TAYLOR SWIFT

The publisher’s long-running biographical series takes on megastar Taylor Swift.

Sánchez Vegara breathlessly starts Swift out as a girl at home who “believed in unicorns and fairy tales” as well as “the power of songs to tell stories and change the world.” The author then traces her subject’s enchanted career from first demo recordings at age 11 to the 2022 announcement of the Eras tour. Though her early devotion to country music made her a loner at school, she was able to shake it off, winning four Grammys by the time she turned 20. Readers may find the text frustratingly vague or confusing; Sánchez Vegara notes that Swift recorded her first album for a record label “after being spotted” at a gig (by whom?). Likewise, in the backmatter, the author states that after “her masters were sold without her permission, Taylor decided to take back ownership of her art”—some parental explanation may be necessary here, too. Sánchez Vegara covers familiar ground; confirmed Swifties will discover little new here, and even young children who don’t recognize Swift will never, ever read this book more than once. Figures in Fallberg’s star-bejeweled, often lilac-tinted scenes are racially diverse; one young listener in the final campfire singalong uses a wheelchair, and another wears an eye patch.

A thinner-than-thin profile, wrapped in lavender haze and sweeter than fiction.