Unplugged: A Novel [Paperback]

Paul McComas (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 2002

Jimi Hendrix. Janis Joplin. Jim Morrison. Each of these rockers died at 27 of drugs, despair, or both. And when Kurt Cobain took his own life at the same age, his mother lamented, I told him not to join that stupid club. Unplugged imagines a talented and tormented woman whose membership in that club is denied but only barely. 27-year-old rocker Dayna Clay struggles with deepening depression to make it through the final concert of a wildly successful tour. She flies home to attempt suicide. She survives, but journeys aimlessly, incognito. She ends up in the South Dakota badlands where she meets a stuntman and rancher, with a lovable daughter. Meanwhile Dayna's disappearance fuels skyrocketing record sales and pblic hysteria, which force her to choose between the past and the future.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

ESCAPE TO OBLIVION—
DEPRESSION UNDONE IN THE BADLANDS

Unplugged, by Paul McComas, tells the story of a bisexual rock musician at the height of her career who trades the bright lights of stardom for the Badlands of South Dakota. A gripping chronicle of depression, recovery, and self-reinvention, Unplugged is also the tale of how a young woman is taught and healed by nature—by the very land beneath her feet.

Dayna Clay struggles to make it through the final concert of a wildly successful tour. Tormented by an ever-deepening depression, the twenty-seven-year-old rocker hands her guitar to a fan and beats a hasty retreat. She flies home to Chicago and attempts suicide, but nature seemingly steps in to spare her. Still unsure whether her life is worth living, she forfeits her career and disappears, setting out incognito for parts unknown.

Throughout her journey, the land and its inhabitants challenge and change her in striking ways. She develops a profound affinity for the Badlands, whose dramatic, semi-stable formations she takes strength from climbing. She forms a bond with the bighorn sheep she finds living on this seemingly unlivable land. And she befriends Drake, a rancher and retired stuntman who himself has struggled with depression, and his mischievous daughter, Kayla, with whom Dayna falls in love.

All the while, though, Dayna’s mysterious disappearance and continuing absence only serve to boost public interest in her—and fuel her skyrocketing record sales. Laboring to choose between her musical ambitions and the new life she has made, Dayna finds herself stranded in a far-flung corner of the wilderness she has come to know and love. Saved from her suicide attempt earlier by nature, she now may perish by the very same hand.

About the Author

Paul McComas is a fiction-writing instructor and performance artist whose short story collection, Twenty Questions (Daniel & Daniel, 1998), is in its third printing. He is also the founder of Rock Against Depression, a teen-suicide prevention program. He lives in Evanston, Illinois.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Daniel & Daniel Pub (October 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 188028460X
• ISBN-13: 978-1880284605
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,742,845 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful breath of fresh air., September 25, 2002

By 

David Reedy (Culver, IN USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Unplugged: A Novel (Paperback)

This is an amazing story that's hard to describe. It's funny, and sexy, and shocking in places. (A word of warning -- parts of the story are very emotionally hard-hitting and will not be right for everyone.)

The story starts with thousands of whipped-up music fans chanting for Danya Clay to deliver her smashing encore song. The story starts fast and keeps rolling. Anyone unsure about whether they'd like this book should just start with the first few pages. If that doesn't "click" with you then the book is not for you. I was hooked from the get-go, and many readers will probably discover the same feeling.

One gets the sense that, at heart, the writer has genuine affection for his characters and for most people in general. This underlying good nature helps a lot when a scene turns dark or violent. The light of good nature can help show the darkness of evil -- the way a great song blends dissonance and harmony.

Highly recommended.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Of an aging rocker who decides to depart the music world, November 10, 2002

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Unplugged: A Novel (Paperback)

Paul McComas' Unplugged tells of an aging rocker who decides to depart from the music world, setting out for parts unknown and ending up in South Dakota. Her search for solitude and healing may unexpectedly lead to a career she can't shake in this moving story.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Book You've Probably Never Heard Of, September 8, 2006

By 

Elizabeth Ridley "Author, 'Dear Mr. Carson'" (Milwaukee, WI USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Unplugged: A Novel (Paperback)

On the surface UNPLUGGED is the story of Dayna Clay, a 27-year-old big-time rock star who, after barely surviving a suicide attempt, flees her home, her fans, and her career to live under an assumed identity in the rough Badlands of South Dakota, where she finds peace, love, and a surprising capacity to heal.
Below the surface, UNPLUGGED is a deeply-felt and seriously-considered story that will make you think, and feel, something on every page. Author McComas writes with remarkable insight, understanding, and authority from a female protagonist's perspective, something very few male authors (in my opinion) are able to do. McComas fully inhabits Dayna's bisexual female body as if he has lived there all his life. In addition, McComas writes about surviving childhood sexual abuse in a subtle yet truthful way, conveying the long-term, lasting pain without resorting to hysteria or hyperbole. For Dayna, as for so many survivors, what happened in the past just "is."
Writing about music is, as they say, like trying to "dance about architecture." Music, by its nature, can't really be captured in words, yet McComas does a great job of ushering the reader into Dayna's inner life as a musician, and his description of her creative process allows you to "hear" the music on the page.
For me, UNPLUGGED reaches its zenith in McComas' amazingly detailed descriptions of the harsh, unforgiving, spooky, yet strangely beautiful Badlands landscape-- a landscape that is at first ominous and impenetrable to Dayna, but that ultimately serves as both her biggest challenge and the source of her deepest strength.
This is a book you may have missed when it was first published in 2002. Now is the time to go out and discover it for yourself. You won't be disappointed.