Award-winning author Matt Rees takes readers to 18th century Austria, where Mozart’s estranged sister Nannerl stumbles into a world of ambition, conspiracy, and immortal music while attempting to uncover the truth about her brother’s suspicious death. Did Mozart’s life end in murder? Nannerl must brave dire circumstances to find out, running afoul of the secret police, the freemasons, and even the Austrian Emperor himself as she delves into a scandal greater than she had ever imagined. With captivating historical details, compelling characters, and a real-life mystery upon which everything hinges, Rees—the award-winning author of the internationally acclaimed Omar Yussef crime series—writes in the tradition of Irvin Yalom’  When Nietzsche Wept, Louis Bayard’s The Pale Blue Eye, and Phillip Sington’s The Einstein Girl to achieve the very best in historical fiction with Mozart’s Last Aria.

This book for me had a series of unfortunate events so it took me a while to get through it, but I was excited for it Sadly, I ended up not really enjoying this book as much as I hoped I would. It wasn’t a bad book, but it also wasn’t one that I would say is riveting. The hardest part for me to deal with in this particular book was the way Mozart’s sister Nannerl was written. I have read other books with his sister ad maybe that is why I am having an issue with it, she just really didn’t stand out as a character I could connect to in this book. She was the “Sherlock” of this book and I just wasn’t really feeling I could believe that.

I know this is historical fiction, but a lot of it just felt a little off the believable scale for me. It might be fiction, but if it is based on real events and people I would hope it would follow that path. For me, I felt this one went a little too far afield. Again, it was not a bad book, it just didn’t really get me into the good book area either. If you want to give it a try go for it you might like it better than I did.

My Gemstone Rating: