Name: Listen
ISBN: 9781635553185

Kris Bryant

Lily Croft is inexplicably drawn to Hope D'Marco but will she have the courage to confront the consequences of her past and present colliding?

Listen

Izza

4.25 stars | This was so good! It reminded me of a SwanQueen fic I once read. I love the relationship between Lily and Hope! It was sweet and just everything I needed xD The writing was great! I will definitely read more from this author.

Reread July 2020.

Former child music prodigy Lily Croft spends most days in her home office crunching numbers and analyzing data as an actuary. Once she filled concert halls across the world, until the pressure got to be too much and forced her retreat. When her boss hands her a temporary assignment, Lily has to leave the safety of working from home to work with people at an office. She keeps her head down and stays focused, but one night on her way to the train station, she hears music wafting from The Leading Note and the life and feelings she suppressed for over a decade bubble up to the surface. Lily is inexplicably drawn to Hope D’Marco, Leading Note’s gorgeous and brilliant founder. But falling for Hope and re-exploring her passion for music force Lily to face her past. Will she go back into hiding, or have the courage to confront the consequences of her past and present colliding?

Lucia Correa

3.75 Stars, rounded up to 4 Stars

I gravitate towards musician romances such as musician based books by Karis Walsh, Julie Blair and Olivia Janae. So I picked this one up.

Lily Croft was a great character. Formally she was Jillian Crest, a former child music prodigy, a pianist performing before large audiences all around the world, a composer and conducting orchestras at 11 yrs old. However the stress and pressure from her parents, she had a breakdown on stage. Its not mentioned but I assume she was emancipated from her parents. Jillian Crest disappeared and became Lily Croft, an actuary who finds numbers comforting and helps her severe anxiety. Lily felt more comfortable working from home, minimizing contact with people. Once her whole life, she now has anxiety attacks when in the same room with a piano. Her anxiety and nightmares are crippling which Bryant writes very well. You can feel Lily's fears and her struggles towards normalcy.

Hope D'Marco is a wonderful character. Lily is first drawn to her music, hearing her practicing piano. Hope is the founder of Leading Note - a non-profit that provides the opportunity for youth to learn music which is dwindling in the public school system. Hope senses and sees Lily's anxieties and she carefully and slowly helps Lily to overcome them. This is definitely a slow burn romance, but the pace was perfect as we watch Lily overcoming her fears as they become closer. But will Lily ever tell Hope about her secret past?

I have to confess I stopped and started this book a few times. However, when I hit 70% I read it straight through. It took me a while to figure out why I was having problems with the book. I realized that I love MCs that are talented musicians - I enjoy living vicariously through them. I played flute as kid and was even First Chair in my High School orchestra. Unfortunately, music doesn't come naturally to me. I had to work very hard. Only here was Lily, at one time one of the most talented, who now avoided music, much less playing, so I was missing that. BTW, I'm also lousy at arithmetic. Mathematics has been linked to music so it wasn't a surprise to me that Lily was a Mathematician. (Great choice by Bryant). I've always said, I wouldn't be a Scientist today, without the invention of calculators. (Yes, I'm that old, but not as old as an abacus). 

Oh, I can't leave this review without mentioning the third MC, Lily's alley cat Clio. Clio who showed up on Lily's 8th floor fire escape and never left. Clio, the therapy cat. "Even when I was alone with Clio, it wasn't happiness I felt. It was peace. Clio relaxed my world. Hope gave it excitement. I needed those two to meet."

I recommend meeting these three intriguing characters.

Bhavana N R

I've had a rough time with romances but DAMN this this book hit all the right spots. They depiction of anxiety is (as far as I can tell from experience) very well executed. And Hope, my dear Hope, I both want to be her and want to marry her.


I actually connected with and liked both the MCs, and the romance was built up pretty well. I personally love medium-burn romances, and though this might seem insta-lovey at first glance, it's also kinda not. I love the way the romance was handled.

Some of my main problems with wlw romances I've read so far has been that 
a) there's always one character who is confused and takes a long time to get their shit together and accept they have a crush
b) coming-out arcs
c) homophobia

[Not that there's anything wrong with these, it's a preference thing]

And most importantly and most irritatingly,
d) the third act drama inducing thing is 90% of the time some form of miscommunication. Which REALLY IRRITATES ME.

But this book seemed to bypass all that which was a blessing for me. And the normalised way homosexuality was dealt with was exactly what I needed.

So yeah, definitely recommend.

Megan Cooper

Rating: 4.5
I think that this is probably my favourite Bryant novel so far - that is subject to change as there's few of her older novels that I haven't read yet. 

For whatever reason, I ended up reading four or five music themed books in a month - Listen stood out as my favourite. The plot, the characters, the dialogue, the obstacles - all worked perfectly together and made this a memorable romance novel. Bryant has created a fantastic protaganist in Lily - a former prodigy, plagued by anxiety and hiding from the world - and how she manages to push through her past and take a chance with expanding her world. 

Read it. Seriously. Stop scrolling through reviews to figure out if you'll like it. You will.