Review: A Thousand Perfect Notes by C G Drews

Publication date: June 7th 2018

Publisher: Orchard Books

Pages: 282

Beck hates his life. He hates his violent mother. He hates his home. Most of all, he hates the piano that his mother forces him to play hour after hour, day after day. He will never play as she did before illness ended her career and left her bitter and broken. But Beck is too scared to stand up to his mother, and tell her his true passion, which is composing his own music - because the least suggestion of rebellion on his part ends in violence.
When Beck meets August, a girl full of life, energy and laughter, love begins to awaken within him and he glimpses a way to escape his painful existence. But dare he reach for it?

Discovering one of your favourite social media bookstagrammer people is releasing their debut novel, is a bit like Christmas. But with more cake. I've followed Cait on her blog, twitter and instagram (go find her @paperfury) for some time, and her humour has always been absolutely glorious. So going into this novel I was expecting a lot. NO PRESSURE OR ANYTHING!

Luckily though, Cait's debut novel not only lived up to all my many expectations, it exceeded them thoroughly.

This is a stunningly beautiful debut novel. It's dark and beautiful, with moments of sharp humour and gut wrenching emotional punches. Her writing has a lyrical quality that weaves its spellbinding web around you, and then tightens throughout the story until at the climax I was feverishly ripping through the pages to find out how it would all end.

The characters are complex and fascinating to unravel. Beck's mother is a particular delight (read: dark and horrible but also incredibly nuanced and complex so you end up feeling super conflicted!) and I adored Joey and the relationship between her and Beck. A* for glorious sibling relationships.

This is an incredible debut, that shows a truly formidable talent at the start of what is sure to be an incredible journey. If this is the quality we get on Cait's first published work, I cannot wait to see what she gifts us with next.