Utopia Avenue
**The long-awaited new novel from the bestselling, prize-winning author of Cloud Atlas and The Bone Clocks.** Utopia Avenue is the strangest British band you’ve never heard of. Emerging from London’s psychedelic scene in 1967 and fronted by folk singer Elf Holloway, guitar demigod Jasper de Zoet, and blues bassist Dean Moss, Utopia Avenue released only two LPs during its brief, blazing journey from the clubs of Soho and drafty ballrooms to Top of the Pops and the cusp of chart success, and on to glory in Amsterdam, prison in Rome, and a fateful American fortnight in the autumn of 1968. David Mitchell’s captivating new novel tells the unexpurgated story of Utopia Avenue; of riots in the streets and revolutions in the head; of drugs, thugs, madness, love, sex, death, art; of the families we choose and the ones we don’t; of fame’s Faustian pact and stardom’s wobbly ladder. Can we change the world in turbulent times, or does the world change us?
Themes & atmosphere
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What you might want to know about Utopia Avenue
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
In the spring of 1967, Soho talent manager Levon Frankland builds a four-piece London band called Utopia Avenue out of bass player Dean Moss, folk singer Elf Holloway, Dutch guitarist Jasper de Zoet, and Yorkshire jazz drummer Griff Griffin.
Yes. Mitchell's novels share recurring characters across what fans call the 'Mitchellverse,' and Utopia Avenue includes appearances by figures from The Bone Clocks, Cloud Atlas, and Black Swan Green.
No. The band is fictional, but they interact with real musicians of the late 1960s including David Bowie, Jerry Garcia, Brian Jones, and Janis Joplin.
Utopia Avenue was written by David Mitchell, published in 2020 by Random House Audio.
Utopia Avenue is 605 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Utopia Avenue takes most readers 9 to 13 hours to finish.
Utopia Avenue is a standalone novel by David Mitchell, not part of a series.
Utopia Avenue is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.