Nocturnes

July 27, 2009
This suite of five stories hits all of Ishiguro's signature notes, but the shorter form mutes their impact. In “Crooner,” Tony Gardner, a washed-up American singer, goes sloshing through the canals of Venice to serenade his trophy wife, Lindy. The narrator, Jan, is a hired guitar player whose mother was a huge fan of Tony, but Jan's experience playing for Tony fractures his romantic ideals. Lindy returns in the title story, which finds her in a luxury hotel reserved for celebrity patients recovering from cosmetic surgery. The narrator this time is Steve, a saxophonist who could never get a break because of his “loser ugly” looks. Lindy idly strikes up a friendship with Steve as they wait for their bandages to come off and their new lives to begin. In the final story, “Cellists,” an unnamed saxophonist narrator who, like Jan, plays in Venice's San Marco square, observes the evolving relationship of a Hungarian cello prodigy after he meets an American woman. The stories are superbly crafted, though they lack the gravity of Ishiguro's longer works (Never Let Me Go
; Remains of the Day
), which may leave readers anticipating a crescendo that never hits.

August 1, 2009
A collection of five stylish stories from Ishiguro (Never Let Me Go, 2005, etc.).

As indicated by both the title and subtitle, all the stories in this fictional equivalent of a concept album concern musicians and the evening. But even more holds them together. All are first-person narratives (four of them by musicians) and most have a recurring motif of exchanging early promise for something—a marriage, a career, maybe both—that one settles for, once the daylight of youth has given way to the twilight of middle age. When one underachiever remarks"I'm only forty-seven," the woman on whom he had a college crush, now married to his best friend, replies,"Only forty-seven. This'only,' this is what's destroying your life. Only, only, only. Only doing my best." That story,"Come Rain or Come Shine," is the most audacious in terms of tone, a very funny narrative, almost emotionally slapstick, about a very sad marriage. The writing is so exquisite throughout that the reader forgives the fact that at least two of these stories don't make much literal sense. In"Malvern Hills," an otherwise subtle story about a young guitarist who believes he has a career in music, and two married couples who have become resigned to their fates, the narrator keeps auditioning for electric bands with an acoustic guitar. The title story, the longest and strangest, concerns a session saxophonist who has somehow been persuaded to have plastic surgery on his face as a big career move. (Who really cares what a session or jazz musician looks like?) But even though there are a few false notes, the tonal command sustains perfect pitch.

Like sophisticated literary mood music, this book lingers in the memory, ringing true in theme and metaphor even when lacking plausibility.

(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

Starred review from September 15, 2009
In Venice, an old-time singer drafts a guitar player from one of the piazza's bands to accompany him as he serenades the wife he is about to leave. She later turns up in the tale of a sax player whose own wife, having left him, offers to pay for plastic surgery that could help his career. A man who once shared a love for show tunes with an old friend is asked by her husband to act the fool to help save their marriage. A self-centered songwriter breeds disruption while working at his sister's inn, and an inspiring cellist encounters a most unusual teacher. Despite what one might expect from the title, these aren't stories about music, which is simply enfolded in the characters' lives; the music doesn't so much inspire the action as frame it. The writing is lighter and more loose-limbed than one might expect of the author of "Never Let Me Go", but it delivers the same scary insights into human misbehavior. VERDICT Once again Ishiguro does something different; recommended for anyone who loves thoughtful writing. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ" 5/1/09.]Barbara Hoffert, "Library Journal"

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from August 1, 2009
A once-famous crooner believes he must destroy the very core of his life to achieve a comeback. A young songwriter excels at selfishness rather than creativity. A gifted yet unheralded saxophone player is persuaded to undergo plastic surgery to enhance his visual appeal in a world that values image over talent. As a recipient of the Booker Prize and the Order of the British Empire, Ishiguro is no stranger to the vagaries of fame, nor, as a Japanese British writer, is he unfamiliar with the misapprehensions ones appearance can arouse. Questions of identity, artistic integrity, and success shape each of the five meshed stories in this droll and enrapturing collection. Each tale of musicians, muses, and users is funny and incisive; each is a fable about the dream of mastery and the nightmare of pragmatism; and each dramatic story line delivers arresting psychological transformations. Encompassing a palatial hotel in the insomniac dead of night and sun-kissed hills, an immigrant journeyman guitar player weathering prejudice in Venice and a young cellist enthralled by an unlikely mentor, dissonant marriages and shattering recognitions, Ishiguros stories are at once exquisite and ravaging. Much like the haunting music of down-and-out jazz great Chet Baker, whom Ishiguro names to strike just the right crepuscular note.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)