Marlon James' new novel A Brief History of Seven Killings has enough musical references embedded in it to construct a decent soundtrack accompaniment. After all, the subject matter revolves around a fictionalized account of the assassination attempt on reggae genius Bob Marley in 1976. Section 4 of the novel is called “White Lines/Kids in America.” John Lennon, The Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, Guns 'n' Roses, Chic, and ABBA all make cameo appearances too. But the song that wedged itself into my head while reading this book was not “Buffalo Soldier,” nor “I Shot the Sheriff,” nor “Redemption Song.” In fact, my earworm du jour is not actually referenced in the book at all, although another song by the same artist makes a brief cameo in the later pages as the kind of thing the kids were going crazy for back in 1985.

“7” was a minor hit for Prince in 1992. It was the 14th track off his 14th album, the Love Symbol album that marked his transition to becoming, for a while, The Artist Formerly Known as Prince. The song opens with a ringing a capella chorus: “all 7 and we'll watch them fall/they stand in the way of love and we will smoke them all.” The lyrics continue in the grand tradition of apocalyptic texts that are simultaneously grandiose and head-scratchingly oblique, enhanced by multi-tracked vocals, finger cymbals and synthesized sitar. So who are these seven opponents to the kind of love that moves through “all space and time?” The Seven Deadly Sins? Seven Princes of Hell? Seven sinister aspects of the singer's own personality that he wishes to metaphorically slay, as the video implies? Who knows? The liner notes to The Hits 1 recount an anecdote where backup singer Jevetta Steele asked Prince what the lyrics she's just been singing really mean. The reply: “He only smiled.”

Numerology is all over both Seven Killings and “7.” Fifty-six bullets were fired at Bob Marley by eight would-be assassins; that's seven bullets each. The number seven is a lucky number, an indivisible prime. The seventh day of the week is the Sabbath, the day creation was completed and God rested. The Book of Revelation talks of seven seals to be broken on Judgment Day, the seventh releasing seven angels who dispense seven plagues upon the Earth. There are seven musical notes on the standard Western scale (the eighth note of the octave is the same as the first). Prince's birthday is June 7. Bob Marley released seven studio albums, including his masterpiece, Exodus, in 1977.

Fundamentally, numerology is about noticing repeating patterns and motifs and infusing them with meaning. And speaking of meaning, one great thing about apocalyptic visions is that they can be interpreted in any direction you like. Make a convincing argument, and your interpretation might be the one that catches on; reader-response theory in real time. The multiplication of meanings in “7” make it a perfect conceptual soundtrack to Seven Killings, a sprawling and complex work that challenges the reader to make sense of its interlocking narratives and overlapping characters. No one narrative and no one interpretation will suffice to contain this sprawl, and that's a feature not a bug.

The other great thing about apocalyptic visions is that after the cataclysms, we are promised a new and better world. After the plagues and the rivers of blood, “there will be a new city with streets of gold,” Heaven on Earth, for all eternity. For all the violence and horror of this world – detailed without quarter in Seven Killings – the promise of something better, a permanent revolution, can sustain us. Seven Killings chronicles a moment in Jamaican history when this fragile promise inspired big changes – not all of them for the better, and none of them predictable. The result was hardly a utopia, to be sure. Seven Killings is not as optimistic as the song. It reminds us that disruption is more than a business buzzword, and that the status quo has its own agenda as well. But hope remains unkillable, even as meanings shift. A lot more than seven killings occur in Seven Killings, but in the end those who seemed invincible, we watch them fall, while some of those who seemed most vulnerable find novel ways to survive. The Artist Formerly Known as Prince left his label, regained control of his master recordings and became Prince once more.