10 Novels about Violinists
If you’re looking for a book about a violinists, violin student or violin maker, you’ve come to the right place. For a full list of novels about string players, visit our online bookshop at Bookshop.org. Got a book to recommend? Get in touch using the contact form or on socials.
Indyana Schneider, published in 2023 by Simon & Schuster Ltd
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Maya is living her dream in Vienna. First violinist with the prestigious Habsburg Philharmonic, her days are filled with music, her nights with wild parties and passionate, no-strings-attached sex with her colleague, star cellist Lucia Rizzo.
But when Josh - the ex-love of Maya's life - unexpectedly shows up at her door, the perfect world she's built begins to unravel.
Set over a blisteringly hot weekend in a city where ghosts lurk in every alleyway, Since the World is Ending explores the sacrifices we make and the risks we take when we pour life into our art.
A novel about music, consequence, desire and the importance of love and art in a world on fire by a daring and uniquely compelling young novelist.
Jion Sheibani, published in 2023 by Hot Key Books
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Azadeh is a budding violinist on a music scholarship at an expensive private school, dealing with all the usual trials of being sixteen: trying her best to fit in, keep up and have fun. Then as her mum's mental health spirals out of control, Azadeh's world starts to unravel. Her friendships fall away, and as much as she and her dad try to keep a lid on everything, their problems insist on taking over. Feeling alone, it's her violin that finally helps Azadeh to find her way back to her friends, herself and even her mum.
A beautifully packaged, highly important and irresistible novel about mental health struggles and the solace we find in music and rhythm, friendship, family and honesty.
Harriet Constable, published in 2024 by Bloomsbury Publishing
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Venice. 1704. In this city of glittering splendour, desperation and destitution are never far away. At the Ospedale della Pietà, abandoned orphan girls are posted every through a tiny gap in the wall every day.
Eight-year-old Anna Maria is just one of the three hundred girls growing up within the Pietà's walls – but she already knows she is different. Obsessive and gifted, she is on a mission to become Venice’s greatest violinist and composer, and in her remarkable world of colour and sound, it seems like nothing with stop her.
Helena Attlee, published in 2021 by Penguin Books Ltd
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From the moment she hears Lev's violin for the first time, Helena Attlee is captivated. She is told that it is an Italian instrument, named after its former Russian owner. Eager to discover all she can about its ancestry and the stories contained within its delicate wooden body, she sets out for Cremona, birthplace of the Italian violin. This is the beginning of a beguiling journey whose end she could never have anticipated.
Making its way from dusty workshops, through Alpine forests, cool Venetian churches, glittering Florentine courts, and far-flung Russian flea markets, Lev's Violin takes us from the heart of Italian culture to its very furthest reaches.
Aja Gabel, published in 2018 by Prentice Hall Press
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Jana. Brit. Daniel. Henry. They would never have been friends if they hadn't needed each other. They would never have found each other except for the art which drew them together. They would never have become family without their love for the music, for each other.
Brit is the second violinist, a beautiful and quiet orphan; on the viola is Henry, a prodigy who's always had it easy; the cellist is Daniel, the oldest and an angry skeptic who sleeps around; and on first violin is Jana, their flinty, resilient leader. Together, they are the Van Ness Quartet. After the group's youthful, rocky start, they experience devastating failure and wild success, heartbreak and marriage, triumph and loss, betrayal and enduring loyalty. They are always tied to each other - by career, by the intensity of their art, by the secrets they carry, by choosing each other over and over again.
Ian McEwan, published in 2007 by Vintage Publishing
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Edward and Florence (a violinist in a string quartet), young innocents married that morning, arrive at a hotel on the Dorset coast. At dinner in their rooms they struggle to suppress their private fears of the wedding night to come and, unbeknownst to them both, the events of the evening will haunt them for the rest of their lives.
Set in the borderland of English history immediately before the liberation and licence of the swinging sixties, McEwan reveals how a life can be irrevocably altered by a moment’s twist of fate.
The Violin Maker’s Secret
Evie Woods, published in 2026 by HarperCollins
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On any given day, there are thousands of items slowly gathering dust in the Lost and Found of Heathrow Airport. Unknown to anyone, hidden among the clutter, is a very special object that can change the fortunes of those who possess it – a violin of rare beauty and power.
Now, as if by chance, it has fallen into the hands of three strangers…
Baggage claim agent Devlin, retired teacher Walter, and appraiser Gabrielle have nothing in common, but can these three unlikely guardians unlock the secrets of the violin?
Madeleine Thien, published in 2016 by Granta Books
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In Canada in 1991, ten-year-old Marie and her mother invite a guest into their home: a young woman who has fled China in the aftermath of the Tiananmen Square protests. Her name is Ai-Ming.
As her relationship with Marie deepens, Ai-Ming tells the story of her family in revolutionary China, from the crowded teahouses in the first days of Chairman Mao's ascent, to the Shanghai Conservatory in the 1960s and the events leading to the Beijing demonstrations of 1989.
Jojo Moyes, published in 2008 by Hodder & Stoughton
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Isabel Delancey, a classical violinist, has always taken her gifted life for granted. But when her husband dies suddenly, leaving her with a mountain of debt, she and her two children are forced to abandon their home and move to a crumbling pile in the country.
With the house falling down around them, and the last of her savings fast disappearing, Isabel turns to her neighbours, not knowing that her mere presence there has stirred up long-standing obsessions.
Jilly Cooper, published in 1996 by Transworld Publishers
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Abigail Rosen, nicknamed Appassionata, was the sexiest, most flamboyant violinist in classical music, but she was also the loneliest and the most exploited girl in the world. When a dramatic suicide attempt destroyed her violin career, she set her sights on the male-dominated heights of the conductor's rostrum.
Given the chance to take over the Rutminster Symphony Orchestra, Abby is ecstatic, not realising the RSO is in hock up to its neck and is composed of the wildest bunch of musicians ever to blow a horn or caress a fiddle.
Nora Roberts, published in 1991 by Little, Brown Book Group
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Burned out by a whirlwind musical career, Caroline Waverly arrives in the small Mississippi town of Innocence desperate for some peace and quiet.
Relaxing in her grandmother's beautiful home by the bayou, Caroline has no intention of indulging in a summer fling . . . until she meets Tucker Longstreet. Tucker has a reputation for keeping his romances short and shallow, but this feels different for both of them. Perhaps they might both have a chance for real, lasting love.
But then Caroline's quiet summer is shattered by tragedy. A killer is stalking the town, targeting young women. Worse still, evidence seems to point to Tucker himself. And the remote town of Innocence isn't quite as safe and sleepy as it seems . . .
Hannah Fiddy is the Founder of Alternative Classical and a freelance marketing consultant, developing audiences for classical music. Described as a "classical innovator" by Classical Whisper, Hannah has created and promoted numerous concerts outside of traditional spaces, including warehouses, pubs, clubs and museums; interviewed some of the world's most famous composers; and guest lectured on innovation in the classical music industry. Hannah has managed the digital marketing for many music organisations and artists including choral composer John Rutter and The King’s Singers. In a past life she founded London Flashmob, producing quirky events from wedding proposals to cultural pranks for up to 1,000 people.
