The Minimalist

The Minimalist - Hardcover

$28.00
Sale price  $28.00 Regular price 
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The Minimalist

The Minimalist - Hardcover

by Kailee Pedersen
$28.00
Sale price  $28.00 Regular price 

Book Overview

For fans of Tár and The Piano Teacher, this gruesome and unsettling psychological drama is a darkly lucid portrait of a classical composer's descent into madness.

As the last and greatest student of famed minimalist composer Ryder Wakefield, Mia Voss has long been assured a rise to prominence in the insular world of classical music. When Ryder dies unexpectedly, she inherits everything-including the unfinished manuscript of his final composition, the mysterious Death Fugue: Music for Orchestra.

Haunted by memories of her tragic romance with Ryder's late son, Oliver--like Mia, an Asian American adoptee--Mia leaves her girlfriend behind and returns to Ryder's home to finish his last work. While there to untangle her complex relationship with Ryder, who hid his Jewish and gay identities to become one of the most important twentieth-century American composers, Mia must also contend with her lingering guilt over Oliver's suicide and her own musical ambition as the manuscript begins to exert a disturbing, mesmerizing hold over her.

Drawn from the author's own experiences as an adoptee and classical musician, The Minimalist is a harrowing examination of loss, torment, mental illness, self-harm, and artistic disintegration.
ISBN9781250328274
Author Kailee Pedersen
PublisherSt. Martin's Press
GenreLiterature
FormatHardcover
PublishedAugust 2026
LanguageENG- English
Pages272
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

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About Kailee Pedersen

Kailee Pedersen writes haunted, unsettling speculative fiction. She graduated with a B.A. in Classics from Columbia University, specializing in ancient Greek. Kailee was adopted from Nanning in 1996 and grew up in Nebraska, where her family owns a farm. Her writing on LGBTQ+ and Asian American themes was awarded an Artist Fellowship by the Nebraska Arts Council in 2015. When not scribbling down her next book, you can catch her singing opera, playing video games, or working as a software engineer in New York City. Sacrificial Animals is her first novel.

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