Cello Bride - Book Review

Cello Bride by Angel S. Broady is a passionate story, richly imagined in the spaces of real history. Broady meticulously creates for the reader a strange, beautiful yet harsh society where parents give their daughters to Royalty to be used as concubines. The author gives a new take on the cherished but controversial custom of having concubines. Brody’s character, Queen Pivan, considers them toys for her husband King Wun to use to satiate his sexual desires.. However, the queen has strict rules to follow for her concubines, one of them is not to get pregnant; if they do, they will be killed along with their child. Another rule is that they are not to have any sexual relations with anyone other than King Wun; breaking that rule means death.

The protagonist of the story is a beautiful 17-year-old woman who’s a friend of Angela, Queen Pivan’s most cherished concubine. The woman’s name is Miya Xi, and she is a virtuoso of the violin and is sought after to try a cello that a young man, named, Timothy Locksmith is hired to promote. Locksmith’s employer, Andrea Amati, is going broke and hopes that this virtuoso, Miya Xi’s, recommendation of the instrument will save his company or at least help it survive.

Broady weaves in various love affairs; Miya has her admirers one of them is a young man name Ito who worships her but isn’t liked by Lou, her father. She is also stealing the heart of Timothy Locksmith.  In the palace, Angela is in a precarious affair with King Wun. He is beginning to like her too much. Other concubines are jealous of her being Wun’s favorite. Angela, however, has feeling towards a young guard which could lead to her death if discovered. And jealousy abounds throughout the palace. Angela is painfully human as she struggles to move through life with integrity. I highly recommend this to anyone who wants to grow in their understanding of what life was in China in the era where concubines were a normal part of the palace realm.

Broady pulls no punches and includes passages that probably wouldn’t have made it past Chinese government censors – writing of forced marriages and abuse at the hands of husbands and official figures. The strength of Broady’s work is in her compassion for the characters in her stories, the personal, unpolished text, relating intimate and often shocking details of unbelievably difficult and painful lives.

Those who are interested in unconventional romances with an out-of-the-ordinary setting will find plenty to enjoy in the novel, Cello Bride. It is tragic, poignant and aggravating all at once but in a good way. The novel is a surprisingly wonderful dive into Chinese culture.