In one sense, David Mitchell published a new novel this year, titledUtopia Avenue.
Other Mitchell novels, likeCloud AtlasandThe Bone Clocks, give a better indication of his overall project.
“I do like my novels to have these hyperlinks between them,” Mitchell tells EW.
Credit: Paul Stuart; Random House
“Like how the songs on an LP likeSgt.
Pepper’sadd up to more than the sum of their parts.
Two members ofGhostwritten’s ensemble pop up inUtopia Avenue.
Vintage
They need to be who they are.
They mustn’t feel like I’ve Photoshopped them together from that best-known moments.
“Music is a force beyond language,” Mitchell says.
Random House
“Maybe that’s why I’m drawn to it.
Music isn’t just adescriptionof a profound experience, itisa profound experience.
I don’t make it easy for myself.”
Random House
But that connection is only explicit if you’ve read both books.
“Whereas if you have readThousand Autumns,Utopia Avenueis not a realist novel anymore.
It’s a mostly realist novel with this fantastical organ beating inside it.
Random House
That cannot happen without a little bit of friction,” Mitchell says.
“It meant that the novel was quite rigidly timed.
I couldn’t mess about with the track order.”
Random House
Random House
