Soloist

Salzman, Mark. The Soloist. New York: Random House, 1994.

I hated to put this book down. I started off reading it at the same time as two other books (which shall remain nameless), but soon I found myself favoring The Soloist over the other two. Which, when you think about it, isn’t a very smart move because when I finished The Soloist I was left with the lesser liked books.
Lesson learned. There is a reason why dessert is served at the end of the meal – save the best for last. It tastes sweeter that way. That goes for books as well, especially The Soloist. I can’t wait to read Salzman’s other books.

In a nutshell The Soloist is about a man who is struggling with who he was as a child in relation to who he has become as an adult. As a child Renne Sundheimer was a prodigy who mastered the cello and thrilled audiences world-wide. As an adult, having mysteriously lost his talent, Renne has become a cello teacher for a university in Southern California. His life revolves around the music he used to make until two completely different events happen. First, Renne is summoned to jury duty where he hears a case involving a murdered Buddhist monk. Second, Renne finds himself the tutor of another cello prodigy, a nine-year old Korean boy. In both situations Renne started out an unwilling participant. He was convinced he didn’t want to serve on a jury and planned to profess an undue hardship. He was also convinced he didn’t want to give private lessons to an introverted Korean boy. In both cases he fails to extract himself from involvement and ultimately ends up changing his life.

Favorite lines: “Human beings are primates, and primates weren’t designed to tie themselves up into knots and hold still (p 99). I’m not sure how my yoga friends would take to this comment, but I found it funny.
And the last lines of the book are perfect, “I don’t think about the past as much as I used to, and I hardly ever think further than a semester ahead. I’m not sure that’s a bad thing, though. I’m starting to think that the larger picture is overrated” (p 284). Precisely.

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter called, “Mark Salzman: Too Good to Miss” (p 194).

Off topic comment: When Pearl introduces Salzman in her second Lust book she mentions not going to readings given by authors she likes. She is always afraid of not liking the person behind the words, or thinking of the author’s voice when reading his or her newest offering. I’m like that with music. Once I see the musician I can’t get their image out of my head and sometimes, often, it skews the music.