♡ Thank you for the free ARC, Crown Publishing and author Holly Brickley.
♡ Publication Date: 2.25.25
Synopsis
It’s a Friday night in a campus bar in Berkeley, fall of 2000, and Percy Marks is pontificating about music again. Hall and Oates is on the jukebox, and Percy—who has no talent for music, just lots of opinions about it—can’t stop herself from overanalyzing the song, indulging what she knows to be her most annoying habit. But something is different tonight. The guy beside her at the bar, fellow student Joe Morrow, is a songwriter. And he could listen to Percy talk all night. Joe asks Percy for feedback on one of his songs—and the results kick off a partnership that will span years, ignite new passions in them both, and crush their egos again and again. Is their collaboration worth its cost? Or is it holding Percy back from finding her own voice?
Thoughts
This debut novel piqued my interest since the premise vaguely reminded me of Daisy Jones and the Six and The Lightning Bottles, both of which are music-focused historical fiction romance stories. I loved the book for its atmosphere and nostalgia. It was a gritty glimpse back at the early 2000s. Although I would have enjoyed more personal growth, I enjoyed Joe and Percy’s story.
★★★☆☆