As someone who isn’t normally big on historical fiction, I wasn’t expecting to love this book based on the music industry of the 60’s and 70’s. I expected a romance that pulled from the romanticizing of being a touring artist, but instead got a rich story, characters, and a picture of how female artists were treated at this time.

When the headliner of a local music festival doesn’t show, Jane Quinn and her friends-turned-bandmates are tasked with performing for their largest audience yet with no preparation. Everyone expects a train wreck, but they audience quickly sees Jane for who she is: a hauntingly beautiful singer-songwriter.

While I absolutely loved this slow-burn story and how the characters all handled their grief differently, I thought the last quarter of the book couldn’t hold a candle to everything that came before it. This magnificent, descriptive writing that shared the highs and lows of touring ended up quickly putting together an international escape and one of the least satisfying endings I’ve read in a while. No major spoilers here, but I love a good bittersweet ending normally. This one just felt like they needed something to tie up all the loose ends quickly. Everything else was so well done for me that it still easily gets 4/5 stars in my book and I highly recommend it to everyone who loves music, wanted to be a musician growing up, or wonders what it would be like to be the person walking the red carpets. This is just a debut novel, and I can’t wait to see how the author’s writing develops and grows in all books to come!

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for my honest opinion.