The Violin Conspiracy by Brendan Slocumb *****

The Violin Conspiracy (debut novel) by Brendan Slocumb is the story of Ray McMillian, an underprivileged violin genius: how he inherits a Stradivarius violin, gets accepted to the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, and has his violin stolen. Ray’s story is an emotional roller coaster making this a book that you can’t put down. Highly recommended.

In addition to rags-to-riches and the violin heist, the author (a violinist himself) displays the joy of playing and performing classical music. Ray practices for hours to learn each piece in his muscle memory and then infuses his performance with the emotions and imagery he feels.

The final theme is racism. Ray is black and faces racism at every turn. People don’t believe he can play classical music. Cops arrest him believing he has stolen the violin.

The author has a message, but it doesn’t get in the way of a thrilling story.

“Musicians of color, however, are severely underrepresented in the classical music world—and that’s one of the reasons I wanted to write this book. Look up the statistics: 1.8 percent of musicians performing in classical symphonies are Black; 12 percent are people of color. But for me, day to day, performance by performance, it wasn’t about being a statistic: it was about trying to live my life and play the music that I loved, and often being stymied for reasons that seem, even now, incomprehensible.”

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