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A review by emtees
A Thousand Perfect Notes by C.G. Drews
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
This was a brutal read. A Thousand Perfect Notes is a story of physical and emotional abuse and it doesn’t skimp at all on the difficult details. It is ultimately a hopeful story, but thanks to the close attention paid to the emotional state of the main character, even the ending is bittersweet.
Beck is the son of the Maestro, a once-brilliant pianist who lost her career to illness and has spent the years since forcing her son to follow in her wake, demanding that he spend every free minute practicing and refusing to allow anything else in his life to matter - not school, not friends, not even the basics of living like decent food or clothing. Beck knows he isn’t allowed things like that; if he takes a night off from practice or dares to bring anyone into his life, his mother will erupt into violence. Beck has the bruises and scars to prove it. Worse, she might turn on his little sister Joey, the one bright spot in Beck’s life. So Beck spends his days attempting to perfect his mother’s favorite classical pieces, all the while knowing he will never live up to her impossible standard not matter how much he longs for her praise. The irony is that Beck actually loves music - he has endless songs in his head and longs to compose them - but that’s not the music his mother cares about. Then Beck meets August, a quirky classmate who has a thing for rescuing those who need it, whether that’s stray dogs or sad boys. August pushes her way into Beck’s life despite his attempts to be as off-putting as possible, and Beck slowly begins to hope that she actually cares about him as more than a charity case. But right when it seems like life might have at least one small source of happiness, the Maestro tells Beck that she is going to make him play for his uncle Jan, the famed pianist and composer, and if he does well, he will be shipped off to Germany to study music. Which leaves Beck with two options, both terrible: fail, and risk his mother’s wrath, or succeed and lose the few things in life that matter.
Like I said, this book doesn’t skimp on the harsh details of Beck’s life, whether it’s the cruel insults his mother slings at him or her violent assaults. The book is told entirely from his perspective and it is an immersive one, with Drews using a broken-up prose style to convey Beck’s state of mind. Beck is a kid who has been thoroughly beaten down and it shows, which makes the moments when people show interest or care for him hit the reader as hard as they hit him. For a long time, I wasn’t sure Beck was even a good musician, so thoroughly had his mother convinced him that he was a failure, so the moments when people praised him felt powerful. And his relationship with August was something delicate and beautiful amid all the brutality. But ultimately this book was really about the twisted relationship between Beck and his mother. Drews did a good job of making the Maestro into a real person, with her own tragedy and sadness, without ever justifying her treatment of her children.
My only issues with this book came from the brief moments when it slipped into melodrama. For the most part, despite how horrible Beck’s life was, it felt realistic, from the way the adults around him ignored what was happening to him or felt helpless to do anything to the way something ordinary like a first kiss could loom so large even for someone with such an abnormal life. But there were occasional moments when the story lost track of that realism. Major spoilers for the ending:The biggest one for me was the bit about Beck’s name. For most of the story, Beck refuses to let anyone call him by his real name, which we eventually learn is Beethoven. That’s obviously a name most teenage boys would be embarrassed about, but Beck also feels like it’s a label he can never live up to, a way of emphasizing his mediocrity by comparing it to genius. Which is fine. But then at the end of the book, in her last attack on him, the Maestro ends up badly damaging Beck’s ears, leaving him seriously hearing impaired. Not only is there no time to let the seriousness of these consequences land - there is only one chapter of the story left after Beck loses his hearing - but if you know the story of the real Beethoven, you’re left with the sense that Drews kept Beck’s name a secret to avoid foreshadowing his fate. Which felt… silly, in a way that didn’t fit with the rest of the book.
Beck is the son of the Maestro, a once-brilliant pianist who lost her career to illness and has spent the years since forcing her son to follow in her wake, demanding that he spend every free minute practicing and refusing to allow anything else in his life to matter - not school, not friends, not even the basics of living like decent food or clothing. Beck knows he isn’t allowed things like that; if he takes a night off from practice or dares to bring anyone into his life, his mother will erupt into violence. Beck has the bruises and scars to prove it. Worse, she might turn on his little sister Joey, the one bright spot in Beck’s life. So Beck spends his days attempting to perfect his mother’s favorite classical pieces, all the while knowing he will never live up to her impossible standard not matter how much he longs for her praise. The irony is that Beck actually loves music - he has endless songs in his head and longs to compose them - but that’s not the music his mother cares about. Then Beck meets August, a quirky classmate who has a thing for rescuing those who need it, whether that’s stray dogs or sad boys. August pushes her way into Beck’s life despite his attempts to be as off-putting as possible, and Beck slowly begins to hope that she actually cares about him as more than a charity case. But right when it seems like life might have at least one small source of happiness, the Maestro tells Beck that she is going to make him play for his uncle Jan, the famed pianist and composer, and if he does well, he will be shipped off to Germany to study music. Which leaves Beck with two options, both terrible: fail, and risk his mother’s wrath, or succeed and lose the few things in life that matter.
Like I said, this book doesn’t skimp on the harsh details of Beck’s life, whether it’s the cruel insults his mother slings at him or her violent assaults. The book is told entirely from his perspective and it is an immersive one, with Drews using a broken-up prose style to convey Beck’s state of mind. Beck is a kid who has been thoroughly beaten down and it shows, which makes the moments when people show interest or care for him hit the reader as hard as they hit him. For a long time, I wasn’t sure Beck was even a good musician, so thoroughly had his mother convinced him that he was a failure, so the moments when people praised him felt powerful. And his relationship with August was something delicate and beautiful amid all the brutality. But ultimately this book was really about the twisted relationship between Beck and his mother. Drews did a good job of making the Maestro into a real person, with her own tragedy and sadness, without ever justifying her treatment of her children.
My only issues with this book came from the brief moments when it slipped into melodrama. For the most part, despite how horrible Beck’s life was, it felt realistic, from the way the adults around him ignored what was happening to him or felt helpless to do anything to the way something ordinary like a first kiss could loom so large even for someone with such an abnormal life. But there were occasional moments when the story lost track of that realism. Major spoilers for the ending:
Content Warnings
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Child abuse, and Gaslighting
The main plot revolves around an abusive parent-child relationship that includes physical abuse, emotional abuse, and severe neglect. All the abuse is described in detail.