Duet for One

Overview

Haunted by his youthful romance with Dara, gifted and sensitive violinist Adam must confront his past to find a way forward. At the Philadelphia graveside of his mother, Adele Pearl, wife and partner in a celebrated two-piano team, his father, Victor, mourns the loss of both his wife and musical career. As Adam reflects on their relationship, he realizes his mother was absent in ways that truly mattered. Struggling with the emptiness left by a series of failed relationships with talented women, Adam grapples with his connection to Dara, an English professor burdened by her own divorce and blind to what she lost in him. Martha Anne Toll’s Duet for One weaves a poignant narrative of loss, connection, and the enduring hope that love can be found where life resides, following her acclaimed debut, Three Muses.

Reviews

"Duet for One is a beautiful meditation on love and the great vessel of time. Begin reading it to be stirred by its symphonic prose, and soon you’ll harmonize and fall in love with its unforgettable characters.”
- Jai Chakrabarti, author of A Play for the End of the World and A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness

"Duet for One is a lovely story about artistry, time, memory, and romance. Martha Anne Toll has a wonderful way of writing about music. It is a balm to the spirit!"
-Lydia Kiesling, author of Mobility and The Golden State

"Music - like love - is a challenge to both the senses and the intellectual mind. In this poignant and attentively-written novel, Martha Anne Toll writes about the triumphs and sorrows of these two elements of human life, and considers how they might intertwine. Duet for One unfolds with symphonic sweep, each of its movements revealing deeper layers of emotion and insight into the central characters. The great works - works by Brahms, Beethoven, Schubert, Paganini, Mozart, Smetana - serve as the backdrop for Toll's clever and intricate storytelling. Truly, a memorable novel."
-Pauls Toutonghi, author of The Refugee Ocean and Red Weather

Author Biography

Martha Anne Toll's debut novel, Three Muses, was shortlisted for the Gotham Book Prize and won the Petrichor Prize for Finely Crafted Fiction. A book critic for NPR and The Washington Post, among others, Toll had a career in social justice after training as a classical viola player. She serves on PEN/Faulkner Foundation’s board and lives in Washington, DC with her husband. They are the lucky parents of two adult daughters. Duet for One is Toll’s second novel. www.marthaannetoll.com.