Nocturnal Book Reviews

Egalley thanks to Simon & Schuster

Absolutely beautiful book!

I usually stay away from contemporary romance be that adult or YA literature, but I always make exception for books about dancers or musicians. They fascinate me.

I read this book in one go. The writing sucks you right in, the pace is breathtaking and totally engrossing.

Carmen is a very likable character who is n the verge of breaking under her mother's demands and unbearable pressure of music competition. She is a child prodigy, who toured around the world playing as a solo violinist in the most prestigious venues for years.

She also started suffering from anxiety and panic attacks few years ago. And what did her ambitious mother do? Put her on Inderal instead of helping her with the therapy.

Now, off topic - I've worked in the pharmacy mainly dealing with psychiatric hospitals and rehabs, I also wrote quite a few articles on anxiety and depression. There are a lot of wonderful therapies, like cognitive-behavioral therapy which helps dealing with anxiety. Drugs just suppress it, but the causes of your problem stay until you learn to deal with them.

So whatever Carmen's mother was doing was destroying the girl's life. Until she met her adversary and main competitor, a brilliant violinist Jeremy.

These two were wonderful for each other, snarky and paranoid in the beginning, they got together on a dare, defying Carmen's mother and with the ulterior motives on Jeremy's side.
But what Jeremy did for Carmen is showed her that she forgot the joy music brought her without her drugs, how it used to make her feel alive.

Meeting Jeremy made Carmen re-evaluate what's important and take a step towards being independent, defy her mother and her teacher, and just live.

I loved her courage, her struggle to do what's right. Jeremy was just as complicated and multi-layered. He, um-m reminded me of Alex Pettyfer in Wild Child - cocky, but nice.

I loved that these two saw music in each other, but the romance wasn't the driving force in this book, - finding one's way was.