Abdi Nazemian: Art Makes The People Come Together
My latest novel Desert Echoes tells the story of high school junior Kam, whose first love Ash disappeared in the Joshua Tree desert. Kam was with Ash on that trip, and he’s been haunted by Ash’s disappearance ever since. The book jumps in time from present to past as Kam slowly discovers the truth not just about Ash, but about himself as well. On a recent tour of London bookshops, multiple booksellers asked me what genre the book is. I struggled to find one genre to encapsulate a novel that includes romance, mystery, family drama, and more. But I finally found the right answer: its genre is Lana Del Rey.
That answer is meant to get a laugh, but it also speaks to one of the book’s core themes: the power of art to unite us and bring us closer to those we love. In the novel, Kam and Ash meet in their school choir when they’re asked to write down song requests on note cards. Most students write down popular songs they’d like the choir to sing. Kam and Ash both suggest ‘God Knows I Tried’ by Lana Del Rey. Kam says of Ash, “Our eyes found each other. Recognized something in each other. I knew instantly that, like me, he wanted life to feel like poetry. That he longed for romance.”
Desert Echoes is inspired by the loss of my own first boyfriend Damon, a magnetic and complex artist who loved the desert and its mysteries. When Damon and I first met in our early twenties, we were opposites in many ways. He was a musical prodigy who found immense success at a young age in both Hollywood and theatre. I was working as an assistant. He was out and proud. I was still in the closet to my family. But music connected us. The night we met, after I first saw his brilliant musical bare: a Pop Opera, we realized we had the same Kate Bush CD in our car. Kam’s words about Ash could’ve been mine on that night. I knew instantly that, like me, he wanted life to feel big, bold, ambitious. That he longed for the dramatic sweep of a Kate Bush opus. After our first date, we discovered our mutual obsession with Tori Amos, whose concerts and music would become the connective tissue of our relationship.
The experience of being united by art is one I’ve always cherished. Throughout my life, I’ve found some of my closest friends through shared musical, literary or cinematic obsessions. In turn, I’ve poured these artistic loves into my novels. Few things make me happier than a young reader telling me they deep dived into Madonna because they read Like a Love Story, which dramatizes my emotional journey as a closeted immigrant moving to New York during the worst years of the AIDS crisis. Or a reader telling me they listened to Googoosh after immersing themselves in Only This Beautiful Moment, an intergenerational Iranian family saga. Sharing my favourite art through my books, from writers like James Baldwin and Tony Kushner to actors like Joan Crawford and Judy Garland, is my way of inviting readers to connect with me through art. Baldwin said, and Madonna often quotes, that “artists are here to disturb the peace”. I do believe that to be true, and for those who agree, please support all the young adult and children’s authors being banned and threatened right now. But I also believe that art’s job is to build bridges, to unite people through shared love and longing. This is why I feel so despondent when I see people using art to fight with each other, to divide, to judge. Art should unify. I hope that’s what my books do.
Desert Echoes is out now in paperback
