The procession climbs the hill in silence, each person carrying a flame.
Seen from a distance, the line of lights looks almost weightless —
a string of small stars ascending toward a darker sky.

And then the circle forms.
Fire touching fire, until the whole clearing glows.

It is here that Anthony steps forward, as if he were emerging from a Chagall dream — a figure lifted out of color and light, shaped by the courage to just be, give beyond what you have yourself and invite destiny in.

How to render the music and the atmosphere of that moment?
No composer has ever written it and none probably ever will.
This is about this moment only.

Perhaps approach like this:

• Prokofiev — Violin Concerto No. 1
for the impossibly high, glass-like threads of sound
that hover above human breath.

• “An Irish Party in the Third Class” — Titanic soundtrack
for the heartbeat of the earth:
feet stamping, hands clapping,
the communal joy that gathers people into one pulse.

• Paganini
for the fierce, unbroken line of mastery
that ignites after Anthony’s speech
as he turns away and the night draws him forward.

Three fragments —
and between them, a hint of the music that enchanted the people present in the circle of torches around midsummer and how the story started to glow.
As an echo, Chagall’s Le Violoniste, described here by the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam:
→https://www.stedelijk.nl/nl/collectie/753-marc-chagall-le-violoniste

1.

2.

3.

Not the music itself. Not the one there. But something like an outline — a faint afterglow left by the torches.

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Alleged restored clip of Pilu et Mimi Doudou (date uncertain). Source: NiniVid archives. Authenticity unverified.
The video-file seems corrupted.

We’re deeply sorry!

A LOST MASTERPIECE

It remains an enduring disappointment that no recording survives of the one known masterpiece by the artist Pilu Doudou.
Not on Spotify, not on YouTube, not in any private or public archive. Even inquiries at the esteemed Institut Français des Grands Compositeurs Contemporains in Lyon yielded nothing.
The staff there, unfailingly polite, claimed never to have encountered the composer’s name at all.

The Musée des Rouleaux de Cire in Avignon proved equally unfruitful, though it must be said they generously granted access to their cooled vaults containing more than 3,200 wax cylinders.
Each one was inspected.
None contained the sought-after work.

A MYSTERY

And yet the lyrics exist — preserved in black and white.
And according to Ferrier, the composition itself was “limpide, frappant et simple” —crystal-clear, striking, and simple.
Why, then, the silence?
A clerical error? Institutional oversight?
Or something else?

We may never know.

The IFGCC (A Brief Note)

Founded in 1897 and housed in a discreet building in Lyon’s 6th arrondissement, the Institut Français des Grands Compositeurs Contemporains guards an impressive archive of French musical history.
Its curators, however, apply a notably narrow definition of “composer of national relevance,” and it is not unheard of for certain marginal or regionally attested figures to be absent from their ledgers.

Whether this omission is accidental or intentional in the case of Pilu Doudou remains unclear.
Historical records from the fin de siècle are, after all, incomplete by nature — sometimes because they were never kept, and sometimes because they were never meant to be.

A Modest Consolation

For the reader-listener who is left empty-handed, here is at least a small comfort:

• a recipe for roast chicken with lemon, thyme, and garlic butter,

  

• –and, for the reader seeking an equivalent in spirit, the celebrated Hippopotamus Song (Flanders & Swann) — a work whose enthusiastic communal refrains recall, in their own way, the triumphs once attributed to Pilu Doudou..
  

A modest substitute, perhaps — but perfectly serviceable.

DISCLAIMER

The editorial board also wishes to address recurring allegations that Monsieur Doudou never existed at all, and that the works attributed to him may have originated from a celebrated composer of the period, purely — it is said — to cast his own music in a more flattering light.
We consider such assertions unhelpful and almost certainly misguided.
Our honoured composer Ferrier would never resort to such methods.

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Play this at the novel’s beginning.
And play it while Denise and Marie-Rose take their walk together along the tideline. Marie-Rose reflects on this moment in the summer of 1901, long after she traveled back again to her own time in 2021:

I’ve always been struck by how precisely things unfold. You can appear aimless—drifting, improvising—and still move with perfect precision toward your fate.
Who’s steering, then? Is it really you? Or is that what being yourself means: to be guided, straight as an arrow, without even knowing?
Honestly, we were just meandering. That’s what I thought, anyway—while walking straight into what was waiting for me.

Title song of a very different movie, although… ?

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Nina Rosewood on the role of music in this novel:

Music often reveals something about people, landscapes, seasons, time of the day, epoques and moods all at once.

In SURRENDERING, some of the music is intentionally anachronistic — meaning it didn’t yet exist at the time in which the story takes place.

But in this novel, that can hardly be called a problem.
Two of the three protagonists are themselves anachronisms. They come from 2021 and could not possibly have existed in 1901, the year in which most of the story unfolds.
Or… could they? Is it perhaps not so impossible after all?

And the third protagonist?
He belongs entirely to 1901. Yet he is a great musician, and the essence of him — his music — accomplishes what his body cannot: it travels forward in time with ease, reaches into the future, and finds the woman he loves, drawing her back into his world.
This composer draws entire landscapes. Landscapes in sound.

As a little girl, Marie-Rose already loved his music and played it on her piano.
And now, as a young woman, she finds herself loving the man behind that music — the man she meets, alive, in 1901.

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Nina Rosewood on music tracks in a novel:

You move around your characters as if in a slow circle. If they create art within the story, you approach them by looking for real works that might have inspired them or taught them something. And then you place those works beside them — or at their feet if you like. It’s fitting, really: you’re dancing with them.

Flamenco

Legend #1: Camaron de la Isla

Legend #2 Carlos Saura.
ARTE once produced a magnificent documentary.
You’ll want to set aside a proper moment to watch it.
Length: 90 minutes!

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More will follow.
This one offers a kind of sneak preview into the vibe of book 2. Only one aspect. There will be quite other aspects too, historical ones.
Leading into the depths of the soul, and fate and that of an ancient city…

←back home

Couleur locale, the scents of cultures, and emotion often live more around the words than within them.
Music is precise in an entirely different way.

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The lands of chapter 3 exist. You can simply go there.
The castle exists too. Clues will appear as the book unfolds — so hold off on the riddle for now…

Today brings two pieces of music, chosen for the soft land, the ocean, the language, and the soul that sings through it.

1. “A Fadista” — Ana Moura

Studio version here:

And a beautifully atmospheric live version:

English translation of the lyrics
(condensed and smoothed for readability; original source linked below):

The Fado Singer

A black-belted dress,
Long black hair,
A shawl embroidered in black.
She walks the avenue at night;
Passersby think she’s lost —
A woman of vice and sin —
Misunderstood, insulted, hunted,
Used to being summoned.

She enters the café cantante.
In a teasing tone,
For those who would try to “buy” her,
A guitar trembles.
A shadow moves
Slowly to the center of the room.
She begins to sing —
And those who would have bought her
Sit instead in silence, watching.

A song ancient and deep,
Rising from the ends of the earth,
Interrupts the noise of the night.
Those listening
Seem gathered in prayer.
Even those who slighted her
Close their eyes,
As if asking forgiveness.

Again the black dress,
The long dark hair,
The embroidered shawl.
Singing to that table,
She offers them the certainty
That they are forgiven.
And in front of her,
As if on an altar,
The fado is heard in silence.

Source of translation: lyricstranslate.com
https://lyricstranslate.com/en/fadista-fado-singer.html (Original link)

2. “De Frou Oan It Finster” — Nynke Laverman

same track on You Tube:

A Fado variant — and a loving nod to the Frisian readers of the Dutch edition. There is such a thing as Frisian fado, and it is breathtaking.

Is that perhaps the riddle of a soft land’s language?
Does it speak with the water — or from the water: ocean, sea, lakes, channels?
A mixture of softness and firmness, and, when needed, a kind of beautiful hardness.
Water flows… but it can hardly be compressed. Very Frisian too.

Here, the dreamer’s gaze rests not in the eyes of donkeys but of cows — and the musicality is held within the language itself.

English translation
The Woman at the Window

Never does the gate open.
The window is so high
That she first sees only the earth
Stretching far away:
The river embracing the forest
In a blue curve;
Red birds, slender deer
Moving through the green.

She knows nothing
Of the play of life below;
Yet it must be beautiful,
For she longs for it deeply.
She wants to embrace something —
Finds nothing to kiss
But her own shoulder,
Round and cool and tender.

The original is in Dutch. The song is sung in beautiful Frysk.

It is a poem by J. Slauerhoff (1898–1936).
Born and raised in Leeuwarden, in Friesland.
His novel The Forbidden Kingdom links directly to the soft land.
It blends fact and fiction around the poet Camões, who was exiled for his love for Diana, a lady-in-waiting coveted by the Infante. Diana refused him and entered a convent. The poem may well be about her.

While the exiled Camões sailed the world’s oceans — much like Slauerhoff himself, who worked as a ship’s doctor — this woman remained behind.

The perfect theme for a fado.

Enjoy listening.

Dear readers,

I’m quietly delighted to tell you that The Sky Travellers, the first book of The Katalyst Trilogy, is now available for pre-order.

This story has lived with me for a long time — a journey through landscapes both outer and inner, written to be read with attention, breath, and room in the heart. It opens the trilogy, but each book flows into the next as one continuous arc. A long unfolding, carried by air, light, and human connection.

Here is a small moment from early in the story — one of those scenes that still lingers with me:

Excerpt

He accepted the applause — soft and scattered, like rainfall in the open air.
Then he took back his violin, bow, and hat from the two dancers, who stirred from their stillness, and began to play again — quietly, almost to himself.

He walked toward the garden gate, the melody drifting with him.
The crowd began to follow, torches in hand, the long procession moving once more — but now in reverse, flowing downward through the night. The notes of his violin thinned in the wind, fading, returning now and then in fleeting, silver threads of sound.

At the checkpoint, John and Sheila handed back their torches. Together with the others, they walked silently through the dark streets toward their room — still under the spell of what they’d witnessed.

There at last, they broke the silence.
“How did you like it?” they both asked at exactly the same time — and laughed at their perfect timing, their old familiar harmony.
“Amazing,” he said to her — and she to him.
They began to undress.

“Come to bed,” Sheila said. “When I close my eyes, I can still see the torches — and how they shone in your eyes. Come, John. But I warn you, I’m terribly sleepy.”
“I smuggled a little lantern from home in my suitcase,” he said. “I’ll light it and set it on the table. Then, if you open your eyes, you’ll see a small glow.”

She laughed softly.
“And then I’ll see you,” she said. “You’re my own smuggler — sneaking through customs with your secret, lovely contraband, and now you live in my bed.”

🔗 Pre-order link

To find your local Amazon store automatically — wherever you live:

👉 https://mybook.to/skytravellers
Kindle in preorder, releasing on December 2.
Paperback ordering from release date on

Ordering from Greece?
👉 https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0G1D73G8Z

To my early Dutch readers: you walked with this story long before it was bound in English. Thank you for being its first companions as it now steps onto a wider stage.
Thank you for being here — for reading, for staying close, and for following my work across the years. With The Sky Travellers, we open the first door into a luminous trilogy I’ve poured everything into.

The Katalyst Trilogy is a modern Grail story — not in armor or riddles, but in soul. It explores the quiet, unexpected forms of nourishment we all search for, and the way meaning sometimes appears just as we think we’re only passing through a landscape.

This project has taken me on more journeys than I can count. What began as a simple story slowly revealed itself as something older, deeper — an archetype stirring to life as the pages unfolded. And that moment — when you recognize it — is pure magnetism.

There’s so much ahead.
And I’d love for you to walk this path with me, book by book, light by light.

Warmly,

Stories inside stories…

THERE ARE MOMENTS when music, painting, and story fold into each other — when a dance on canvas echoes in a novel, and a melody carries the weight of memory. In Surrendering, such a moment belongs to Denise, who watches two lovers dance and feels her own past rise within her, stirred by the strains of Debussy.

However fictional, the love story of Claude Ferrier and Marie-Rose Duchamps is deeply rooted in reality. Love stories are real — and they need to be told again and again.
This one, in particular, is rooted in art.
There is something impressionistic about the main character, Claude Ferrier, that calls to mind Debussy. And the setting is unmistakably French — not quite fin de siècle, because the twentieth century has just begun (we are in 1901), yet the atmosphere of the novel lingers in that twilight. The hotel on the Côte d’Azur, its guests, the building, the way people look and dress, their conventions and social codes — all are still very much of the fin de siècle.

I needed a scene where Marie-Rose’s friend, Denise, observes the couple while they dance. Denise is a middle-aged Frenchwoman, deeply attached to her younger friend. As she watches the lovers, she is reminded of her own great love, Grace, with whom she once visited this very place — and who has since died. As the lovers swirl around each other in the hotel’s orangerie, with musicians playing, Denise is swept into the vortex of her own love and grief. How she misses Grace. How strong, confident, and beautiful Grace was — and now she is gone. Through a mist of tears, Denise’s eyes follow the dancers. Her ears, which can no longer hear the voice of her beloved, take in the music… cello and piano interwoven.

For this scene, I had in mind Debussy’s languid, melancholy waltz: La plus que lente.

Decades after the moment in the novel, two musicians — the pianist Martha Argerich and the cellist Mischa Maisky — would become world-renowned. They traveled the globe together, always delighting in each other’s company, always making music.

Maisky arranged Debussy’s original piano piece, transforming it into a beautiful, sensual poem for cello and piano. My joy in writing this chapter was to leave their names unspoken — to let the two lovers dance, while the mourning woman is moved to tears by the music and the sight of the couple, remembering her own beloved Grace.

First: the music.
Then: the book excerpt.

Excerpt from Surrendering- Nina Rosewood. Ch22: “A Slow Waltz”

…the music changed. So did the ensemble. A different pianist and a cellist now sat on the stage. They played a slow, lingering waltz that wavered between serious classical music—to be listened to—and light salon music, meant as a backdrop for conversation or a gentle undercurrent for dancing. But the classical won out over the entertaining. A quiet, focused circle formed around the musicians, as though instead of sound and melody they were producing stillness and attention.

The cello sang. So warmly, so mournfully, so tenderly. The piano danced along, fluid and light, riding the waves of the melody. But the tones also carried something ancient, something sorrowful. Denise felt it touch her. She let herself be carried along on the tide of wistfulness.

The dancing couples had gradually left the floor two by two, becoming listeners instead. Only one couple remained, dancing the slow, sensitive waltz with deep attention. From time to time they glanced around them. But mostly, they looked into each other’s eyes. They seemed to hold one another not only in their arms, but in their gaze, as if, from their perspective, it wasn’t they who were turning, but the world around them.

Marie-Rose was dancing. She wore the light dress from the day before, the one with the red piping around the neckline, the short sleeves, and the hem. She danced on her red shoes and wore the straw hat with the ribbons. Claude wore white linen and the corduroy jacket Denise already knew.

It was clear that although he was leading the dance, his radiant partner had the true oversight, and had probably just taught him this waltz. At the same time, she had surrendered into his arms. She let herself be held as she leaned back into the movement, eyes sometimes closed, sometimes lifting again to meet his.

The languid calm of their steps, the gentle way their eyes stayed on each other—and especially Marie-Rose’s posture—told Denise that they had become a couple that day.

She sees with the eyes of her soul. You can maybe read it in gestures, in the way people move, how they hold themselves. But even then, you have to let it speak in you. You have to be willing to let it in, to really see that love is blossoming—yes, even when you’re grieving! Grief doesn’t mean love has vanished. No, it means it’s still here. That’s exactly why it hurts so much. And she and Grace... No, I should say Grace and I. Not out of politeness, but because it was Grace who brought her here for the first time. That’s how she knew this place. They danced here, the two of them, lightly, intimately. To other music, from another time, a time that hadn’t yet arrived here. And sometimes they moved a little uneasily in it, dodging small-minded judgments. Sometimes they danced a little incognito, made little concessions—by occasionally dancing with a monsieur, which could also be quite fun. Some of them were kind, or funny. And then you went back to each other, back into the dance. And now, this music, this tenderness, this couple dancing before her eyes...

How can you even see such tenderness? Isn’t that supposed to be invisible? And yet you do. You feel it. It reaches you. It stirs something, and that something begins to melt. You want to cry. Tears coming, pushing, tearing..

You don’t cry. You fight them, as long as you can. Even if you know you will lose the battle.

But something in you must remain open to this music, this tenderness. Oh, this fragile beauty, right before your eyes! You want to hear every beat, every measure of this cellist and pianist. Could they be in love, too? So tenderly attuned to one another, exchanging now and then a glance full of... something. Is it love for the music? Or for each other? Or both?

And if love is eternal, if it exists beyond time, then so does Grace’s love. That too. Her name wasn’t Grace for nothing. Oh, how full of grace she danced! How radiant she was... so timelessly beautiful, inside and out. It never stopped. How can someone be so beautiful, and then die?

DE KATALYST- NINA ROSEWOOD

Het festival waar ieder geeft en ontvangt
Ze bestaan natuurlijk.Festivals waarin je meedoet. Dit festival is er één van. Gesitueerd in Zuid-Europa, een beetje door een Amerikaanse bril bekeken, en rond de tijd van de zomerzonnewende.
Acht hoofdpersonages. Daaronder de organisator en inspirator. Hij lijkt alles te hebben. Maar hij is ziek.
Het festival ontwikkelt zich tot de plek van zijn genezing, wanneer hij begint te ontvangen.
Moderne graalroman
De aloude elementen van een graalroman zijn aanwezig. De voeding die iedereen op geheimzinnige wijze het juiste brengt. De zieke koning. En de dwaas die schijnbaar onzinnig door het verhaal buitelt maar een proces op gang brengt waar hij ook niets aan kan doen dat het gebeurt. De kracht van gebundelde liefde, maar ook de zomerzon, veel romantiek, en prachtige kunst. Muziek, dans, wervelende voorstellingen, een kinderprogramma waar de volwassenen jaloers op kunnen worden. En de innigheid van de liefdesrelaties en hun evolutie. De genezing blijkt niet alleen voor de hoofdpersoon. Ze blijkt aanstekelijk. Het is geen zweverig proces. Er is veel prachtig klassiek medische toewijding in het spel en kennis van nu.
Lange adem
Niet doen als je niet van boeken houdt die met je meegaan en waar je in wegdroomt. Niet doen als je trilogieën haat. Niet doen als je bang bent voor idealen.
Psst, geheimpje…
De mooie naam van mijn grootmoeder heb ik niet meegenomen naar de grote Engelse boekwereld. Maar hier is die er nog. Ik vond het heerlijk die een tijdlang te mogen dragen.

DEEL ÉÉN: DE LUCHTREIZIGERS

PROLOOG

1. In de keuken

2. Verwachtingen en nieuwsgierigheid

3. De burcht in het zachte land

4. Logan Airport

5. Opstijgen

VRIJDAG 16 JUNI

6. Passen en meten

7. Jezelf vergeten

8. Fakkels

ZATERDAG 17 JUNI

9. Het huis aan de rivier

10. De leeuwerik

11. Gelukkige vlinders

12. De ziel van het geheel

13. Ongerust

14. Scheppingsdrang

15. Het Creative Department

16. Set opbouw

17. De betoverde prins

18. Nachtballet

ZONDAG 18 JUNI

19. De droom van John

20. Klankpaleis en schaalmodel

21. Slenteren

22. Op vleugels in de zon

23. Bergbewoner en stralende ster

24. Come fly with me

25. Weer een droom

MAANDAG 19 JUNI

26. Het bijennest

27. Ergens mee rondlopen

28. Kinderkluwen

29. Check, check, dubbelcheck

30. Het middelpunt van de wereld

31. Witte en rode rozen

32. Jazzcafé en tangodans

33. Vuurvliegjes

DEEL TWEE: HET PAD VAN DE DWAAS

DINSDAG 20 JUNI

34. Zoektocht in een doolhof

35. Een plek voor als je ergens mee zit

36. Langs de hellingen

37. Het poppenlazaret

38. Denise Márquez

39. De grote kosmos der dingen

40. Essentie

WOENSDAG 21 JUNI

41. Nachtelijk telefoongesprek

42. Het woordeloze zuchten van het hart

43. Een reële kans

44. Het gebroken popje

45. Krijgsraad

46. Dr. Agnes

47. Overleg tussen geliefden

48. Spreekkamer in Sevilla

49. Negentien vier en tachtig

50. Winterochtend in São Paulo

51. De moeder en de vroedvrouw

52. Truck driver

53. Siësta

54. Tablao in Triana

55. Rocio

56. Midzomernachtgasten

57. Dans met mij

58. Anthony’s droom

59. Nachtsurfers

60. Charon

61. Het placebo-effecten het sterken van de geest

62. Elke tijd zijn eigen bibliofiel

63. Pijnlijke fundamenten

64. Avond in de Joodse wijk

65. Nachtgeheimen

DEEL DRIE: DE NAAM VAN HET LAND

DONDERDAG 22 JUNI

66. De kring der limousines

67. In vertrouwde bezetting op Headquarters

68. Het festival is volwassen

69. Kink in de kabel

70. Fladderen of feet-on-the-ground?

71. Vijf hectare

72. Aan weerszijden van de tafel

73. Familiezaken

74. De ezels

75. Vesperuur

76. Nachtvlucht naar Lissabon

KOMENDE AFLEVERINGEN

77. Binnenplaats

78. Strakke, witte wereld

79. Het Santa Maria

80. Sol Atlântico

VRIJDAG 23 JUNI

81. Bewolkt

82. Vlugger dan een oogwenk

83. Zonder signalement gaat ook

84. Café A Brasileira

85. Ben je er klaar voor?

86. Het popje Fabiola

87. Siësta bij de bijen

88. Zakelijk advies

89. Nog een siësta

90. On stage

91. Audiëntie

92. Vrouw aan het strand

ZATERDAG 24 JUNI

93. Weerzien na lange tijd

94. Een echte arts

95. Alles draait om kinderen

96. De Bungalow

97. Spreid je vleugels, allebei!

98. Rollercoaster

99. De santenkraam

100. Feeërieke kasteeltuin

101. Holo Art

102. Het sterrenmaal

ZONDAG 25 JUNI

103. Aan de bar

104. Limo-talk

105. Brandewijn van pruimen

106. De naam van het land

107. Je liefde en je onmacht

108. De Finale

109. De Tafelronde

110. Als de Fado maar dan Braziliaans

111. Portugees eerbetoon aan het festival

EPILOOG

112. Verankeren

113. De tijdlozen

114. De rozentuin

EINDE

OVERZICHT META-PAGINA’S BIJ DE KATALYST

De couleur locale-pagina's

Copyright © 2020 Ninabooks

Alle personen en gebeurtenissen in dit boek berusten op fictie. Elke gelijkenis met bestaande personen of gebeurtenissen berust louter op toeval

Niets uit deze uitgave mag worden verveelvoudigd en/of openbaar gemaakt, door middel van druk, fotokopie, microfilm of welke andere wijze ook, zonder voorafgaande schriftelijke toestemming van Uitgeverij Ninabooks.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm or any other means without written permission from Uitgeverij Ninabooks

Here is the complete YouTube playlist:

Playlist Twin City YouTube

Twin City…
The desert is more than a setting — it is a force.
A horizon that never ends, the eagle lifting into hot air, the long American freeways shimmering toward something half-real.
European impressionists wander in from another world, and the kind of tender, aching jazz that draws old memories to the surface moves just under the skin.

A morning star that burns too brightly, and love that makes the ground tremble
“like the heart of a trembling bird.”

Old terminal stations echo with ghosts of departures and returns.
The Kreutzer Sonata slips through the pages the way it always has through literature: dramatic, unruly, irresistible.
Loving someone — and letting that person go just when you’ve found them.
And Ravel’s Pavane pour une infante défunte, returning more than once, as if the story keeps circling a secret it isn’t ready to reveal.

And As Time Goes By…

What remains?
Maybe just this: “That I miss you.”

Before you begin, one piece to bring you into the right light — like the slow fade-in of the film’s first frame.

Chapter 1 — The gas station on the road to El Paso

The real land hidden under the American Dream.
The first wide cinematic sweep.

• Wild Mountain Honey

Chapter 6 — On the road together

A road movie inside the novel.
Einaudi’s Fly — Paris sliding past, and two people beginning to travel the same inner route.

• Ludovico Einaudi — Fly
• The Intouchables — Trailer

Chapter 16 — Pavane pour une infante défunte

A moment so still it becomes a tableau.
Ravel’s lines falling like bright dust.

• Ravel — Pavane (Ashkenazy)

Chapter 17 — The Eagle’s Flight

The desert opens.
The sky becomes a road.

• Fly Like an Eagle

Chapter 27 — The Banquet

Play the Pavane again.
The music knows its own way through the story.

Chapter 30 — Autumn music

A tribute to Nomi and her cello.
Maisky — fierce, tender, and entirely truthful.

Chapter 39 — Piano on the street

Plaza Cervantina, Ciudad Juárez.
A street turning into a stage.
John’s fingers telling stories nobody is ever ready for yet.
Debussy and Granados, or In A Sentimental Mood
And the emotional load of Casablanca’s As Time Goes Bye.

• Debussy: La soirée en Grenade, played by himself

• Hank Jones — In a Sentimental Mood

• As Time Goes By — Dooley Wilson

• Granados — Danza española No. 5

• Duke Ellington — In a Sentimental Mood (solo)

Chapter 45 — Facing Love

It takes courage.
Shallow — Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper

Chapter 46 — Morning Star

Evergreen for the glow around two sleeping lovers.
And The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face — where the world reshapes itself because someone is alive in your arms.

• Evergreen — Barbra Streisand
• The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face

Chapter 48 — The Ordinaryness Of Mysteries

Train stations.
Old Europe breathing into the scene like a second film layered behind the first.

• Françoise Hardy & Jacques Dutronc — Puisque vous partez en voyage

Chapter 56 — Rosanne’s dream

A dream that feels like falling into music.
• Sarah McLachlan — Angel — [insert link]

Chapter 60 — Kreutzer Sonata

In the novel performed by Shapiro and Carpenter.
Here played by the masters — gravity, fire, precision.

• Beethoven — Kreutzer Sonata (Perlman & Ashkenazy)

Chapter 65 — The Garden of God

A recitative, really — quiet light, quiet sorrow.
John remembers this music like a confession.
And the holiness of a vow.

• Bach — St. Matthew Passion, No. 74 Recitative
• Prokofiev — Friar Laurence (Romeo & Juliet Suite)

Chapter 66 — The letter

A scene weighted by what cannot be said.
Music that circles the unsaid like a veil.
• La Santa Cecilia — Me Verás

Chapter 68 — Rosa Ana

The Pavane again — but changed.
Mythic now.
Like Rosa Ana herself.

• Ravel — Pavane (Ashkenazy)

Epilogue

Rosanne’s laughing eyes.
“That I miss you.”
And John crossing the border, the light opening behind him…

And now?

Will there be a sequel to Twin City?
The music knows before we do.
Something new is already forming in the quiet —
and it might very well grow into the next novel.
Its title might be The Woman in the Pueblo.
Or it might change.
That’s how it is now.

Every tale leaves a door ajar. This one does too.

For now:
Enjoy the music
And feel the story.