Debbie B discovered I have a thing for YA fiction and mentioned of hers from high school had just written a YA book. I asked her the title, discovered it was a self published book so it wouldn’t be available at my library. I waited about 30 seconds and said what the hell, I’ll just buy it. And I did.
The Practice Room arrived shortly before my trip to California. I figured it would be an easy airport (and hotel room) read so I took it with me. Unfortunately, I also took Joe Hill with me – and I was super busy while I was there and pretty much just slept when I wasn’t working. So… I didn’t even pick the darn thing up until this week and I read it pretty quickly – not as quickly as I expected because it wasn’t super compelling.
It was kind of cute and was an interesting way to teach kids about music. In fact, with some polishing, it could be a really good way to teach kids about music. “Music-morphing” into another world is a good concept for a YA book, though I think this is really more middle grade fiction than YA. It just needs a wee bit more personality and a good editor to boost it along.