I Wish You Could Hear the Song I'm Listening To As I Write This...

I Wish You Could Hear the Song I'm Listening to As I Write This... explores the classic tale of adolescent rebellion but it is more complex. How do young people deal with the apparent universal desire for attention and fame? Social media today has made the fulfillment of this desire accessible to more people. But this work explores this issue very personally and deeply. When the young narrator asks her grandmother why is everyone in their family so eager to perform as a musician, the grandmother challenges her by stating, “Who in this world doesn’t want to be famous? Who would shy away from attention, notoriety? Who would want to hide their talent?” The narrator— a talented singer who prefers to sing only for her own enjoyment—decides she would. Her confrontation with what is expected of her and her own struggle to understand why and how she is different is the hub of this novella.

Born in Medellin in 1998, Espinal Solano wrote this novella for a youth literary contest while she was in high school in 2016. She did not win the competition, but her work was discovered and quickly published by Editorial Angosta. Written in the first person, the semi-autobiographical coming-of-age story introduces us to a young woman who has grown up in a musical family. Her mother and grandmother are professional singers. There is not one family member who is not an amateur, semi-professional or professional vocalist, instrumentalist or both.