Ghost Music
(Warleigh Hall Press Orchestral Novel Series Book 2)
This is the second edition of Ghost Music,
Book Summary
Ghost Music
(This is the second edition of Ghost Music, which was originally published by Orion/Hachette. In August 2024 this version won the Gold Medal for literary fiction in the Global ebooks Awards.)
A standalone sequel to the bestselling While the Music Lasts, Ghost Music was inspired by McVeigh’s fifteen years of touring on four continents with London orchestras including the BBC Symphony, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the Orchestre Revolutionnaire et Romantique.
“McVeigh defines an orchestra as ‘a combination of the unlikely and the insufferable, attempting the impossible.’ The same may be said of her novel, which smoothly harmonizes disparate themes and perspectives. Sexy and satirical, the narrative captivatingly chronicles personal politics and the world of music, both ghostly and otherwise.” – Publishers Weekly
GHOST MUSIC finds the fictional Orchestra of London beset by difficulties. Zimetski, their fiery Polish conductor, drives musicians simultaneously to greater performances and personal desperation, while Pete, the orchestral manager, attempts damage control.
William Mellor, a cellist, buys an antique cello at auction only to discover that it has supernatural qualities. A mysterious young woman then joins the orchestra, captivates the conductor and attempts to captivate William, who’s struggling to get back together with his estranged wife. In the end, no force, whether earthly or otherwise, can keep William from confronting the cello’s true nature – as well as his own.
Reviews for Ghost Music
“McVeigh holds nothing back in her account of the backstage life of an orchestra. Although there is no overriding voice, orchestra manager Pete Hegal emerges as the reader’s friend. A disillusioned violinist, Pete speaks with McVeigh’s wry perception… The tempo rises on the Royal Sinfonia’s Greek tour: a musical world that many see as staid and disciplined is turned upside down by McVeigh. The Last Night of the Proms will never seem the same again.” – The Yorkshire Post
“Wonderful!–even better than your first novel. And even more true!” – Vladimir Ashkenazy, Letter to Alice McVeigh
“Ever wondered what goes on in the backstage life of a symphony orchestra? This racy novel was written by someone who knows.” The Daily Mail
What readers say about the book🧐
McVeigh holds nothing back in her account of the backstage life of an orchestra. Although there is no overriding voice, orchestra manager Pete Hegal emerges as the reader's friend. A disillusioned violinist, Pete speaks with McVeigh's wry perception... The tempo rises on the Royal Sinfonia's Greek tour: a musical world that many see as staid and disciplined is turned upside down by McVeigh. The Last Night of the Proms will never seem the same again.
The Yorkshire Post
About the Author
Alice McVeigh
Alice McVeigh has been published by Orion/Hachette in contemporary fiction, by UK’s Unbound in speculative fiction (writing as Spaulding Taylor) and by Warleigh Hall Press in historical fiction. Her books have been in the last seven for the UK Selfies Book Award (2024), been a runner-up for Foreword Indies’ “Book of the Year” and joint runner-up in Writers Digest International Book Awards. Three of her novels have been Publishers Weekly’s starred “Editors Picks” – one was a BookLife quarterfinalist. McVeigh’s multi-award-winning Austenesque series won First Place for Book Series (historical) in Chanticleer’s International Book Awards 2023.
A long-term Londoner, McVeigh was born in Seoul, South Korea, and grew up in Thailand, Singapore, and Myanmar, where her father was a US diplomat. After spending her teenage years in McLean, Virginia, and achieving a degree with distinction in cello performance at the internationally renowned Jacobs School of Music, she came to London to study cello with William Pleeth. McVeigh spent over fifteen years performing worldwide with orchestras including the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic, and Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s Orchestre Revolutionaire et Romantique.
She was first published in the late1990s, when her two contemporary novels (WHILE THE MUSIC LASTS and GHOST MUSIC) were published by Orion Publishing to excellent reviews, including: “The orchestra becomes a universe in microcosm; all human life is here . . . McVeigh succeeds in harmonising a supremely comic tone with much darker notes”(The Sunday Times). And: “McVeigh is a professional cellist and is thus able to describe with wry authority the extraordinary life of a London orchestra. This is a very enjoyable novel, and not quite as light as it pretends to be” (The Sunday Telegraph). Inspired by her life as a touring cello professional, both novels have been recently released in completely new editions on Smashwords.
Alice has long been married to Simon McVeigh, Professor Emeritus at the University of London; their daughter Rachel has a Presidential Scholarship at Harvard in Chinese Lit. (Ph.D). When not playing cello or writing, Alice is generally smiting tennis balls at the Bromley Tennis Centre. (Often far too hard. As Rachel observed when aged four, “My mum hits the ball farther than anybody!”)