Maria von Trapp, a novel? Yes, please! Add to that it’s written by a highly skilled novelist and this is a must-read this summer.
I was excited to receive an advanced copy of this novel from the publisher. This is my unbiased opinion.
I admit, I knew very little about the real people in this story before reading Maria. Now I feel like I have the bigger picture. I love when a novel teaches me something. (You’ve heard me say that before if you’ve read my other reviews, but it’s still true!) What I did know, or thought I knew, came totally from the movie-or was it from watching high school musicals over the years? I’m not sure.
The story takes us to the real Maria, and her discontent with the play that has gone into rehearsals. The author created a character that is assistant to Oscar Hammerstein. The assistant, Fran meets with Maria and hears her concerns while knowing there isn’t much that can be changed at this point. I appreciated knowing about Maria’s pious nature, her sternness, her disapproval with how the family is portrayed (her husband as the strict disciplinarian that in fact Maria was, the oldest child as a girl when he was actually boy … and more) While we know deep down that stories inspired by someone’s life are not usually 100% factual, it’s still good to know what was real and what was Hollywood, or in this time setting, Broadway.
I love how we get to go back in time with Maria and experience her struggle to leave the nuns. Her backstory makes the elder Maria much more relatable. How her decision to marry The Captain came about. How he felt about her. How the children felt about her. The actual songs they sang together. If you knew someone about the von Trapps, this might not surprise you. It did me. The Sound of Music is so fun and entertaining that it’s easy to forget the story is loosely based on real people, so I for one appreciated learning all the backstory.
An important character both in this novel and in real life was Hammerstein. I enjoyed getting to know him and his genius. The last song written was an important factor in resolving Maria’s issues with the play and perhaps, as Moran has suggested, with her children.. You’ll have to read the book to find out which one. I mean, what fantastic musical scores were created!
The only down note, in my opinion, was the unexplored, brief relationship between the two fictional characters, Fran and Peter. I would have liked to have seen more of. a parallel drawn between Fran in the later timeline and Maria in the 1930s I thought that was going to happen seeing as Fran was in an unhappy relationship with a man named Jack and Maria’s early life was also unhappy. But there might not have been enough similarities for that. The ending seemed to be missing something. Maybe it was that. However, this novel was fun to read, educational, and entertaining. If you love The Sound of Music you must read this!
Reviewed by Cindy Thomson
Novel PASTimes 