E-Reader tips and tricks for Kindle, Apple Books
These e-reader tips and tricks will come in handy for your Kindle or Apple Books.
Problem Solved, USA TODAY
Liz Riggs loved sitting on the patio of Cafe Roze in East Nashville, drinking Americano and writing. When it was time for happy hour, she drank a martini. Slowly but surely, her Nashville-inspired debut novel, Lo Fi, came together.
On July 9, “Lo Fi,” inspired by the Nashville music scene, was released worldwide through Riverhead Books.
“I mean, I fell head over heels in love with Nashville,” she told the Tennessean while having drinks at Dino’s. “I was in the mood for concerts… and yeah, then it was kind of over for me.”
Her first novel, Lo Fi, is a sensual, dark story about a young woman who works in a stuffy Nashville music venue aptly named The Venue.
The story follows protagonist Alison “Al” Hunter, who works as a bouncer at the club, develops romances with people in the music industry (and industry-related circles), and is haunted by the disappearance of an indie music star from Nashville.
Riggs’ debut novel is already making waves in the Nashville music scene. Madi Diaz and Kacey Musgraves attended the book launch at The Basement in July. Artists Chris Housman and Vinnie Paolizzi even took the stage at the launch to support the event.
The literary world is also rallying behind Riggs. “Sweeping, sexy and melancholy… a tattered love letter to youth, music and Nashville,” said Daisy Alpert Florin, author of “My Last Innocent Year.” “A portrait of our ‘lo-fi’ days, before we really came into focus, before we knew we were worth listening to.”
“Lo Fi” captures a side of Nashville that is sometimes pushed aside or forgotten – this city is a thriving ecosystem for a seductive, inviting and chaotically intoxicating alternative and indie music scene.
From English teaching to novel writing
Riggs is a Nashville-based writer who holds an MFA in Fiction from NYU and has written for The Atlantic, Bon Appétit, American Songwriter, MTV, and more.
But for her, it all started in Tennessee.
Riggs was born in Franklin—her mother is from Chattanooga and her father attended Vanderbilt, but her family moved to Cincinnati when she was young.
She has always been fascinated by Nashville and moved back there in 2009 to teach high school English. Riggs worked in education for 15 years, teaching at Whites Creek and LEAD Academy, but she also wrote on the side.
In 2017, Riggs applied to NYU for her Master of Fine Arts – that’s when she says she started writing seriously. In the summer of 2020, she began writing “Lo Fi.”
“I knew I wanted to write a book someday, but I didn’t know what it would be, what it would look like, or how I would do it,” Riggs said, so she wrote what she knew.
“Lo Fi”: A dark snapshot of Nashville’s seductive alternative rock scene
In her 15 years in Nashville, Riggs has attended many shows.
“I think I wanted to be a music journalist,” Riggs said. “I saw ‘Almost Famous’ when I was in high school and thought, ‘Oh my God, I want to be William Miller… or Penny Lane, or maybe anyone else!'”
Riggs cites “Almost Famous,” a 2000 film that tells the story of a young music journalist and a groupie who accompany a rock’n’roll band on tour, as a major inspiration for her book. She also says “High Fidelity” served as an inspiration.
Riggs knew Nashville inside and out, having interviewed bands and reviewed shows for her other writing jobs, so “Lo Fi” was a natural fit.
And although it is a work of fiction, “Lo Fi” draws from Nashville’s very real indie music scene.
Riggs’ protagonist stamps her hands at The Venue, a dark club reminiscent of the Mercy Lounge or The Basement East (Riggs confirms that the Mercy Lounge was an inspiration, adding that she used to spend a lot of time at the place).
“I’ve never worked in a venue,” she said. “I’ve worked in a restaurant… I’ve incorporated some elements of that into my writing.”
“I’ve spent a lot of time in venues and dated guys from bands, but I think my experiences have always been similar to Al’s, which is closely tied to this industry,” she continued.
“Lo Fi” captures the lives of those who make Nashville’s music industry run, not just the talent on stage. Their pervasive love of music, which draws people to Nashville to work in the industry in some capacity, is an underlying theme of the novel.
The smallness and intimacy of Nashville’s music scene is also highlighted.
As Riggs noticed when she moved to Nashville, the characters are always surrounded by someone who knows someone in the music industry, bigwigs and A&Rs, artists and managers.
The focus on the indie alternative, emo pop and singer-songwriter scenes deviates from the typical portrayal of Nashville as a pure country music town.
“I don’t mean to criticize Nashville at all, I just never listened to country music,” Riggs said. “I was never that enchanted by country music.”
Riggs’ personal tastes include artists such as Death Cab for Cutie, Dashboard Confessional, Margot & The Nuclear So And So’s, and Nashville musicians such as Diaz, The Apache Relay, Andrew Combs, and Evan P. Donohue.
In the novel’s edginess, readers can hear Riggs’ temperamental taste.
“I gave a lot of myself to Al,” Riggs said of her protagonist. “I think, especially the love of music, and I think that inferior – not even The mild ailment – anxiety and depression. I passed on my taste in music to her, but tried to make it cooler.”
While Al struggles with heartbreak, crying fits, and more, she rattles off playlists that include Kings of Leon, Smashing Pumpkins, Bright Eyes, The Postal Service, Frightened Rabbit, Spoon, The Strokes, Bon Iver, and The Killers.
While listening to bands at The Venue, Al tries to work up the courage to sing in front of an audience after a traumatic public performance gone wrong.
Their desire to stay at the center of the music scene – or just to muster enough courage to sing a song at an open mic night when everyone around them seems to be a professional musician – is a familiar feeling.
Riggs also wrote a number of fictional bands and artists in “Lo Fi,” but she again stressed that her fictional artists are not based on real Nashville artists. “It’s all fiction,” she said seriously.
However, it is easy for the reader to imagine fictional “Lo Fi” variations by artists such as Cage The Elephant, Jason Isbell, Kings of Leon, Jack White, Nathaniel Rateliff or Briston Maroney, Paramore and the Black Keys.
When it came time to sum up the book in a few sentences, Riggs said, “This is a book about heartbreak.”
“It’s kind of like trying to figure out your life in your early 20s, when you have no idea who you are but are desperately trying to figure it out.”
“But it’s specifically about songwriting. It’s about being a fan. It’s about depression,” she continued.
“I want people to go home feeling like they’re hearing a song for the very first time that they’re going to love for a very long time, and then they’re sitting in the car and they’re like, ‘Wow, what was that? Turn it up!'”
“That’s the feeling I always try to capture,” she said. “And I think it’s like pure magic.”
Audrey Gibbs is a music writer for The Tennessean. You can reach her at [email protected].
