Some Strange Music Draws Me In

A Novel

By: Griffin Hansbury

Narrated by: Petey Gibson

From an award-winning author, this provocative novel tells an emotionally gripping story about friendship, family, and transgender awakening in a working-class American town.

It’s the summer of 1984 in Swaffham, Massachusetts, when Mel (short for Melanie) meets Sylvia, a tough-as-nails trans woman whose shameless swagger inspires Mel’s dawning self-awareness. But Sylvia’s presence sparks fury among her neighbors and throws Mel into conflict with her mother and best friend. Decades later, in 2019, Max (formerly Mel) is on probation from his teaching job for, ironically, defying speech codes around trans identity. Back in Swaffham, he must navigate life as part of a fractured family and face his own role in the disasters of the past.

Populated by a cast of unforgettable characters, Some Strange Music Draws Me In is a propulsive work about multiple electrifying relationships—between a working-class mother and her queer child, between a trans man and his right-wing sister, and between a teenager and her troubled best friend. Griffin Hansbury, in elegant, arresting, and fearless prose, dares to explore taboos around gender and class as he offers a deeply moving portrait of friendship, family, and a girlhood lived sideways. A timely and captivating narrative of self-realization amid the everyday violence of small-town intolerance, Some Strange Music Draws Me In builds to an explosive conclusion, illuminating the unexpected ways that difference can provide a ticket to liberation.

©2024 Griffin Hansbury (P)2024 Audible, Inc.

Just love. Fantastic story with a unique perspective tied to gender, class, and sexuality

Fantastic. As a transmasc person who grew up poor in a small conservative town, I devoured this story. I felt parts of me represented when we so rarely see our stories elevated. The protagonist even delves into this- the issues of transmasc invisibility and survivor’s guilt. He also talks from the perspective of an older trans person, which is a rarely heard perspective in its own right. Though I’m not old yet, I imagine this will be really meaningful to older trans people out there too. I loved this story because it was beautiful storytelling woven together with sociological commentary on gender, class, and sexuality. The audio performance was also fantastic, with accents that pulled me further into the story’s universe. I cannot wait to read more by this author.

This book was like therapy to me

As a trans man from a conservative family in Florida, I have never felt more seen than I have listening to Max’s story. I cried several times, both from sadness and from joy. This book changed my life in ways I cannot yet describe. What a beautiful gift to the ftm community.

Couldn’t Stop Listening

This audiobook is something I could not “put down “. I usually ride my bike to work but took the subway several times just so I could listen to it. I’m not yet finished with the book but love it so much I have to review it now so more ppl read it.
The toggling between pre- pandemic contemporary adult life and the author’s teen self- alternating 1984 to 2019 -was such a great strategy for connecting to the narrator’s young self and how they have become who they are now. As a fellow gen X queer person from the burbs growing up in a single mom household with an assortment of family dysfunctions and class stress, I found almost everything down to the smallest details so much like a mirror of my own experience.
It is such a beautiful and funny story and so well written. Also super funny to have the Massachusetts accents! It really adds to the story, giving it place and authenticity.