Review: Fantastic Story of Love and Loss
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 10 17, 2013
What a beautifully written love story and you get a classical music education to boot.  I found myself looking up a few of the pieces of music to see what the characters were talking about.  This book is heavy on the classical music references, which made it even more interesting to me.Savannah Marshall is a name most know before even meeting her.  She is the daughter of musical greats and people expect nothing but the same from her.  She is a gifted flute player as she has been playing since the age of ten.  The story starts out with a seventeen year old Savannah enrolling in a prestigious Boston music school. Although classically trained, Savannah likes to mix it up when it comes to her music and has a slightly different philosophy than other classically trained musicians.  She is that good and knows it, she just doesn't know if being a professional musician is what she wants in life.Gregory Fitzgerald is a stick in the mud.  The guy has zero personality and is also a fantastic cello player and knows it.  However unlike Savannah, he is playing professionally as a career.  Gregory is also an instructor and helps out a colleague by taking over her class for a semester. He is not looking for friends or any type of romance, they are considered a distraction to his eighteen hour practice sessions.  Gregory's mission is to be the best musician possible by learning the ins and outs of music and how it's made.  He is a technical man unlike Savannah and her approach to the music.Savannah performs her piece in front of Gregory and others to be considered for the school.  She nails it and totally impresses the stiff Gregory in the process.  He is enamored with her and the more he learns about her background, the more his interest is peaked. Savannah is worldly and mature beyond her years.  Gregory sees a musical counterpart in her, however challenging she may be.The book jumps years ahead and I liked that aspect.  In the beginning Savannah was seventeen and Gregory twenty seven I think.  He is too smart of a character to risk a relationship with her then, so the jump ahead made sense.  We meet Savannah and Gregory again when she is twenty one and a student in his class.  Of course their love for music attracts them to one another, but their philosophies keep them at odds.This was a love story in the making, not an insta-love.  Gregory and Savannah admired each other from afar and didn't act on it for quite a while.  It made for a drawn out romance, however in this case I felt it worked for the characters.Try as they may, there just doesn't seem to be hope for Gregory and Savannah which is sad.  On paper they are absolutely made for each other, there is just too much in the way.  We skip ahead again, this time five years and I was shocked at where we were in their lives. From that point the book seemed predictable, but I felt there were a few twists that kept it interesting and me on my toes.This is a brilliantly written book and like I mentioned, you get a bit of a classical music appreciation along the way.