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On the Come Up
Bri wants to make it as a rapper, but a recording gives people a version of her they can sell. The scenes around the song ask who gets a say once raw material leaves the studio and a whole community has to live with how others hear it.
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White Tears
Friends Seth and Carter are obsessed with early blues. What begins with Seth capturing a stray voice and Carter turning it into an apparent old recording becomes a haunted argument about ownership. Choose it if you want a studio experiment whose ethics matter as much as the sounds.
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Wylding Hall
A folk group retreats to an English country house to record. Its surviving members remember the sessions differently, and the outside world is gone long enough for those differences to turn uncanny. Start here for a short oral-history novel with the mood of a lost recording.
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We Sold Our Souls
Former guitarist Kris Pulaski reconnects with the members of Dürt Würk after their singer's solo career leaves the band behind. Choose this if the stolen-credit side of a breakup sounds even better as a heavy-metal horror story.
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Black Mad Wheel
The Danes are hired to track down a sound coming from a desert. Read it for a band story that takes the musicians' trained ears seriously and then asks how much they can trust each other's hearing when the sound refuses to behave.
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Soul Music
Imp and the other members of the Band With Rocks In get swept up in the rise of a very persuasive new kind of music. Start here if you want the fights over a band's sound, image, and popularity played as Discworld comedy.
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The Band
A K-pop idol goes into hiding after a controversy. The book moves through different points of view on the forces that built his group, making it a good pick if you're interested in how a pop band's public identity can start to crowd out the people performing it.
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Shine
Rachel Kim trains to become a K-pop idol and grows close to already-famous performer Jason Lee. Try it for the stretch before a group debut, when the people practicing beside you are also competing for the scarce spots that would make you professional partners.
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K-Pop Confidential
Candace Park trains in Seoul with other hopefuls who must move and sing together under constant evaluation. Read it for the skill and strain of looking coordinated when the company wants trainees to treat each other as competition.
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Noteworthy
Jordan's alto voice is out of place in the auditions she is expected to pass but makes her a strong fit for an all-boys a cappella group. Start here for the appeal of belonging inside a musical blend and the difficulty of doing it under another identity.
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Five Flavors of Dumb
Deaf high schooler Piper takes on the job of managing a rock band called Dumb. Read it for the practical side of turning a loose collection of classmates into a group that can book a paying gig, and a perspective on what it means to assess a live performance.
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Harmonic Feedback
Drea finds people to make music with when she meets Naomi and Justin. The trio gives her a space to work through sound and a way to connect before every conversation is easy. Try it for a teen music novel where small acts of trust matter more than getting famous.
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Love Songs & Other Lies
Virginia and Cameron have history before they run into each other on a summer battle-of-the-bands tour. Pick it for romance with a performance schedule that forces two people to share space even when they'd prefer to retreat from the conversation.
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The Love Song of Sawyer Bell
Classically trained fiddler Sawyer Bell takes a spot in Victoria Vincent's indie band for a summer tour. Read it for the onstage opportunities and close quarters that let a band leader and new player learn about each other at the same time they're learning to play together.
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Once More with Feeling
A former pop star risks working with someone from her old boy-band orbit when he is set to direct a musical written by her best friend. Try this for a second-chance romance where the important professional question is whether the old collaborators can make a show together now.
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How to Kill a Rock Star
Music writer Eliza starts a relationship with Paul, the frontman of Bananafish. The band's chance at success raises a question about whose willingness to compromise counts. Pick it for a dramatic romance with the pressure of the record business inside the relationship.
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