A new wave of storytelling is emerging—one that mimics the rhythm, pace, and aesthetic of a music video. These are books that don’t just tell a story; they perform it. With quick cuts, lyrical language, and emotionally charged beats, such works offer a sensory experience that feels more like watching a three-minute cinematic montage than reading traditional prose. In an era shaped by short-form content, audio-visual saturation, and streaming culture, this style of writing taps into the modern reader’s subconscious, often blurring the lines between music, image, and text.
Understanding the “Music Video” Effect in Literature
What does it mean for a book to “read like a music video”? It’s more than just having a musical theme or references to pop culture. These books replicate the pacing, atmosphere, and emotional energy of visual storytelling formats. They often employ non-linear structures, sharp transitions, and hyper-visual descriptions. Authors may use staccato-like sentence structures, evocative metaphors, and rhythmic cadences that echo the rhythms of song lyrics or spoken word poetry. In these texts, mood often takes precedence over strict plot progression, mimicking the visual storytelling seen in music videos where feeling and imagery drive the narrative.
Authors Who Write with Flow and Beat
Several contemporary authors have adopted this narrative style, whether consciously or unconsciously. Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a prime example, with prose that mirrors spoken word—raw, fragmented, and emotionally rhythmic. Vuong writes in waves, each sentence cresting and crashing with poetic intensity. Similarly, Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad experiments with form and structure, including a chapter entirely told through PowerPoint slides—visual storytelling in literary disguise. Bret Easton Ellis’s Less Than Zero delivers its story in clipped, emotionally distant fragments, reminiscent of an ’80s synth-pop video in tone and detachment. These authors don’t just write words; they orchestrate them.
The Craft Behind the Rhythm
This music-video-like quality in writing is not accidental. It involves specific literary techniques aimed at evoking rhythm and flow. Sentence variation is key: short, punchy phrases create urgency, while long, flowing ones can evoke a dreamlike or melancholic mood. Repetition, often frowned upon in traditional prose, is used to mimic the chorus or looping beats of music. Additionally, some authors integrate actual lyrics, musical references, or song-like phrasing to reinforce the sonic quality of the text. Pacing also plays a crucial role—moments of rapid-fire narration are interspersed with slower, reflective passages to mimic the dynamics of a song’s rise and fall.
Notable Examples in Modern Fiction
Several contemporary novels exemplify this approach. Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid reads like a rock documentary, complete with interview transcripts that mirror behind-the-scenes footage. Sandra Cisneros’s The House on Mango Street is composed of poetic vignettes that hit like lyrical verses, painting an entire world in snapshots. If Beale Street Could Talk by James Baldwin flows like jazz, its prose steeped in rhythm and soul. And The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky reads like an indie film soundtrack, its narrative pulsing with teenage angst and emotional highs and lows. These books don’t just tell you how characters feel—they make you feel it, in tempo.
Why This Style Resonates Today
Broad trends in media consumption seem to be making their way into Howard Jacobson’s prose. Today’s readers are in the habit of reading moving (literally and emotionally) content. Attention spans these days are growing for storytelling in ways that simply insert you into the whole story. Platforms such as TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube are taking over the talking time, and the thirstiest ‘no time to do anything’ market is here, primed for it. Such books strike that quick emotional payoff while remaining, in literary depth, as dense as any text could be. They serve readers who are visually and sonically attuned, while still wanting to read. In other words, all they are are stories ready for this time, blending the past into the present to catch up with modern media consumption.