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MY REVIEW
Quite a different book than what I usually read. A gifted pianist had a nodule on the palm, making it difficult for her to use her little finger. After 16 years of devoting to her home, she wanted to get back to concert life.
An opportunity arose and she wanted to take it. But Susannah had a lot of obstacles to surpass, including fights with husband, missed appointments, therapy for Dupuytren’s contracture that she was diagnosed with, failing her son’s wishes.
This was Susannah’s journey to achieve her dreams. But at what cost?
My first book by author Barbara Lynn Probst, I enjoyed the initial parts where she played for the audition without telling anyone. I liked her passion and talent.
The author dealt with a lot of social topics as Susannah was adopted and wanted to know the birth family along with their medical history. But they were least interested. And it affected her badly.
There was relationship identity issues where one wanted to break the wife and mother mold and the others couldn’t understand it. I liked how she still pursued her dreams.
Then came her desperation for the treatment, both real and experimental, for a slow progressive disease but which could potentially affect her career. But her husband was against it. I liked her bravery to try something new.
Emotions ebbed and flowed in the entire story likes the notes from the piano where I could understand certain facets of the main character. There was a fire burning in her, and I admired her for it. We all need that in our hearts.
But…
She lied and evaded a lot of things, instead of talking straight with the people around, including her family. Her father had episodes of memory losses, but she didn’t seem to bother much about it. She was supposed to be someone who was warm and kind, but she came across as someone who brushed all that away just to get to her dreams. I didn’t like such a facet shown. She didn’t come across as intelligent and endearing. If she had spoken straight, I would have enjoyed the book more.
There were a couple of lines which put me off her by her antiquated views, even at the age of forty. She wrongly thought her mother had been barren and hence had adopted her. And the lines below were her thoughts as quoted in the book.
She had always assumed her mother couldn’t have children. Secretly and not so secretly, she had viewed it as a defect, a missing capacity that belonged to women who were normal and whole. It made her pity and hate her mother in equal measures.
These were her thoughts about her mother’s so called ‘barrenness.’ A modern woman in our times thinking so just rubbed me raw.
The ending was quite rushed, so I couldn’t savor the change of hearts or experience the emotions of a family finding its way back to each other. The richness of music came across, but it failed to evoke my emotions. A pity!!
MY RATING
BOOK LINKS
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BOOK BLURB
What if you had a second chance at the very thing you thought you’d renounced forever? How steep a price would you be willing to pay?
Susannah’s career as a pianist has been on hold for nearly sixteen years, ever since her son was born. An adoptee who’s never forgiven her birth mother for not putting her first, Susannah vowed to put her own child first, no matter what. And she did.
But now, suddenly, she has a chance to vault into that elite tier of “chosen” musicians. There’s just one problem: somewhere along the way, she lost the power and the magic that used to be hers at the keyboard. She needs to get them back. Now.
Her quest―what her husband calls her obsession―turns out to have a cost Susannah couldn’t have anticipated. Even her hand betrays her, as Susannah learns that she has a progressive hereditary disease that’s making her fingers cramp and curl―a curse waiting in her genes, legacy of a birth family that gave her little else. As her now-or-never concert draws near, Susannah is catapulted back to memories she’s never been able to purge―and forward, to choices she never thought she would have to make.
BOOK DETAILS
Publication Date: April 2021
I received an ARC from NetGalley and the publisher, and this is my journey down its pages, straight from the heart. STRICTLY HONEST and UNBIASED.
All my reviews can be found here.
4 Responses
This one would have frustrated me too. Excellent reviewing!
Thank you so much. I agree. She was a bit too much. But DJ only I thought so. Everyone on GR gave it 5 stars. Wonder if we read the same book
I don’t like the sound of this main character. She sounds self absorbed. Fair review!
I found that odd she was adopted and hated her mother couldn’t give birth. The book has 5 stars on gr. So no idea if I read some earlier draft from NG