Heartbreak Is the National Anthem: How Taylor Swift Reinvented Pop Music

Music journalist Sheffield (Turn Around Bright Eyes) offers a spirited tribute to “the messiest and most fascinating figure in pop music.” A fan of Taylor Swift since hearing “Our Song” in the summer of 2007, Sheffield documents her entry into the music industry at 11, her move to Nashville at 13, her high school “outcast days,” and the release of her eponymous debut album in 2006. Sheffield also charts Swift’s stylistic shifts from 2012’s Red (“the gaudiest mega-pop manifesto”) to the “stark goth-folk sound” and “brooding ballads” of 2020’s Folklore. He pins the key to Swift’s fame on her ability to verbalize the “melodramatic love and explosive flings and rude interruptions” of teenage girlhood, even as she manages to keep “her deepest mysteries to herself.” Readers will revel in the unrestrained delight with which Sheffield captures his subject, mixing a fan’s exuberance with a music critic’s nuanced analysis. Swifties won’t be able to put this down. (Nov.)