The Dark Violinist follows the story of Sebastian, an extraordinarily talented violinist who can play pieces that even the masters can't play; and is the son of an equally extraordinary violinist, Santiago Ramirez. Sebastian is also plagued by dark visions and is seen as someone with mental health issues. He gets taken under the wing of a renowned conductor, Dr. Brownstone, trying to find new talent that he can use against his nemesis, Jay Nygaard. But there is a lot more going on under the surface that are yet to be revealed.

Chambers has a great knack for making you feel what the character's are feeling through one sentence alone. It is hard to write about the sound of music, but I felt that Chambers did this well.

However, there were some sentences that I had to read a few times to get the sentiment; I felt like they could've been reworded a bit better. There were times when I felt like a little more description may have helped make a scene more profound or spooky. I feel as though it would've helped if Chambers explained things a little more regarding what was happening with Seb and how things had passed over to him from his father. These things didn't affect my ability to enjoy this book though and there were many comical little quips that I liked.

There is a nice amount of diversity in this book which I appreciated, and of course it revolves around a person with perceived mental health issues, but there is also a character who has half a hand. There is a little bit of spiciness too, but not overly so, so there's no drawn out, very graphic descriptions which aren't to my taste.

I felt as though the characters behaved mostly as you would expect them to in light of the situations they were in, and was true to their personality. They felt well built and believable, and there were a couple of characters that I particularly liked (…. Nancy basically, though I did like Mikhaila too).

As you get closer to the end, there's a strong sense of foreboding, like there's a fire brewing (Sebastian felt like a fireball waiting to explode) and you don't know what or who will burn, which made the book more exciting to read and I found it hard to put down!

Sebastian's character sort of changed as the book progressed, becoming someone who could be quite callous and abrasive. He also became dead set on becoming an amazing and famous violinist, but although Sebastian played the violin for a while before meeting Brownstone, it wasn't made obvious from the get go that his life long dream was to become a super famous musician.

On the other hand, I appreciated that the book went its own way; it didn't follow loads of the usual tropes and the story sometimes went in a direction I couldn't have predicted which I enjoyed. I love an original story!

So, if you're a lover of classical music, gothic horrors and deals with the devil, as well as forbidden romance and strong characters, give this book a try!

I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout and am voluntarily leaving a review. Due to be published in May 2024.

Content Warnings

Brother by Ania Ahlborn

Go to review page

challenging dark sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

Content Warnings

What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher

Go to review page

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

One for the Blackbird, One for the Crow by Olivia Hawker

Go to review page

Did not finish book. Stopped at 11%.

This book is beautifully written but it's overly descriptive. Everything is just really slow for me.

My Family Can Kiss My Ass: How to Deal with Toxic, Messy, Narcissistic Family Members by Chanel Jasmin Clark

Go to review page

funny reflective fast-paced

2.0

I go into every book with the mentality that they automatically get 5 stars and that rating fluctuates throughout my reading. This book quickly went down to a 4, a 3, a 2, a 2.5 and then finally a 2.

The cause of the first lost star, which isn't mentioned in the blurb, is that the author is religious and most of the book is her preaching about God and how he can fix your problems. As an atheist, I prefer to avoid religious books, especially ones that preach too much, so I don't appreciate this being left out of the blurb.

The cause of the second lost star is that the book is heavily anecdotal with no credible sources of information. It felt like I was reading the author's diary or autobiography. I understand that for the author to understand narcissists, they're likely going to have personal experience but just under half way through, her chapters lose structure and is made up of a formula of 'The narcissist will do this to you - I know this because this and this happened to me - so yeah, that's the fact, don't contact them'.

That leads me onto the loss of the third star. Her main advice is: go no contact. Whilst this is legitimate advice for dealing with narcissistic family members, when the rest of the book is full of anecdotes and no new or scientific information, it simply becomes a needlessly stretched out passage of text that reads 'go no contact' in as many possible ways.
The author even has one chapter that says to avoid holidays and vacations with toxic family, then one immediately after saying to avoid family functions, then another chapter saying to avoid funerals. To me, this read as the same thing stretched over three chapters.

It went down to 2 as the book continued to go down the route of 'the narcissist will do this one specific thing to you. I know this because my mum did it to me (followed by another long diary entry)'.

It had a small 0.5 boost when there were some comical sentences thrown in the ever increasingly ranty, sweary, downward spiral of the end of the book; and also when the author said that the church is toxic as hell and won't help you heal.

It went back down to 2 when the author displayed her (likely religion caused) homophobia in the second to last chapter. Then the last chapter was almost entirely focused on the church and God, referring to family members as demonic and even included burning sage, spraying walls with Florida water (???) and mopping your floors with ammonia? I think this is good evidence of how unhinged and unstructured the book becomes the further you read.

What kept this book at a 2 was that, at least at the beginning of the book, the writing started off quite good. She was using official terminology, providing examples that were contained and there were a couple of nuggets of information I found affirming. Throw in some witty or comical sentences and there was a recipe here for a decent and helpful book. Unfortunately, it wasn't delivered.

More...

hannxm's reviews 65 reviews

hannxm's reviews
65 reviews