Reviews

If I can keep Hush Note’s leading guitarist, Nixon Winters, on the straight and narrow for the next six months, I’ll finally get my own band to manage—assuming we don’t kill each other first.

The egotistical, irritating rock star is fresh out of rehab, but it’s obvious his demons followed him home—and now I’m sleeping down the hall. I’ve watched him self-destruct every summer, and with album deadlines and tour dates looming, I can’t let it happen again. My career is in his hands.

But tattoos can’t cover every scar, and I’m starting to see through his trademark, irresistible charm to the damage beneath.

Everyone wants the rock star. I’m falling for the man.

If he doesn’t let me in, he’ll never break the cycle—And when these six months are up,I might be the one left broken.

The last few of Rebecca Yarros’s books has been absolutely stellar for me—tear-jerkers, heart-wrenching and unforgettable sorts that you can’t really get back to unless you want a broken heart again and again—so giving ‘Muses and Melodies’ a go seemed like a natural step to take.

The minder and the out-of-control rock star gone off the deep end isn’t a new trope, but I was eager to see what Yarros has done with this. Not having read the first two books meant going in blind, but I didn’t have any problems at all getting into Nixon’s and Zoe’s relationship. Yarros’s writing—from plot to writing style—first of all, is solid…there’s a good flow to the book, well, up until the last bit where it seemed to stutter a bit when like all newly-minted relationships run into a hole and need some digging out.

The biggest issue I faced was the usual playing up of stereotypes: the manwhore rock star with ton of issues supposedly driving such reckless and wanton behaviour (and we all know by now just how I feel about that), the stoic but committed minder who inevitably falls in love with him and gets torn down by the sheer destructive power of his refusal (or inability?) to give more than he takes. Cue the ugly separation and the angst that follow, until someone gets a revelation or comes to a realisation.

That much diminished the power of Nixon/Zoe’s connection for me, more so when Nixon’s personal crisis was handled with what felt like almost a passing glance and a gradual (and non-dramatic) return to ‘normal’. I found myself sympathising more with Zoe and the tenuous rope that she walked with Nixon and her job, wondering too many times whether Nixon was worth that much of her time and effort, more so when the plot, after hurtling through at a steady pace, came to a standstill by the conclusion. With an ending that paradoxically felt as much of a slow burn as their beginning—even though it was clearly a HEA—, ‘Muses and Melodies’ simply seemed too sedate to soar.