Katy Simpson Smith’s Book Notes music playlist for her novel The Maltese Version

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book. Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Hanif Abdurraqib, Andrew Sean Greer, Roxane Gay, and many others. Katy Simpson Smith’s novel The Maltese Version is a compelling literary thriller immersed in the worlds of love and language. The New York Times wrote of the book: “Philosophical and disarmingly dishy . . . It’s a book that―for both its inventiveness and its many linguistic sleights of hand―can renew our faith in the playful joys and critical capacity of fiction.” In her own words, here is Katy Simpson Smith’s Book Notes music playlist for her novel The Maltese Version: Music, like literature, is a form of translation – it takes the roiling surge of feeling in the human breast and converts it into sound. I’m not a writer who listens to music as I contemplate the blank page, but I…