2.5 stars, rounded up because music.
So.
I truly appreciate what the author was trying to do. I love stories about music and musicians and the idea that this was a fictionalized version of Wolfgang and Nannerl Mozart (complete with themes of feminism woven throughout) was immediately intriguing to me.
There were things I enjoyed about this book and this I didn’t find as successful. Namely, I wasn’t excited at all about the fantastical Kingdom of Back. I wanted to be. I love fantasy, and the idea of portal fantasy is so compelling, but I don’t seem to enjoy them as much as I expect to. I’m not sure why. The same thing goes for most fae stories. They sound really fun and engaging, and then I end up not enjoying them.
I did like the historical aspect of this, and the sections that focused on music and composing, but even then there was something that just didn’t quite work for me. I think the book might’ve been more successful if the author had just used the Mozart siblings as inspiration and created an entirely fictionalized set of characters.

I feel like this book is mid-marketed as Young Adult. In reality, it reads much better as a middle grade book, especially since the characters are so young through most of it. The conflict also felt very juvenile as far as the mini quests she had to do throughout the fantastical part of the book. She’s never met with much resistance and is easily able to complete her tasks.


This last thing is going to seem very nitpicky, and it doesn’t have any bearing on my rating, but I wanted to mention it in case anyone is interested in the audiobook. More often than not, I’m neutral about audiobooks. There are occasions where I think that the audiobook experience is exceptional (looking at you Illuminae Files and The Diviners) and there are definitely voice actors who I just don’t enjoy (the actor who did the Miss Peregrine books and many others...something about his voice just grated on my nerves), but usually my opinion is middle of the road.
With KOB, I actually felt like the audiobook experience took me out of the story at times. The story takes place in Austria and throughout Europe. The Mozarts live in Austria...and the voice actor is American. There is no attempt made to use any sort of vaguely European accent, much less Austrian, and all her males characters sound exactly the same and it’s BAD.
I understand that in movies oftentimes the actors will default to British accents even if the movie takes place in France or Belgium or whatnot, but at least that’s on the same continent! American though? It made me wonder if the people producing the audiobook had even read it...but if things like that don’t bother you, feel free to ignore these past few paragraphs and listen away