Author: Justin Courter
Publication Date:
July 16, 2024Format: (paperback)
ISBN: 978-1-952085-27-7
Length: 365 pages
Cadenza is the story of a woman’s drive to succeed and overcome her physical and emotional scars. It’s a tale of relentless ambition, dark secrets, and the lengths to which the human mind will go.
At the age of seven, Jennifer Coleman is severely burned in a house fire that kills her sister. Despite the barriers of her scarred face and her tragic childhood, she reaches the pinnacle of achievement as a classical concert pianist, but at a deep psychological cost.
During Jennifer’s meteoric rise as a virtuoso pianist, her disfigurement takes on mythic proportions. She is internationally loved and admired, but unable to love herself. At a pivotal point in her career, she meets an extraordinarily creative, suicidal musician named Felix, who challenges Jennifer's beliefs and falls deeply in love with her. Will Jennifer be able to learn from Felix’s example before she self-destructs?
Cadenza: a novel
“Cadenza is symphonic. It succeeds not only as an absorbing, psychologically nuanced novel, but also as a tragic fable of ambition and virtuosity. Its extraordinary heroine offers profound truths about purpose, memory, trauma, and the transcendent powers of art and love.”
—Lauren Acampora, author of The Hundred Waters
“An engrossing epic of artistic triumphs and personal disasters, unflinching in its depiction of scars both physical and emotional, Cadenza reads like a piano concerto playing in a house on fire.”
—Brett Marie, author of The Upsetter Blog
Justin Courter’s novels include Skunk: A Love Story and The Heart of It All. His work has appeared in The Literary Review, Poetry East, Pleiades, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, American Book Review, and many other publications. He lives in New York City. Visit his website: www.justincourter.com
