folklore: the novel

""It started with imagery. Visuals that popped into my mind and piqued my curiosity. Stars drawn around scars. A cardigan that still bears the scent of loss twenty years later. Battleships sinking into the ocean, down, down, down. The tree swing in the woods of my childhood. Hushed tones of "let's run away" and never doing it. The sun drenched month of August, sipped away like a bottle of wine. A mirrored disco ball hovering above a dance floor. A whiskey bottle beckoning. Hands held through plastic. A single thread that, for better or for worse, ties you to your fate."

Taylor Swift wrote folklore in 2020, an album she describes as twisting and turning reality and fantasy, blurred. In 2021, the album in my own mind began to cohere into one, linear, complex story.

Welcome to folklore, the novel. Invisible strings can tie together, bind a wind, or make a puppet of us all. Betty, Jame, Inez, and Bill, all more deeply loveable and more deeply flawed than first glance.

Welcome to their folklore.