I'm always on the lookout for books that feature music in meaningful ways, and this one does with piano.
Fig's terrified her father will wander into the surf during a hurricane and be killed. It's something he does, wander away during hurricanes, drawn by the music of the howling wind and crashing waves.
He's a music composer and pianist trying to capture the violent beauty of what he hears, and he suffers from deep depressions Fig tries to manage -- alone. Her mother has already left them. But Fig fails, of course, and an art class turns into a disastrous scene with her father, which triggers a Social Services worker to knock on the door. Soon, the social worker is monitoring her father's parenting and Fig's life.
So when her father wanders off and a neighbor offers to find him, she's initially reluctant to accept his help, but this neighbor has a way of cutting through her father's depression fog like no one else. And with her best friend and help from a girl who works in the library, she's not as alone in dealing with her dad's bouts of depression as she thought.
I won't spoil what happens. You'll have to read to find out. But it's ultimately a story about finding love and a parent doing the best he can for his daughter.
Enjoy!
