The Age of Anxiety

A Novel

By: Pete Townshend

Narrated by: Michael Jayston

Length: 9 hrs and 1 min

Publisher's summary

In his debut novel, rock legend Pete Townshend explores the anxiety of modern life and madness in a story that stretches across two generations of a London family, their lovers, collaborators, and friends.

A former rock star disappears on the Cumberland moors. When his wife finds him, she discovers he has become a hermit and a painter of apocalyptic visions.

An art dealer has drug-induced visions of demonic faces swirling in a bedstead and soon his wife disappears, nowhere to be found.

A beautiful Irish girl who has stabbed her father to death is determined to seduce her best friend's husband.

A young composer begins to experience aural hallucinations, expressions of the fear and anxiety of the people of London. He constructs a maze in his back garden.

Driven by passion and musical ambition, events spiral out of control - good drugs and bad drugs, loves lost and found, families broken apart and reunited.

Conceived jointly as an opera, The Age of Anxiety deals with mythic and operatic themes. Hallucinations and soundscapes haunt this novel, which on one level is an extended meditation on manic genius and the dark art of creativity.

©2019 Pete Townshend (P)2019 Hachette Books

Excellent Look in the London Art/Music world

Pete Townshend (yes, THAT Pete Townshend) has created an excellent study of the characters of several fascinating fictional but very real characters. set in the music and visual art world in London, which Townshend knows well, it follows the lives of a group of young and middle-aged people over a 20-year period. Each of these people is a fascinating and fully rounded human being. Each is distinct, and any of them alone could have carried a novel. Their interaction and development over time is fascinating and is the core of the book. This is not the heavily plotted typical 21st Century novel. it a book about character and insight. Michael Jayston does an excellent job of narrating the story. Listen to this, it is well worth your time and book credit. And Mr. Townshend, please write another for us all.

A good and flavorful listen

The narrator Michael Jayston kept my attention with his reading of the intense dialogue, poetic musings and everything else Pete Townsend expressed in this novel. Not entirely a thick plot by my estimations, but still an interesting and worthwhile listen with the tangible plot that it does have. There’s a lot of of engaging ideas, conversations and perspectives to be heard here. Recommended if you are intrigued by music, psychology, philosophy and/or he-said she-said dynamics.

A Multifaceted Story

The world of rock music is intertwined with magic and family affairs in this novel. The story grabs our attention from the start and stays interesting throughout. There are a couple of odd chapters near the end, but they don't detract from the book's good. The characters are interesting, and even though there are several of them, the author makes it easy to tell them apart. I enjoyed listening to the book. The reader did a great job.

Pete Townshend, Who Are You?

In a story replete with more improbable coincidences than “Candide”, it is no coincidence that Louis Doxstader, the protagonist in this novel, is cast as a dealer in outsider art. This book is the literary equivalent. Although Pete Townshend’s writing craft does not rise to the level of a Kazuo Ishiguro or a Salman Rushdie, it is still impressive. Possibly even more so because of his outsider status. When Michael Jordan left basketball in 1994 to try his hand at baseball, no one expected him to be a hall-of-famer. But his performance, especially off the field, was remarkable. The same can be said for Townshend’s entry into the field of creative writing, particularly when one considers that this story was conceived jointly as a novel and an opera. Evidently, there are plans to turn it into an “opera art installation”. Is it possible that creativity, like energy, cannot be created or destroyed? Does it simply shift from one form to another? This venture by a 75-year-old rock star suggests that it does. “The Age of Anxiety” is an amazingly creative endeavor by an amazingly talented individual. This book/future opera art installation is a remarkable achievement for someone who, by all rights, should be well past his creative prime. Pete Townshend, Who Are You?

Fascinating

Pete Townshend is truly a gifted and imaginative artist who once again creates a unique story with great depth and complexity. Having followed his music, I was aware of his being a gifted story-teller and this selection is another example of his creative artistry. Read the book and listen to The Who's new album, maybe we'll see it on Broadway?

Intriguing story, but ultimately unfulfilling

I've been a devoted Who fan since I was a kid, so when Pete Townshend puts anything into the world, I'm going to consume it. While the initial premise of the story is compelling, it ultimately left me wanting more, and even groaning at its overdone melodramatic last third. Much like his lead character Walter, I think Pete had some trouble relating the things he was hearing and seeing into this book. But if you are a Who fan, there are plenty of nuggets interwoven in the narrative for you to discover and (rightly or wrongly) associate with Pete's own life experiences, as well as themes and threads that have permeated his work for decades.

Ultimately, the most disappointing thing for me is how the women are written. Not a page goes by that the female characters aren't being described by their desirable physical attributes or their sexual worth to the men of the story. Most of the women come off as very flat and uninteresting, with their defining qualities being their sexual appetites and their attraction to the men around them, while the male characters grapple with the bigger problems of the the world around them and how to create meaningful art. This problem at least gets recognized and commented on at the end of the story, but it still made the majority of the book an uncomfortable read for me. Also uncomfortable is the way the gay character (who actually seems to be transgender, but is referred to as a "cross dresser") is written as a total camp stereotype, and the casualness with which sexual assault is discussed and dismissed towards the end of the story.

As for the narration, I just wish they had picked someone with a younger voice. I understand that the story is being told by a man in his 60's, but I had a hard time especially with the tone the narrator (who is in his 80's) takes for the younger women in the story.

Ace

Brain training! Pete Townshend at his creative best. In novel form. An epic journey. Enjoy it!

Hearing Anxiety

This fictional autobiography follows an art dealer who, in his youth, was a drug addict and drinker. It gives the feeling of being in the character's disjointed mind. Louie, the art dealer, muses about his ex-wife and the scheming women he encounters. It reminds me of the saying "sex, drugs, and rock and roll" as he describes his life.

Pete is great, but not my cup of tea

I love The Who, and I gave this a shot because his biography was really well written and fascinating. This book was like the worst Woody Allen movies (like September). Just very dull conversations about art you can’t see and music you can’t listen to. None of the characters motivations make any sense. Every time it got slightly interesting, something happened to pull it into dull territory again.