Brendan Slocumb presents ‘The Dark Maestro’ on our Best May Books episode.

On this episode of Fully Booked, we’re celebrating the best books of May. First, in a special editors’ segment, Laurie Muchnick, John McMurtrie, Mahnaz Dar, and Laura Simeon each recommend one of the month’s most anticipated titles. Then, I’m joined in conversation by the author of one of May’s best books, Brendan Slocumb, who returns to the podcast to discuss his latest musical thriller, The Dark Maestro(Doubleday, May 13).

Raised in Fayetteville, North Caroline, Slocumb is a professional musician (violin, viola) and decorated music educator who lives in Washington, D.C. He is the author of the novels The Violin Conspiracy (2022) and Symphony of Secrets (2023). His latest, The Dark Maestro, centers on a cello prodigy who must battle a cadre of criminals to reclaim his promising future.

Here’s a bit from our starred review: “The latest classical music–themed thriller from Slocumb follows Curtis Wilson, who grows up in Washington, D.C., with Zippy, his drug-dealer father, and Larissa, Zippy’s on-again, off-again girlfriend. Curtis loves two things: comic books and the cello, which he plays at a startlingly advanced level. Zippy gets busted for selling drugs and goes to prison while Curtis continues his ascent as a musical prodigy, earning a scholarship to Juilliard; when Zippy is released, he leaves behind his drug-dealing life—for an even sketchier, and more illegal, black-market scheme.…This is an intricately plotted novel, paced perfectly by Slocumb, who keeps the book moving at a breakneck speed—but not at the expense of his beautifully drawn characters.…A virtuosic thriller.”

Slocumb and I begin by discussing critical responses to The Dark Maestro. We talk about the word maestro, and the image it conjures, and the family at the heart of the novel: Curtis, Zippy, Larissa, and Patrice. We consider loyalty, debts owed, and the shorthand families use to communicate. Slocumb reveals the medical crisis that struck while he was writing the book—and how a friend literally saved his life. We talk about the novel’s notable tone, reversals of fortune, assumed identities, classical music, cover art symbolism, and more.

BEST BOOKS OF MAY 2025:

Malcolm Lives!: The Official Biography of Malcolm X for Young Readers by Ibram X. Kendi (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)

Hurricane by Jason Chin (Neal Porter/Holiday House)

Things Become Other Things: A Walking Memoir by Craig Mod (Random House)

The Names by Florence Knapp (Pamela Dorman/Viking)

THANKS TO OUR SPONSORS:

Not Yet! by Sally-Jane Heit

Doctor Witch by Frank Edwards

Fire in the Belly of the Beast by H.G. Rogers

Fully Booked is produced by Cabel Adkins Audio and Megan Labrise.