Book Club Guide

A Song for a New Day

by Sarah Pinsker · 2019 · Science Fiction

Key themes

Live music as the thing worth fighting for — when everything moves online
A pandemic and a ban on gatherings, written before COVID-19
The musician who won't stop performing live — and the scout drawn to her

About this book

In a near-future America where mass gatherings have been banned after a wave of attacks and a pandemic, a touring musician who refuses to stop performing live encounters a young scout for a tech company that has built an empire on virtual concerts. Pinsker's Nebula Award-winning novel — written before COVID-19 but eerily predictive — is about live music, isolation and what gets lost when everything moves online.

Published in 2019, A Song for a New Day won the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 2020 — just as the COVID-19 pandemic began, making its premise about banned gatherings suddenly, uncomfortably topical. Pinsker is also a musician and has described the novel as growing from her own experience of touring.

Discussion questions

The novel's premise — mass gatherings banned after attacks and a pandemic — was written before COVID-19 and became eerily predictive. How does reading it after 2020 change the experience — does the foresight feel uncanny, or does the novel's actual concerns turn out to be about something else entirely?
Luce, the touring musician, insists on performing live even when it's illegal and dangerous. How does Pinsker develop this commitment — as principle, as identity, or as something the novel interrogates?
Rosemary, the corporate scout, represents the alternative — a world where all music has moved to virtual platforms controlled by a single company. How does Pinsker develop the relationship between these two characters and what each represents?
The novel is fundamentally about what gets lost when human connection moves online — even when the online version is technically superior in some ways. How does Pinsker make this argument through character and plot rather than simply stating it?
A Song for a New Day won the Nebula Award. What does it do that earns this recognition — and what does its central concern (live music, physical gathering, human presence) say about what science fiction can illuminate about the present even when imagining the future?