5 HUGE stars for the latest Brendan Slocumb book. More review later as I still sit and revel in this gorgeous story!

I have loved this authors two other books but this one just really didn’t work for me. I loved the beginning with Curtis and being a prodigy but once we went into witness protection I had a really hard time staying engaged. I wanted to love this and only liked it.

While different than this author's other books, The Dark Maestro is still a very enjoyable and entertaining read. It evoked a lot of emotion for Curtis and the sacrifices he has to make because of his father's poor decisions. In the end, his dad does his best to make things right and in my opinion that helped to redeem his character. Curtis's family is dysfunctional, but yet I still enjoyed the characters. This book is a love letter to comics while exposing the lengths some people will go through to make money. The Author's note is honest and transparent about his inspiration for this book- and may be helpful to read at the beginning (although it contains a mild spoiler).

Thanks to NetGalley and Doubleday Books | Doubleday for a digital ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Having read the other books by this author I was looking forward to reading The Dark Maestro. This book is somewhat far fetched. It doesn't seem to be a real story.
This is the story of a cello prodigy, his father and step mother all living in the worst part of Washington D.C. It goes on as how the father screws up everyone's lives and they have to join the Witness Protection Program. The characters are vividly portrayed and well written.
I liked the core of the story with Curtis, the cello prodigy, the black market organ selling and kidnapping but the rest of the story took a dark turn and was just too weird. This story is divided into 5 parts with the first part being the most believable and enjoyable. The middle parts just get too bogged down and slow. The last part is the part that is just not very believable with all the comic book characters and how Zippy, Curtis and Larissa take matters into their own hands.
Read the author's first two books before reading this one.

Thank you to NetGalley and Doubleday Books for the ARC. Brendan Slocumb is an automatic read author for me. This is his third book and it did not disappoint. This wasn’t typical from his last books but I enjoyed every minute of it. If you haven’t read any of his previous books put them on your list now!!!

The Violin Conspiracy and Symphony of Secrets are two of my all-time favorites, and I recommend them to everyone who will listen, so I was really excited to get my hands on this one.

It honestly pains me to say this, but this one just didn’t land for me. I appreciated the core of the story and understood the events as they unfolded, but it didn’t feel very engaging. I had a hard time getting through it and never really connected with the characters enough to feel invested in what happened to them. I kept reading because I love the author’s previous work and was hoping it would pick up again, especially since I really enjoyed the beginning—but unfortunately, it never quite got back to that feeling for me.

I’m a superhero fan, so I didn’t mind that element in theory, but it went a bit deeper into that world than I expected. I understood why it mattered to the character, it just didn’t totally work for me in execution. That said, the writing itself is still great—it just came down to the plot not being a fit for my taste. I’d still recommend it to readers who are more into that genre.

I also really appreciated the honesty and transparency in the Author’s Note. It’s worth the read and honestly might have been helpful to include before the prologue, just to give returning readers some added context beforehand.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC of this upcoming book! I absolutely love everything I've read from this author. I love how well he writes musical elements intertwined with a fascinating storylines. This one, though still very enjoyable wasn't my favorite of his. I loved the beginning and the ending of the book but the middle dragged for me. I don't want to say too much about it due to spoilers but the plot was a little bit stagnate in the middle third. Though the author used the comic book storyline to amp things up a little bit I found the comic book plots to be a little dull. I feel like the book either needed full on comic book depictions during this part or to do less about writing out the comic book plots in general. I really enjoyed the action at the end third of the book. All things considered it was still an enjoyable read with lots of memorable moments and characters.

I loved this book! The characters were well-written, and I could really picture the action and settings as they were happening. I loved the way the story followed the plot line of a superhero comic. It was so suspenseful and fun to read!

Thank you to #NetGalley and #Doubleday for the DRC of #TheDarkMaestro. The opinions expressed here are entirely my own.

With his debut novel "The Violin Conspiracy", Brenda Slocumb created the genre mash-up of musical arts/thriller/mystery. The Dark Maestro stretches it into new territory.

Curtis is a cello prodigy, being raised by his drug-dealing dad in the projects of DC. When Curtis is on the brink of stardom, his family is taken into protective custody so his dad can help the FBI break up a blackmarket organ harvesting operation. When the FBI fails to capture the kingpin behind the whole operation, the Dark Maestro emerges as Curtis and his family take matters into their own hands.

The back half of this story felt was a little far-fetched, but I was already in love with the characters so I went along for the ride. Not my favorite of Slocumb's novels, but still an enjoyable read.

I am a huge fan of Brendan Slocumb and his new novel lives up to the hype! This has everything I come to look for in a Slocumb work - a main character we love to root for, a mystery I can't solve, and a way of teaching empathy that I rarely come across with other authors.

The Dark Maestro follows Curtis through a tumultuous childhood and into an even less stable adulthood as he navigates his passion and talent for music. Though we love Curtis as soon as we meet him, I also greatly enjoyed experiencing the book through Larissa's POV - we get to learn a lot from her, and I had a great time moving through the story with her quick wit.

My only wish for this book would be to experience a tiny bit more of the music from Curtis himself. In his previous two novels, I feel like we really got to experience the main character actually creating and performing a lot of music, and the entire story felt music-centric. When Curtis is ripped away from his life, the reader is also a bit separated from a musical plot line. The rest of the story really lacks any connection to music and Curtis's cello, especially in comparison to The Violin Conspiracy and Symphony of Secrets. This was only slightly resolved by the sub-plot of the Dark Maestro comic.

Big thanks to Brendan Slocumb, Doubleday, and NetGalley for a copy of this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was a big fan of Brendan Slocumb's first two books. This one, not so much. Dark Maestro starts strong. Curtis is making his debut solo appearance with the New York Philharmonic. A young black man, raised in the DC projects, with a criminal father, he defied all expectations. But at the end of the performance, the FBI whisks him away into hiding. His father has been involved with a major criminal organization and when caught, provided evidence requiring the family to enter WITSEC as the major kingpins were never caught. Slocum does a great job painting the whole WITSEC process and the way it destroys Curtis’s planned life. Larissa, his dad’s girlfriend, enlists Curtis’s help to start creating YouTube comics and that takes off but puts them at risk. It started going off the rails for me when the three of them decided they could find the kingpins the FBI had failed to find. One’s enjoyment of this book will depend on your desire to have the plot be at all believable. I’m one who wants my stories somewhat mired in the possible. Fans of thrillers, willing to totally suspend belief, will probably enjoy this more.
I did find the three main characters all well done and believable. They were easy to envision.
The Author’s Note is an intricate part of the story and should not be missed.
My thanks to Netgalley and Doubleday Books for an advance copy of this book.

Curtis Wilson is growing up in Washington, D.C. His father, Zippy, deals drugs, and his mother is absent from his life. He has been raised primarily by Larissa, his father's on-and-off girlfriend. Curtis loves reading comic books and playing the cello. Despite everything working against him, he is a true musical prodigy. Just as things start looking promising for Curtis, his father's illegal activities put his future in jeopardy. After deciding to cooperate with the FBI, the family has to go on the run from a group of merciless criminals. Can a Black cello virtuoso remain unnoticed? And how can Curtis integrate his passion for comic books during his time in hiding? It's time to create The Dark Maestro. 

Author Brendan Slocumb is also a violinist and educator. In The Dark Maestro, he combines his musical expertise and interest in comic books into a fast-paced thriller that follows a family's quest to reclaim their lives. Curtis is a great character. While some parts of the plot require a suspension of disbelief, it doesn't detract from the enjoyment of this creative story.

I was a big fan of Slocumb's first two novels and was very excited to read this one.

I was so excited to read this because I absolutely loved both The Violin Conspiracy and Symphony of Secrets! This was quite a departure from Brendan Slocumb's first two books though, and the shift didn't quite work for me.

The book is split into five parts, and the first was my favorite. I loved following Curtis's journey to becoming a young comic book-loving cello prodigy with the backdrop of his father Zippy and his father's girlfriend Larissa's hustle and grind lifestyles. The subsequent parts built up the tension as Zippy's work caught up to him and the family had to enter witness protection. Unfortunately, the last two parts took the story in a hard-right turn which verged on unbelievable and absurd at times.

Still, I appreciate the idea and loved that the author tried to marry his two lifelong passions, music and comic books, into one story.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review!

Fans of Brendan Slocumb will not be disappointed with The Dark Maestro. While it has a slightly different feel than his other books, I think he wrote the book he really wanted to write, and his author’s note helps that all make sense! We still get plenty of music and I loved that the focus was on the main character’s relationship with his father. It releases next month so be on the look out for The Dark Maestro!
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the advanced copy in exchange for my review.

Curtis Wilson, his father Zippy, and surrogate mother Larissa live in the Washington DC projects. Curtis receives a cello through a charitable organization when he is 5 years old, and it changes his life. He immerses himself into practicing his cello, attends Julliard, and his goal is to become a cello soloist with major orchestras. He is so close to achieving his goal when his family's life comes crashing down due to his father's drug dealing. His life is forever changed and his family is on the run.

I have read both of Brendan Slocumb's other books and love how they are infused with classical music and musicians, a theme which is continued in this book. In addition, this novel brings in superheros, comics and animated videos, juxtaposing them with both classical music and rap. The chapters alternate between the three main characters - Curtis, Zippy and Larissa - each bringing their own point of view and enhancing the development of each character. The themes of class struggle, the importance of family, commitment, haves and have-nots, goals and success are all addressed. Overall, quite a page-turner!

Many thanks to NetGalley and Doubleday for an advanced reader copy to review in exchange for an honest opinion. This book will be published May 13, 2025.

Read more of my reviews at https://thegoodreader13.blogspot.com/.

I was very excited to read Brendan Slocumb’s third book, thank you NetGalley! Although it is very different in tone and in plot from his first two books, it was a great book that explored some new themes. Truly a family drama, it's about a Cellist prodigy coming from the gritty, drug ridden part of DC, and you get a tight knit family that has each other’s backs. The father, Zippy, a drug dealer who has set his sights on better things, and a step mom, Larissa, who works with battered women. Of course there is also Curtis, the child prodigy who loves his cello so much and I wish my child loved to practice as much as he does! As the plot progresses, you can tell the author is using some fantastical and wish fulfillment storylines for his own healing, and I truly love this about the story. I also enjoyed the family dynamics and that even though they came from some tough backgrounds, they always loved each other and tried to do their best in the world. It also begs the question - if you are working for someone that seems to be too good to be true, is just doing your job enough? Or should you be asking where the underlying money comes from?

Wow. The Dark Maestro will keep you on the edge of your seat as you read to see what will happen next. The author Brendan Slocumb has combined the worlds of Classical music, rap, comic books, black market organ donation, forensic accounting, crime syndicates, and the local, state, federal, and international policing agencies into this extraordinary novel that follows music prodigy Curtis Wilson and his family as they navigate life. The story will keep you guessing until the very end. I highly recommend this book.

This was such a wild ride. Having read Brendan Slocumb’s first novel, The Violin Conspiracy, I was really excited about this. It tackled many real life issues but also eventually asks the reader to suspend disbelief. Overall I really enjoyed it so much but a star comes off because I was pretty disappointed with the ending and some of the questionable choices made by the main characters. The ending didn’t make sense to me and felt all for nothing, and some of the violent actions just did not fit the character’s at all. But beyond that it was a really great story. I will definitely get to Symphony of Secrets soon since I never got to it! Thank you to NetGalley and Doubleday for the ARC!

This book is vastly different from his previous novels which I loved. Curtis is a child prodigy on the cello. He lives in the poor part of town and dreams of making it on stage to play with symphony. His father Zippy, is a drug dealer and at first believes him always practicing is a waste of time. His boss sees Curtis on the television and now invites the family to barbecues and to perform as he is impressed with Curtis.

Curtis has trouble fitting in at school and often gets picked on. He leans into comic books as his way to escape reality. When his life gets turned upside by his father landing them in witness protection he invents his own comic hero Dark Maestro. He sets out to get his life back to performing.

His father claimed to always have his back but was rarely there for him and was hard to read about the neglect he lived with. Larissa had a heart of gold and truly loved Curtis and nurtured him.

Doubleday Books provided an early galley for review.

I have been a fan for Slocumb's novels for the past several years, so I was very excited to see the listing for his latest one. I correctly concluded that I was in for another good reading experience.

The narration bounces between the three lead characters (Curtis, Zippy and Larissa) as the story unfolds across the years. From the set-up chapters, we get a good sense of who they are, the world they are coming from, and what they do to survive in it. The story momentum builds to a fevered pitch over the last third of the novel.

As a comic book fan, I enjoyed the added touch of Curtis' reference to comics. For those in that loop, they serve as nice Easter eggs. They are more than just character-quirks as comics do tie into the plot of the story. Per his notes in the back, the author is also a big fan.

Slocumb also ties in the musical elements as this is something he knows personally from his own life. This is a signature component across all of his novels to date. There is also a bit of worldbuilding going on as a few things in this novel tie into earlier works as well, thus setting the books in a shared world.