I’m Joseph Raffetto, and this is my book. This post isn’t about what Mysteries of Bowie and Other Oddities is about; you can read that on Goodreads. Below, I talk about how the book was conceived and what inspired it.
In 2012, I read Orwell’s Diaries. They were an inspiration; before then, I knew George Orwell only through Nineteen Eighty-Four. Orwell’s diaries opened the door to the gift of Orwell for me, and I went on to read every one of his novels and nonfiction books, as well as many of his essays. It was enlightening to learn about the man who fought imperialism, fascism, and Stalinism in his lifetime. He battled mainly with the pen, but he fought on the battlefield too. He volunteered to fight in the Spanish Civil War and almost lost his life when he was shot in the neck in a trench. My fictional account, “Inside Orwell,” tells Orwell’s life story intertwined with his experiences in the Spanish Civil War.
Orwell’s books are discovered and championed by every generation. He is a favorite of many journalists, and he is quoted liberally by pretty much everyone in the media. He’s the writer who steers us all toward the truth in a complex world.
Orwell came to me late in life. David Bowie came early. Diamond Dogs was one of the first albums I ever bought, at around 13 years old. My first concert was Bowie at the Los Angeles Forum in 1976, during his Thin White Duke period.
Bowie has always been a favorite of mine musically, but it was only more recently that I really dug into his “Berlin” period of the late 1970s. I knew the music, of course, but it was the German Foreign Office thanking David, after he died, for helping bring down the Berlin Wall that sparked my interest in writing “Bowie and the Berlin Wall.”
I had to read multiple books about Berlin and the history of the Wall, but Bowie’s music and presence in Berlin made him one of the many “heroes” who represented freedom and helped bring the Berlin Wall down. His song “Heroes” was the anthem of divided Berlin, and his concert at the Wall was another pivotal moment before East Germany opened up. His artistic presence and music lifted spirits and gave hope to Berliners.
I delve into Bowie’s family and how World Wars I and II affected them, as well as Bowie’s gift for supporting and touching marginalized communities. And, of course, I get into Bowie’s “Berlin Trilogy” of albums, Low, “Heroes,” and Lodger, and how many of the songs relate to Berlin and the Cold War. Bowie said these three albums were his DNA.
In 2013 and 2014, I read more than 100 books each year. What a tremendous experience; I read so many quality books. Many are on my favorites shelf on Goodreads. During this period, I read multiple books about Venice, Italy, and Venice, California. That was the impetus for my novella “Venice to Venice,” in which I compare the two Venices while layering on a thriller rooted in the Iraq War.
“The Mysteries of Game Theory” is a dystopian thriller set in Los Angeles, where I lived for 14 years. I suspect that when people read that a pandemic has hit LA in the story, they naturally assume it was based on the COVID pandemic. The truth is, I wrote it before COVID. I wanted to write a dystopian novel, and I had recently read The Plague by Albert Camus and A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe. They were the impetus for the plot.
The last piece in Mysteries of Bowie and Other Oddities, a very short one, is “The Georges,” whose characters are George Orwell, George W. Bush, and George Zimmerman (the killer of Trayvon Martin).
Here are the current reviews of Mysteries of Bowie and Other Oddities.
A BookLife Editor’s Pick: “Essential read on the interconnectedness of war and the struggle for peace.” Read the full review here.
Kirkus Reviews: “Ultimately, the threads of Orwell and Bowie woven throughout prove fascinating. A thought-provoking collection of fiction and nonfiction.” Read the full review here.
You’ll love David Bowie’s Favorite Books Categorized.
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