focused on black culture. I felt this was the stronger book because of the other topics throughout, just my opinion. Recommended! Definitely looking forward to more books from this author in the future.

Thanks to Netgalley, Dawnie Walton, and Simon Schuster 37 Ink for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Available: 3/30/21

I really liked the format of this book. Laid out as a series of interviews for a book, complete with “editor notes”, this was a long but good read. One that makes you think about the social injustices from the 70s through 2026, but also one that takes you on a musical journey. The characters are so real and the interviews are written so that you question whether or not this is fiction. I wanted to Google Opal Jewel to see if I missed something. This is also the emotional journey of a black woman trying to find her father’s history and the whys and hows of his demise. From the side characters to the main folks, incredible detail was paid to every aspect.
A phenomenal debut from this author, if a smidge long in some parts. I’m glad I was invited to read a galley of Opal & Nev.

This book was written so well and interestingly that it felt like nonfiction! The Final Revival of Opal & Nev is book inception-the narrator, S. Sunny Shelton, is writing a book about a short-lived band that happened to involve her father (who is neither of the title characters, but is a very integral piece of the story). She wants to get to the heart of some things in the past while also maintaining professionalism, but the book she is writing already is, and becomes, far more personal. I really enjoyed the way to book was written, as interview pieces arranged in order to become a story line, with "editor's notes" throughout to show what was happening as Shelton was writing the book.

The characters are all written intricately, with flaws at the forefront. It captured what was going on during the 70s, from drug use to racism, with such realistic detail that I could feel the emotions, fear, and anger that the characters were feeling.

This book is a great read, and once you get into it, it rolls pretty fast. Every now and then there is a slight lag, where you are wanting to get to the crux of the situation, but overall, a great, fast-paced read.

Thank you to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster for an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

4.5/5

For fans of Daisy Jones & The Six. This book is fast-paced and engaging, especially the first part, as you bounce between perspectives with Opal & Nev’s band members leading up to the Rivington Showcase.

It exposes the systemic racism and the white supremacist ideology embedded in American patriotism. It exposes how white people are able to navigate the world differently than Black people. And it exposes how white people may turn a blind eye to the racially motivated violence and injustice they see but must be held accountable for their choices and inactions.

This is a powerful novel for how it shows that not much has changed. I enjoyed the historical elements and the way Walton embeds this story amongst historical events—from the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing that killed four Black girls, to the Altamont Free Concert murder, to Trumpism.

It’s an entertaining and informative read. It’s hard to capture an audible medium in written form, but Walton does an incredible job of describing the visual performances and musical cadences. I like the characterization and the way it ebbs and flows, depending on where you are in the book and whose perspective you’re in. And there’s a real sense of understanding where each character is coming from, whether you agree with them or not.

I would have liked to hear more from the other band members before and after the Showcase, and Part 1 ended with such a bang that Part 2 seemed a bit slow in comparison. Also, just a personal preference, but I wish the relationship between Sunny and the Opal & Nev story was revealed later.

Thank you to NetGalley, Simon & Schuster, and Dawnie Walton for making this ARC available in exchange for an honest review.

<i>The Final Revival of Opal & Nev</i> starts off strong. The voice of Sunny, reporter, struck me as so real that I looked up the famous Opal Jewel... only to realize she was a fictional character and this was a novel. Yet, throughout, she remains entirely believable. Dawnie Walton interweaves fiction and fact in a way that is remarkably fluid, historic events and figures seamlessly woven into the fictional story of Opal Jewel.

I can imagine some reviewers will say, "for fans of <i>Daisy Jones and the Six</i>" because the writing style is similar. Quickly changing perspectives, all linked to the heroine, telling different parts of the same storyline about a rock-and-roll phenom. I love this kind of storytelling and the layers it brings. However, this story, unlike <i>Daisy Jones</i> is very much about race.

Opal Jewel is a fierce black woman from a working-class Detroit family. When she moves to New York City to make music with the quirky, white Nev Charles, she revels in flamboyance, color, and outlandish personality. And Opal is acutely aware of how she is treated in comparison to Nev, or other white people. There is violence, policy brutality, blatant racism, and the finger always points back at Opal or her black friends--the white perpetrators sliding out of the same predicaments easily.

Overall, I have mixed feelings about this book. Several times it slowed enough that I wanted to put it down. Then, there'd be a an absolutely stunning line or paragraph that hit me deep in the belly--almost always about racism--and made me think. That kept me reading. This novel is timely, credible, and powerful. But I can't quite bring myself to rate it more highly because it was too bloated and bogged down for me.

Thank you to publisher & author for the NetGalley.

This book was hard for me to get into, mostly the style didn't work for me personally though others have liked it a lot. So while the topics were things that interested in me and it was a time i lived through, i felt more detached and less involved than i wanted to be reading a book

I was immediately intrigued by this book when I first heard about it - I was a big fan of Daisy Jones and the Six, and was eager to see how this book would handle the "oral history" format. Walton takes that format and adds so much more to the story - while it is a story around a musical duo, it goes so far beyond the music they made and tells a gripping story that, while primarily set in the 60s/70s, still reflects similar racial issues we are still grappling with today.
Considering we go into the story knowing the pivotal moment in the story basically from the first few pages, there was still a great element of tension and suspense as we approach that moment in the timeline. And even though you think you know what happened by the time we get to that day, Walton still manages to knock you over with some revelations from the characters retelling the story. And the ending was an excellent mix of realism and satisfaction.
The writing in this book is beautiful. I enjoyed it immensely, and cannot wait for it to hit the shelves so everyone can enjoy it!
Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for an ARC.

As much as I wanted to love this book, as a music fan, I didn't. I am 100% sure that I will be in the minority here. The writing style is journalistic, behind the scenes, just like Daisy Jones. So many people loved Daisy Jones, but I didn't. I think that this style of writing is not for me. I never feel like I can really settle in when the narration and perspective is constantly changing. That said, the content is very interesting. If a reader is a fan of the style, I think that they will love this book. I just can't get passed the style; it doesn't work for me individually.

The Final Revival of Opal & Nev presents a fictional oral history of the titular duo and the famous photograph taken during a violent, racially motivated riot at one of their shows in the early 70s. While Nev goes on to have a kind of fame most reminiscent of a Billy Joel or Elton John-type, Opal is the standout character, a wholly unique punk rock, black power, feminist creation by the book’s author, Dawnie Walton. Interspersed with a first-person narrative by Sunny, the editor of a Rolling Stones-esque magazine who has a personal history with Opal, Walton has a lot to say about race, white allyship, and the capitalist structures that prop up our cultural institutions.

Walton’s choice to present three-quarters of the book in each character’s voice as they relay the beats of the story to Sunny makes the book reminiscent of Daisy Jones & the Six, but The Final Revival of Opal & Nev is far deeper and better executed than Taylor Jenkins Reid’s crowd pleaser. I hope that this book finds a similar sized audience, even if the style of a written oral history was off putting at times and made the book more laborious to read than if Walton had opted to go for a more traditional first- or third-person narrative. Still, there is much to like here, and the narration from Sunny set in early 2016 are poignant and intriguing. I’m excited to see what Walton does next in a more traditional narrative.

I received an advanced reading copy through NetGalley.

I was absolutely thrilled for The Final Revival of Opal & Nev; it was probably in my top 5 most anticipated books for the year. So I think part of my problem was that I probably had set my expectations much too high for it. Another part of the problem, based on quick skimming of other reviews, was that I have not read Daisy Jones and therefore was completely unfamiliar with the oral history writing style.

I recognize that Sunny needed to insert her voice somehow throughout the book, but I didn't particularly enjoy the use of the "Editor's Note" feature. It felt a little heavy handed, and like she was doing a lot of telling us vs. showing us what was going on. It also contributed to a weird flow throughout the novel. The pacing felt off to me, with nothing happening for long stretches, or a ton of buildup only for the big event to happen within a page or two, and then back to long stretches of very little going on. I struggled to stay super engaged with the book throughout.

I do think Walton did a great job of writing in the voices of the different characters; it never got confusing whose point of view she was writing from and each character's voice felt very unique. That being said, the character development of characters across the board fell just a little bit short for me. I was never quite able to get myself fully emotionally invested in their arcs. The points of the story that hit on Jimmy were far and away the strongest.

Not by any means a bad read, and wow do I wish Opal Jewel actually existed in our world, but it just didn't quite check all of my boxes.

I don't know how to review this book, because while I recognize its incredible writing, well-drawn out characters and important subject matter, for some reason it didn't captivate me. Walton is a gifted author and she writes beautifully, but her words could not capture my attention. Perhaps it was because of inevitable comparisons to Daisy Jones, a similar book that I loved, but I kept feeling like something was lacking, even if I still can't put my finger on it. Rounding up from 3.5 because the novel is impressive in many ways and perhaps I was just not its target reader. Thank you for the early copy.

Not reading the other reviews, because I can already guess that they all draw comparisons to Daisy Jones. This reads exactly like Taylor Jenkins Reid's bestseller, but with a 2021-woke/racial angle. Not that that's a bad thing-- TJR is one of my favorite contemporary authors, and while I wouldn't recommend reading this directly after that one, it's entertaining and, if not wholly unique, exceedingly well written. The novel is one of epic proportions, creating a landscape that feels at once familiar and new, and tracking along multiple timelines, from multiple points of view. All of the characters are dynamic, though none more so than the titular Opal Jewel, who is complex and jumps off the page. She is ahead of her time, though she still manages to feel 'real', in her day.
Would definitely recommend to fans of A Visit from the Goon Squad and, obviously, Daisy Jones & the Six.

(3.5 stars) In my opinion, this book suffers by comparison to Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Not because it’s not as good…it’s actually better as it deals with other issues (race especially) in addition to drama surrounding the band. But being so similar in structure and subject to Daisy Jones, I felt as if I had read it before. Opal IS Daisy as a POC with fashion flair and a bald head that she decorates with wild wigs. Nev is similar to Billy, leading the band and dealing with crises with his lead singer. Opal and Nev’s story is told from the point of view of a female journalist whose father played drums for the band. This was an interesting way to narrate the story, and gave an added dimension to the tale. Still too similar to Daisy Jones for me, though.

This is a very creatively written story of Opal, a talented young black woman who found fame and fortune singing with the up and coming English singer, Nev, in the 1970s. The book combines elements of reality (singers and songs that we all will recognize) with the fictional musical work of Opal and Nev. Their lives and careers together are wonderful and horrible, and their story is told by a young black journalist, with a special connection to Opal.

I loved the first part of the book when Opal and Nev are first starting out - so entertaining and compelling. I wondered how the horror of certain events would be settled - how would Opal and Nev would resolve their differences, both musical and personal. The ending seem to drag on just a tad - I might have edited it down some. I'm not sure I would have ended the story this way. And I'm not sure I'm comfortable with the relationship the journalist had with Opal, finding it not especially believable, given the nature of the relationship.

This book will appeal to those of us who grew up in the 1970s and listened to great music on the radio, and had the opportunity to go see nascent bands perform in small clubs, and then got to appreciate reunion tours of those same bands years after they had achieved musical fame.

Thank you, NetGalley, for allowing me to read this book.

Is "fake rock biopic" a genre of fiction? If not, can we make it one? Either way, Opal & Nev was a truly original take, and it will easily hold its own against the inevitable comparisons to "Daisy Jones and the Six." For one thing, Opal and Nev themselves were such a unique creation - such an unexpected musical duo. I didn't even try to imagine what their music might have sounded like, I just accepted that people heard something special in it. Luckily, the stellar writing is all the evidence readers will need.

3 stars
This has all the Daisy Jones vibes. I absolutely loved how that story was told, but I love how this author did their own interpretation. It’s a oral history this characters giving their takes on events.
I thought the characters felt real and genuine. I thought the setting was spot on and I loved the weaving of real world events.
It didn’t capture me as much as I thought it would. I wanted to be emotionally invested, and that took me awhile.
It fell off a bit at the end, but overall, a great debut novel.

I think this faux musician/ celebrity trend should continue forever. I absolutely love it.
I definitely think of you appreciated Daisy Jones, you will appreciate this story!