Monday, February 15, 2016

The Story Continues....

Born in Oakland, CA, Kathy Parsons has been an independent piano teacher since early 1981. Kathy lived in the San Francisco Bay Area until mid-2007 when she relocated to Florence, OR (on the central Oregon Coast). She continues to teach locally and via the internet in addition to reviewing many recordings and interviewing artists for her website, MainlyPiano.com, and editing new sheet music. I am so pleased to find her review of my novel, The Music of Us.


"The Music of Us" is the third installment of Uvi Poznansky's series, "Still Life With Memories." The first two volumes were originally released as one book and told the story of Ben, Lenny (Ben's father), and Anita, Lenny's much younger new wife. In that book, Natasha was Lenny's ex-wife and was institutionalized for early-onset Alzheimer's. As I remember, her piano was actually more prominent in the story than she was, but her spirit was always present in a shadowy, mysterious way. "The Music of Us" begins in the early 1970's and looks back at the story of Lenny's and Natasha's meeting, early relationship, and eventual marriage; the bulk of the story is about their courtship. Natasha was a young concert pianist who met Lenny when she performed for the troops on the base where he was stationed during WWII. "The Music of Us" is told from Lenny's point of view, an interesting contrast to the earlier book which was told with two different voices and took place many years later when Ben (Lenny and Natasha's son) was an adult. In many ways, it's the story of a difficult but somewhat less complicated time when heartfelt letters were exchanged and it was often weeks or even months between communications. It's a good story and well-told. I would expect that the next volume will be told from Natasha's point of view, and I look forward to getting to know her better.

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