Title: A Song for a New Day
Author: Sarah Pinsker
Publisher: Penguin 2019
Genre: Science Fiction
Pages: 384
Rating: 3/5 stars
Reading Challenges: COYER; Quarter of a Century - 2019
Where I Got It: Amazon Kindle
In the Before, when the government didn't prohibit large public gatherings, Luce Cannon was on top of the world. One of her songs had just taken off and she was on her way to becoming a star. Now, in the After, terror attacks and deadly viruses have led the government to ban concerts, and Luce's connection to the world--her music, her purpose—is closed off forever. She does what she has to do: she performs in illegal concerts to a small but passionate community, always evading the law.
Rosemary Laws barely remembers the Before times. She spends her days in Hoodspace, helping customers order all of their goods online for drone delivery—no physical contact with humans needed. By lucky chance, she finds a new job and a new calling: discover amazing musicians and bring their concerts to everyone via virtual reality. The only catch is that she'll have to do something she's never done before and go out in public. Find the illegal concerts and bring musicians into the limelight they deserve. But when she sees how the world could actually be, that won’t be enough.
Nerdy Bookish Friends’ first selection of the year and it was a bit of a dud for me. I don’t actually think that this is a bad book at all. I just started reading it, got about halfway through, and realized that it put me in a terrible melancholy mood. I deeply felt the loneliness of both of the main characters as they navigated an isolated world. At times, I was very intrigued by how the world has changed since the pandemic. But… the story meandered and seemed to get stuck in places. More importantly, I was having a lot of trouble really connecting to Rosemary. She was so incredibly naive that I couldn’t even root for her. While I didn’t love the book, I am excited to discuss it with my online book friends.
Next up on the TBR pile: