Thank you so much to Macmillan Audio for the complimentary ALC!
Thank you so much to St Martin's Press for the gifted book!

This book will be out on June 17th.

I don't feel like I am in the minority when I say that I love ABBA! Their music is just so much fun and are an earworm. When I saw that there was an opportunity to learn more about the band, I jumped on it!

I felt that the structure of the book was different than what I was expecting. I thought the book was going to be the beginning of the band, height of fame and then after they disbanded. Though the beginning of the book did focus on the start of the band specifically on Benny and Bjorn. The story didn't seem to have any flow and would bounce from one topic to another.

I was really looking forward to learning about the band during the height of the band's fame but unfortunately I did not get there. I was hoping that the book would dive into what it was like to be the biggest band and what life was like for the group. The band members were married to one another - where is the drama from that in the book?! The book did mention how they were pretty much not in the tabloid or known for being wild as they were older with children.

The book mostly focused on the genius of the music and how it was a part of pop culture which I did enjoy. Who knew that so many punk & alternative acts loved Abba! Of course I loved the section on A*Teens who were popular when I was a tween girl. And they did talk about the movie success as well as Broadway. I was also happy to see that the Swedish pop explosion of the later 90s was discussed as even now I am still fascinated by the music that comes from there.

I read this book majority with the audiobook and I thought the narrator Ian Hallard was fine. I thought he did a great job with all the different Swedish names and terminology. The audio is just over 10 hours long and I was able to complete in 2 days so it was easily digestible.

Though I did enjoy this, I just wanted more Abba.


*I do not rate Non Fiction books.*