by Patti Smith
M Train begins in the tiny Greenwich Village café where Smith goes every morning for black coffee, ruminates on the world as it is and the world as it was, and writes in her notebook. Through prose that shifts fluidly between dreams and reality, past and present, we travel to Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul in Mexico; to the fertile moon terrain of Iceland; to a ramshackle seaside bungalow in New York’s Far Rockaway that Smith acquires just before Hurricane Sandy hits; to the West 4th Street subway station, filled with the sounds of the Velvet Underground after the death of Lou Reed; and to the graves of Genet, Plath, Rimbaud, and Mishima.
Woven throughout are reflections on the writer’s craft and on artistic creation. Here, too, are singular memories of Smith’s life in Michigan and the irremediable loss of her husband, Fred Sonic Smith.
Braiding despair with hope and consolation, illustrated with her signature Polaroids, M Train is a meditation on travel, detective shows, literature, and coffee. It is a powerful, deeply moving book by one of the most remarkable multiplatform artists at work today.
Featuring a postscript with five new photos from Patti Smith
M Train begins in the tiny Greenwich Village café where Smith goes every morning for black coffee, ruminates on the world as it is and the world as it was, and writes in her notebook. Through prose that shifts fluidly between dreams and reality, past and present, we travel to Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul in Mexico; to the fertile moon terrain of Iceland; to a ramshackle seaside bungalow in New York’s Far Rockaway that Smith acquires just before Hurricane Sandy hits; to the West 4th Street subway station, filled with the sounds of the Velvet Underground after the death of Lou Reed; and to the graves of Genet, Plath, Rimbaud, and Mishima.
Woven throughout are reflections on the writer’s craft and on artistic creation. Here, too, are singular memories of Smith’s life in Michigan and the irremediable loss of her husband, Fred Sonic Smith.
Braiding despair with hope and consolation, illustrated with her signature Polaroids, M Train is a meditation on travel, detective shows, literature, and coffee. It is a powerful, deeply moving book by one of the most remarkable multiplatform artists at work today.
Featuring a postscript with five new photos from Patti Smith
Reviews-
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Starred review from August 10, 2015
Following Smith’s bestselling and critically acclaimed book Just Kids, this essay collection creates a map of the singer-songwriter’s peripatetic journeys to cafes, cemeteries, hotels, and train stations around the world. She is the perfect guide, revealing the mysteries in the shadows, the little bits of life people often take for granted—such as a good cup of coffee, a familiar coat, or the “transformation of the heart.” In 19 imagistic reflections, Smith invites readers to travel with her from Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul and Sylvia Plath’s grave to the Far Rockaway bungalow that Smith buys just before Hurricane Sandy comes ashore and destroys much of the surrounding territory. Smith’s haunting and joyful recollections of her life with her late husband, Fred Sonic Smith, anchor her intensely physical descent into memory and its ability to haunt her waking and dreaming life. Smith illustrates her meditations with her signature Polaroid photos of Fred, as well as objects such as her father’s desk chair and the chess table where Bobby Fischer played Boris Spassky. The narrative carries readers through the despair, loss, hope, consolation, and mysteries that Smith faces as she lives through Fred’s death, struggles with the writer’s craft, and comes to realize, through one of her dreams, that the “writer is a conductor”—and she is indeed a phenomenal conductor along these elegant tours of the haunting places in her life, where anyone might stumble upon momentary but life-altering wisdom. -
May 1, 2015
Legendary musician/artist Smith returns with another memoir that passes through 18 "stations" that have defined her life, from Frida Kahlo's Casa Azul in Mexico to the graves of Genet, Plath, Rimbaud, and Mishima to the seaside home she bought in New York's Rockaways just before Hurricane Sandy rushed ashore. As she journeys from station to station, she reflects on the creative process and her life with her husband, guitarist Fred Sonic Smith, whose death is for her an enduring loss.
Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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April 4, 2016
This essay collection creates a map of National Book Award–winner Smith’s peripatetic journeys to cafes, cemeteries, hotels, and train stations around the world. In 19 imagistic reflections, Smith invites readers to travel with her from Frida Kahlo’s Casa Azul and Sylvia Plath’s grave to the Far Rockaway bungalow that Smith buys just before Hurricane Sandy comes ashore and destroys much of the surrounding territory. She ambles across space, time, and even reality as she weaves meaningful moments, emotional experiences such as the loss of her husband, and even the smaller moments her in life. In the audio edition, Smith’s vocal delivery proves as compelling as her writing. Her prose takes on the rhythm of poetry with shifts in cadence and long pauses. Underlining her delivery is a tension that feels akin to a sneer or sidelong look; it’s as if she is confronting or daring the listener to take this journey with her more so than inviting. This method is seductive, and listeners will have a hard time stepping away from her idiosyncratic narration. A Knopf hardcover. -
September 1, 2015
This unusual memoir is a blend of adventures, the everyday, travels, dreams, and reflections on writing, creativity, and life. Smith (National Book Award winner for Just Kids; Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee) is an original. She shares detail-rich scenes of her tiny Rockaway Beach bungalow before and after Hurricane Sandy; an encounter with chess master Bobby Fischer in Iceland; presenting a talk for an explorers' organization in Berlin; visiting the graves of Yukio Mishima and Jean Genet; an imaginary conversation with the bust of Nikola Tesla; her favorite corner spot in Cafe 'Ino in Greenwich Village; and, especially, her event-filled and joyous time with husband Fred "Sonic" Smith before his passing in 1994. Those seeking a conventional autobiography of this writer/performer/artist will not find it here--and a traditional presentation isn't Smith's intent. Her creatively structured approach conveys the essence of Smith, whose writing style is musical in texture, often cinematic in description, and always eloquent. She weaves insightful ponderings on literature, cafes, music, TV, art, childhood, place, and more into the selected episodes of her life. Her trademark Polaroid photos, interspersed throughout, add a strikingly appealing touch. VERDICT In many ways, this book defies categorizing, and that is one of its many charms. It is absorbing and lingers long after its end. Fans of Smith will enjoy this as will writers, artists, and all those inspired by a creative mind. For circulating collections. [See Prepub Alert, 4/6/15.]--Carol J. Binkowski, Bloomfield, NJ
Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
- Maureen Corrigan, NPR (Best Books of 2015) "Incantatory . . . Unlike her first memoir, the now classic, Just Kids, which was all about the thrill of 'becoming,' M Train is mostly about the challenge of enduring erosion and discovering new passions (like detective fiction and a tumbledown cottage in Rockaway Beach, Queens). Smith, of course, is a 'kid' no longer. She's suffered a lot of losses, including the deaths of artist Robert Mapplethorpe, who was her partner in crime in the Just Kids years, and her husband, musician Fred 'Sonic' Smith, who died suddenly in his 40s. 'They are all stories now,' says Smith, thinking of these and other deaths . . . Both of Smith's memoirs tell a haunting story about being sheltered and fed, in all senses, by New York City."
- Garth Risk Hallberg, The Millions "Patti Smith's new book remains one of the best reading experiences I had this year . . . elliptical and fragmentary, weird and beautiful, and, at its core, a reckoning with loss. Much has been made of the book's seeming spontaneity, its diaristic drift. But as the echoes among its discrete episodes pile up, it starts to resonate like a poem. At one point, Smith writes about W.G. Sebald, and there are affinities with The Emigrants in the way M Train circles around a tragedy, or constellation of tragedies, pointing rather than naming. It is formally a riskier book than the comparatively straight-ahead Just Kids, but a worthy companion piece. And that Smith is still taking on these big artistic dares in 2015 should inspire anyone who longs to make art. In this way, and because it is partly a book about reading other books--how a life is made of volumes--it seems like a fitting way to turn the page on one year in reading, and to welcome in another."
- M. G. Lord, The New York Times Book Review "Rich, inventive . . . Where Just Kids charted Smith's path from childhood to celebrity, M Train does not move in a simple arc from one destination to another. It meanders between her interior life and her life in the world, connecting dreams, reflections and memories. Smith's language lures the reader down this nonformulaic path. She doesn't slap a convenient label on emotions; she dissects them. With each sip [of coffee], her ruminations deepen . . . M Train is less about achieving success than surviving it. Smith has outlived many of the companions who sustained her in her youth. She grieves for her husband and her brother; she mourns the artists with whom she had felt a connection when they were alive, including Burroughs and Bowles. And in a scene that strikes a universal chord, she mourns her mother . . . At the center of M Train is the passage of time--the way places and events can mean different things at different stages in a person's life . . . Tender, heartbreaking."
- Linnie Greene, The Rumpus "Incandescent . . . moving, lovely. Patti Smith is a poet with a mindful of memories enough to fill M Train to the brim. Let's be clear: every observation is beautiful. M Train is chiefly concerned with salvaging the pieces that, together, form a life entire . . . In its barest sense, the book is a series of cups of coffee around the world, drunk between waking and sleep. But once the memoir has sunk in its claws, these rituals become a framework for more meaningful observations. What is a life, if not a pattern interrupted by occasional revelations or surprises? Where Just Kids traced the linear progression of her friendship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe and her coming of age in 1970s New York City, M Train finds its footing in shared experiences. It's the universal--not rock 'n' roll in particular--that haunts the reader most . . . Aging and loss transcend fame and geography. Smith whittles her prose down to the essentials . . . M Train's greatest reward, for a reader, is her unwillingness to bend to the dream-cowboy's recurring doubts [about] 'writing about nothing.' Even nothing has meaning--the found objects, the things remembered, the cups of coffee that mark our days better
