Symphony of Secrets by Brendan Slocumb

Symphony of Secrets follows Bern Hendricks, a professor, who makes a shocking discovery about the most famous American composer of all time. Determined to right history's wrongs, Bern strives to give recognition to a young Black female composer whose music was stolen and whose story was silenced.

Told using dual timelines, Slocumb builds a story of today juxtaposed against a story set in the Tin Pan Alley era of Manhattan. While the first half of the book was fairly compelling, the pace of the story picked up during the second half and the narrative became more predictable. As I continued reading, I felt less inclined to pick it up and the inevitable nature of the story became clearer. Slocumb relied more and more on telling and using clipped sentences.

However, the character of Josephine Reed, the young Black composer whose music was stolen from her in the 1920s, was fascinating. Her character was thoughtfully crafted and delicately developed over the course of the book. And while there was still plenty of room for her to be more fully fleshed out, Slocumb's own talent with writing and music clearly shines through Reed and her connection to music. In fact, the depth of understanding the silencing of Black voices, and cultural appropriation in general, could've been more fully and deeply explored if the historical fiction story had solely been told from her perspective. Additionally, her language with expressing music involved a great deal of color association, and the intricacy Slocumb could've utilized to build a more emotionally nuanced foundation might have been more effectively delivered by experiencing her world through her lens.

I received this book for free from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This affected neither my opinion of the book nor the content of my review.