Arts 11 Entertainment illo tu thizoN `And My Shoes Keep Walking Back To You' IC athi Kamen Goldmark's delightful first novel, And My Shoes Keep Walking Back to You (Chronicle Books; $22.95), gives a backstage glimpse into the world of country music. But for Goldmark, an accomplished country and pop singer-songwriter, extensive research wasn't required. She knows firsthand the trials and tribula- tions of the music business. "It's a world I am very familiar with and it's safe territory for me," says Goldmark, who has played in numerous bands. Set mostly in Northern.California, And My Shoes Keep Walking Back To You is the story of young, talented backup singer Sarah Jean Pixlie. While touring with country music star Cindi- Lu Bender, Sarah Jean is fired. A song she's written has hit the radio airwaves and caused a sensation, and diva Cindi-Lu doesn't want the competition. Sarah Jean winds up hanging out at the Dewdrop Inn, a meeting place for an odd assortment of musi- cians, and living with her eccentric family. The novel's colorful characters include Sarah Jean's Jewish mother, Alice Cohen Pixlie, also a musician; her father, Johnny Pixlie, leader of the bar-band the Dewdrop Drifters; and Aunt Perle, her mother's bossy, nutrition-fanatic sister. Shortly after returning home, Sarah Jean discovers she's pregnant, the result of a one-night stand with a guitarist in her old band. Meanwhile, with her song nominated for country music's prestigious "Patsy" award, Sarah Jean tries putting together her own band. Along the way to stardom she meets unsavory characters and faces the challenges and the back- stabbing inherent in the music industry. Through- out, her precocious son remains an important part of her life. And no matter what occurs, she keeps on producing hits. Goldmark weaves her original songs throughout the story, including "Put Me on the Guest List to Your Heart" and "Hell on Heels." The book's characters, Goldmark says, are drawn in part from her own family. "My mother, Betty Kamen, is most like Aunt Perle," she says. "My mother has written about 20 self-published books. In fact, I got Aunt Perle's nutrition tips from my morn. That line, 'You aren't going to eat bread and drive, are you?' is something 2002 86 my mom actually said to me!" When Goldmark set out to write her novel, she automatically thought of a country-music backdrop • "The only [fictional] books about country music I had seen were mysteries," she says. "So I thought it would be nice to have band life be the texture of a novel." Goldmark's interest in country music can be traced to her childhood, although, she says with a chuckle, "I hardly lived in country-music land." She was, in fact, born in Brooklyn, N.Y., and raised on Long Island. "But I got a radio station from West Virginia on my transistor and became fasci- nated with this kind of music," notes Goldmark, who was raised in a Reform home. "You don't have to be Christian to perform or love country music." At age 14, Goldmark began attending high school-sponsored hootenanny shows, which led her to perform concerts in the park. "My firsthand, in the mid-1970s, was called El Rancho Motel," says the author, who moved to Los Angeles after earning a degree at Antioch College in Ohio. "I was in a punk-rock band called the Enchanters and eventually started recording country songs." Her jobs unrelated to music have included teacher, costume shop manager and family-planning educator. Over the years, Goldmark has played in a bevy of bands. She is perhaps best known for founding the almost all- author rock band the Rock Bottom Remainders in the early 1990s. Made up of a rotating roster of such literary notables as Maya Angelou, Stephen King, Amy Tan, Norman Mailer and Dave Barry, the group performed on the CD release Stranger Than Fiction!, rais- ing funds for the PEN Writers Special Fund. The band still puts on occasional ben- efit performances. Detroit Free Press columnist and author Mitch Albom joined the Remainders a couple of years ago. Explaining how they came together, Goldmark says, "I had been working as a media escort for publishing companies, taking authors around for interviews and book signings. "Once in a while someone would tell me how lucky I was to play in a band. It suddenly occurred to me that many authors really wanted to be in a band. "So I sent a letter to a dozen authors and asked if they would like to do this with me — and we could raise money for a good cause. Everyone said, 'Yes!"' While regularly performing with her country-rock band Train Wreck, Goldmark currently is working on a new novel. The co-author of Mid-Life Confidential, by and about the Rock Bottom Remainders, and The Great Rock & Roll Joke Book hopes that after reading And My Shoes Keep Walking Back to You, people will "go out and support their local bands" and play music themselves. "We tend to see music as something other people do," she says, "but I like it when people join in." — Alice Burdick Schweiger Kathi Kamen Goldmark speaks 8 p.m. Monday, Nov. 11, at the Jewish Community Center in West Bloomfield. She also will perform some of her songs. 1/4 N ‘ft. \ • ' ‘‘ N©; A INT C3, BM Lid cITR, amen es(jotunath Her novel's behind-the-scenes look at count)), music comes naturally to Kathi Kamen Goldmark.