More Towels: In Between the Notes [Paperback]

Grant Jarrett (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 15, 2002

One of the four younger brothers of a gifted and very successful jazz pianist, our less exceptional protagonist begins his peculiar journey of discovery at the age of seventeen, leaving his home in Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains to travel with a laughably bad, self-contained show band, "led by Fred Waring Jr., the recovering alcoholic son of a had-been bandleader and blender inventor whose limited celebrity dissolved in the nineteen-fifties even more swiftly than it materialized in the forties." As he travels back and forth across the continent with a series of mostly unremarkable bands-bands with names such as "Love, Peace, and Soul" and "Natural Feelin'"-he encounters a world wherein talent is far less essential than a charming smile and the willingness to wear a ruffled polyester shirt, a world wherein getting laid is far more enjoyable, and a hell of a lot easier than learning to play his instrument or sustaining a meaningful relationship. Beautiful young women and angry husbands litter his voyage; there are violent assaults and hilarious confrontations, and through it all, as he searches desperately for something or someone to believe in, rarely finding anything more than a place to put his "pee-pee, he shares his intensely cynical view of himself and the world around him.Though far more humorous than many memoirs, More Towels is still a serious and often touching coming-of-age story, a story of growth and acceptance and all the battles along the way.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Grant Jarrett spent the first twenty years of his working life as a professional musician, and the six years following managing a small business in Manhattan and writing his first memoir. In the past six years he has written over a dozen short stories, two novels, and a second memoir. Mr. Jarrett lives in New York City and earns his living as an editor and freelance writer. In 2001 he published half a dozen magazine articles and ghostwrote a nonfiction book for Pocketbooks.

Product Details

• Paperback: 268 pages
• Publisher: iUniverse (August 15, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0595237983
• ISBN-13: 978-0595237982
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,465,092 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars hilarious and touching, July 28, 2004

By 

susan_d - See all my reviews

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This review is from: More Towels: In Between the Notes (Paperback)

Before he became a writer, Grant Jarrett spent years of his life as a musician. Not just any musician, but specifically as the much less heralded younger brother of a famous and respected jazz pianist. For any jazz fans out there, you can easily figure out who big brother is. Two striking things about this book are apparent once you're finished with it though. One: Grant admirably doesn't trade on his brother's name here. This book really isn't about being a younger sibling to someone in the spotlight. His brother is merely incidental, because this memoir is much more about a young man struggling to find his niche. Two: It's because of sheer talent as a writer and his acerbic wit that Jarrett is able to pull off this sometimes unflattering peek inside his life.

Jarrett begins the memoir as a teenage drummer when he leaves home on his first big gig. What follows is an often hilarious and sometimes wrenching journey as he travels across the country wearing cringe- worthy ruffled shirts, boozing, and playing more women than music. As he bounces from band to band and woman to woman, one of the things that helps elevate this book above barroom, glory-days chatter is Jarrett's uncanny ability to be brutally honest with the reader (and himself); not just about his poor sartorial choices and sometimes lacking musical skills, but also about his personal choices and actions. He has a sharp wit, and he turns that weapon as mercilessly upon himself as anyone else in the memoir. He's sometimes too hard on himself, so that when he's berating himself for his unsavory behavior, the reader still feels a sympathetic pull for him. This works because he's not only charming and funny, but he's never really bad so much as just plain lost.

He was growing up and moving on in these years. He was often struggling and flailing about, unable to hit the peaks of musicianship he hoped for while clearly searching for someone to accept him for what he was. But with the publication of this memoir, Grant decisively proves that the talent in the Jarrett family flows in more than one direction, and that even though music wasn't his calling, it provided hysterical and touching fodder for unleashing his gifts.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Harrowing, hilarious and subtly heartbreaking, March 10, 2004

By 

"vbd72" (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: More Towels: In Between the Notes (Paperback)

There were a few sections of this book that touched me in a way that surprised me. Jarrett's reaction to his grandmother's death was one, his description of his girfriend at her brother's funeral was another. There were other touching moments too, but then this is a book of moments, moments that paint a picture of a desperately unhappy man coming to terms with his limitations as a musician and as a human being. In the second half of the book Jarrett's inner turmoil starts to seep to the surface and he begins to act out in more dangerous ways. As others have noted this is a very very funny book, but it is also an honest account of one musician's efforts to come to terms with his internal demons.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Uproarious! Poignant ! - Make Room Henry Miller, September 8, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: More Towels: In Between the Notes (Paperback)

Couldn't put this book down! I love this guy! We all know how whacky navigating life's curves through our 20's can be. Jarrett never misses a beat banging his/our funny bone as he romps through his musical career from one bed/bandstand to another with the lust and whimsy of a modern day drumming Tom Jones (not the singer, silly.) Grant has in his wit, humor, and headlong lust for laughs/loins what his Famous Brother has for improvising melody - vibrant genius. BUY THIS BOOK!