Deep Cuts embodies the feeling of being young and in love to the point of obsession. At college one fateful evening, Percy is standing at the barspilling all her opinions on music when she looks up to find Joe, who is captivated by her thoughts. The story follows Joe into music fame and Percy as a music lover and writer. Their friendship, love affair,.and co-dependency is almost toxic and certainly intoxicating. The deep delve into music discussions is superb with each chapter headed with a song title. The audiobook doesnt play the music, but would be best enjoyed with its accompanying playlist for full immersion. Music lovers will love this and fans of music literature like Daisy Jones and the Six. A truly captivating audiobook #Deepcuts #hollybrickley #netgalley

Music fans, you need to get this one on your radar! I went into this one expecting a contemporary romance, and whilst there is a complex relationship between Percy and Joe, the true love story is their passion for music.

Whilst some of the music references were too cool for me (I’m stuck on 60s Burt Bacharach and the Jonas Brothers 🙈), I adored all the nostalgic references to bands and songs gone by, and the way those references changed as time passed and the decades changed. I do want to make it clear that this book is very heavy on the music and songwriting element, and the will they won’t they love story feels very much secondary, as I don’t want people going in expecting a romance novel when it just feels so different to that! But I did adore the dynamic between not just Percy and Joe, but also Percy and Zoe, who is Joe’s first girlfriend in the book - their friendship was really unexpected and fun!

This is a very fresh look at what happens when art, ambition and love collide, and I found all the characters really compelling. Whilst I might not recommend it to someone with no interest in music, for anyone else I think it’s a really cool and entertaining read, and I’m looking forward to chatting to Holly about it on the 20th March - keep your eyes peeled for more details!

Joey (Joe) Morrow and Eileen Percy Marks (Percy) meet during college and bond over their shared love for music. Joe is an aspiring musician with his eyes set on the prize, aka a band and a tour, the pinnacle of musical glory in the early 2000s. What Percy thinks she lacks in musical skills, she more than makes up for in her sonic judgement. The result? When Joe wrote a lacklustre song, Percy helped him punch it up and elevated it to an earworm. Her suggestions, as shown, make songs better in a single tectonic shift.

Those scenes — Percy and Joe becoming friends over their musical tastes, riffing and jamming — are a delight to read. Brickley captures the high that comes with generating creative output so well. Fans of singers and songwriters yearn for behind-the-scenes glimpses of their craft. What’s your process like, they wonder. Did you write the lyrics and then the melody, or did you struggle with either? Brickley gives us generous dollops of the process. It’s almost surreal. We feel the adrenaline rush Percy feels as the song falls into place, as their clamour about hooks, bridges, verses becomes coherent. “Songs were always between us like a balloon we’ve been asked to keep afloat,” she says of her collaboration with Joe.

Soon enough, we also feel the hollowness that accompanies this creative fulfilment. Disconcertingly, Percy’s game-changing role as his musical sidekick existed in the shadows, where she received creative satisfaction sans accountability. A young Percy thought, naively, that she was okay with it. The creative satisfaction is enough, so she deludes herself out of a co-writing credit. The dark shadows are where envy and misunderstandings breed.

Percy is a multi-faceted person: we see her dabble in music journalism, we see her walk the music critic tightrope with her witticisms, we see her as a collaborator with incisive insights that “punch up” the songs, among a bunch of other professional roles that don’t even exist anymore. But most importantly, she was wildly ambitious about putting her musical sensibilities to good use, even if she couldn’t be the one performing. Music was her one true love, her escape, her safe space, her comfort… so was there space for another?

Deep Cuts is as much about Percy’s talent as it is about her emotional choices. It’s also a breezy introspection on a favourite question of the noughties: can you sustain a creative collaboration once romantic attraction enters the equation? Can Percy be Joe’s musical soulmate and simultaneously have a fulfilling life outside him? Is Joe prioritising their working relationship over a potential romance, ominous of what awaits her?

The brief flashes we receive into Joe’s life (and his POV) are so endearing we cannot help but root for him, “I want my music to be good. I don’t have any other options. I suck at everything else.” He does the grunt work of building the band. He takes on the risk. He deals with a sour, former band member. We know he’s worked hard to reach that stage, but he could not have done this without Percy. Both of these things can be true at once. Joe could have so easily become the tortured musician archetype, but Brickley gave a multi-dimensional character, and it made me love these characters individually as much as I relished their dynamic with each other.

There’s also Zoe, Joe’s former girlfriend (a confusing relationship, since she’s a lesbian), who grows closer to Percy and fades in and out of the duo’s lives over the years. Percy values her friendship, and Zoe becomes the connecting link between her and Joe in the more uncommunicative years of their lives.

***
Deep Cuts are the more obscure titles in a musician’s biography. They constitute the sweet spot of a musician’s oeuvre where only superfans and music aficionados take shelter. Holly Brickley’s protagonist, Percy, accords this term her own definition, “I personally like to pretend the phrase “deep cut” has a totally different meaning, one that has nothing to do with anyone else’s opinion. How deep does it cut? How close to the bone? How long do you feel it?”

It’s an easter egg for how the reader should devour this book, too. For all this talk about depth, the story operates on tangible surfaces. How much you want to feel is upto you, which is a good thing, for the book isn’t bogged down by the pretension of being something it’s not. It’s a breezy read, but not a single scene exists without purpose, and not a single editorial call is made without a callback. How strongly do you want to feel the highs and the lows (despite what the overall context of the book suggests, there are some unpalatable experiences woven in, once again, in the manner of the era: character-defining, but unacknowledged beyond the event)?

The novel’s emotional depth matches its cultural resonance. The book is a cultural time capsule: Percy’s career choices scream the early 2000s, each chapter title is a nostalgic nod, and the deep dives into music cement the era’s atmosphere. There’s lots of nostalgia for the music of the noughties: Beach Boys, Green Day, Bowie, Neutral Milk Hotel…you get the drift.

There’s a certain simplicity to the book’s core: you cannot extricate the art you create from the love you feel, your creative output into the world is defined by what the world gives you. The joy of reading this story is also the pain: in an era devoid of smartphones and damning attention spans, we perhaps got second chances and valued them, a fading feeling in the age of swiping and scrolling.

Some excellent one-liners and zingers made it a lovely, memorable, quick read. Think, “Memories are vague on context” or “Joe saw me clearly the way some people can look at an abstract painting and instantly discern a figure.” Or, my favourite, “How do you tell people you’ve only known a few months that they are your best friends without sounding pathetic?” Some vulnerabilities travel through the time-space continuum.

Deep Cuts is the kind of story meant to be adapted to the screen, and I can already envisage a comfort watch coming our way. The book has all the soft parts of some recent favourite books: the musical landscape similar to Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Daisy Jones and the Six, the coming-of-age sentiment of Lily King’s Writers and Lovers, the second chance trope like Elissa Sussman’s Funny You Should Ask, the complicated dynamic of Sally Rooney’s Normal People, and Zoe’s existence in the trio reminiscent of Gabrielle Zevin’s Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow.

Deep Cuts is more than just a love letter to the early 2000s music scene. It’s about the songs and the production as much as it is about the subcultures spawned by that music, the obsessions and coming-of-age experiences of those who found solace in music while living through world-changing events, from 9/11 to the recession. The only constant? Music as a means of self-expression, an escape that envelopes you even as you stand at the edge of the world.

I originally read the ebook ARC first, staying up 'til past 1am to finish this short but dense love letter to music that had me ruminating on long after I finished reading. I felt fully immersed as it captures Percy, Joe and Zoe spending their 20s as the hopefulness of 2000 gives way to the post 9/11 world that hurtles towards the 2008 GFC. I loved all the deep dives into songs which I subsquently listened to while reading (The Knife's beautifully haunting Heartbeats has now been in my head all day).

As an audiobook, Jayme Mattler was the perfect narration choice. While she did sound a bit older than 20something Percy, I think she still had the right vocal tones and energy to make bring this book to life that enhanced my reading experience.

The romance is a raw, messy, co-dependent, push/pull, break each other's hearts experience. Unfortunately, this was the weakest part of the book that I wish Brickley delved deeper. Joe is the typical male musician who pushes away Percy first to enjoy the groupie life, using the excuse he'd 'mess it up', but then wants her so she can fix songs. The book needed to see Joe grow during their estrangement where he acknowledges his behaviour and has proven he's changed and is fully 'all in'. A real shame because what should've been a high note felt a bit flat.

Thanks to HarperCollins UK/The Borough Press and NetGalley for the ALC.

Thank you Harper Collins UK Audio, Borough Press and NetGalley for the ALC.

Deep Cuts is a fiction book set through the 2000s with elements of romance, focused entirely around music.
Any book compared to Daisy Jones & the Six will instantly draw me in, but they've never lived up to that comparison. I would say this book is more comparable to Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow with the messy on-again-off-again relationship tangled through their passion for music and working life. To me, the more compelling relationship was Percy's friendship with Zoe.

Perfect for music lovers, the references littered throughout this novel were incredible for anyone growing up during this time. I was surprised to discover this is an authors debut and look forward to reading more from Holly Brickley in the future.
Incredibly written and well narrated. I think a lot of people will truly enjoy this story.

“How many different ways is it possible to break each other’s heart” -- and mine?

This perfectly titled debut novel by Holley Brickley was an emotional rollercoaster, and I’m still trying to recover.

Though this is a relatively short book, it packs a punch. It tackles powerful topics like grief, family trauma, alcoholism, sexual assault, gentrification, and LGBT issues. The book was full of musical references, and that the author has created a Spotify playlist with all the songs in the story, which as a music lover I was thrilled to "discover".

Both main characters were very flawed — just like real people — and their struggles to find balance in their careers and in each other’s lives felt raw and authentic. Their chemistry was palpable from the beginning & you can't help to want to root for them. The side characters were very lovable and more mature than the main characters, they kept the main characters in check and often times I found myself siding with them. Because let me tell you they will get on your nerves!

The storytelling was vivid and engaging, capturing the gut-wrenching longing I felt as I followed their journey.

Part of me wonders if they’ll actually make it... Years of wasted opportunities because neither of them could just take a break and go to therapy. I mean, c’mon, it could've saved so much TIME & drama! But hey, just like them, we’re all just stumbling through this wild world trying to figure it all out.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️☆ (4/5)

Special thanks to NetGalley for the eARC audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Unfortunately I just don’t think this was for me

The comparison to Daisy Jones initially pulled me in but I didn’t feel any of the same enjoyment
It seemed to go on and on and the music stuff was a bit too much
I didn’t connect with any characters

This was an enjoyable listen, well narrated, and easy to follow. The narration flowed well and flawlessly.

The story itself of music was fantastic and takes you to another level of mixing books with music if your a fan of both, then you're likely to enjoy this. When Percy meets Joe, she wants to help him with his music, given that they are both in the same creative flow. However, personal feelings do get in the way at times, and these things have to be addressed. Can Percy and Joe put these things aside in order to make good music and work well together and accomplish the dreams they have??

In other reviews, there was mention of Daisy Jones and the Six however personally I didn't see the correlation apart from the fact that both are about music, giving them a similar direction. This was a different era and a different feel to it for me both enjoyable but different!

With thanks to Netgalley & Harper Collins for this ELC in return for an honest review.

The Audiobook was spoken very vell, and i really enjoyed listening to it. It´s a great book and i´m looking forward to hear more from the autor.

If you are looking for a romance novel then look no further. This is a fantastic 'will they/won't they' and the sexual charge in the book was palpable! I did especially like the ending and really had no idea which way it would go.

We follow the friendship of Percy and Joe as they meet in their early 20s and develop a shared bond over music. Percy helps Joe write and edit songs and is clearly her muse and inspiration. The chemistry between them on the music sheets is clear, but will it transfer to 'between the sheets' (sorry, but also not sorry)? You will have to read the book and find out.

Deep Cuts took me right back to my early 20s when I wasted way too much time trying to impress loser male musicians who thought they were God’s gift to the world. While some readers might find that kind of toxic, chaotic energy intriguing, for me, it was like reliving a bad dream.

The story wasn’t just uncomfortable—it felt like emotional whiplash, and not in a good way. Every single one of the main characters was insufferable, and not in that compelling, love-to-hate-them kind of way. I genuinely couldn’t stand them, which made it impossible to feel invested in the story. Maybe it’ll resonate with people who find that messy dynamic entertaining, but for me, it just felt like a collection of bad memories I’d rather forget.

Struggling to rate this. Rating is more like 3.5.

Deep Cuts opens in an engaging way, immediately introducing us to our main character, her passion for music, and how a chance encounter at college has the potential to impact you for the rest of your life—for better or worse. There is an addictive giddiness in talking about your passions, and it's the same to watch someone talk about theirs; the way their eyes light up and they come alive. It's captivating. It's like this for Percy and Joe as they talk music. Brickley dissects real songs and music history, such as the relationship between Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell, while also discussing Joe's fictional lyrics. Music, and its power, is such a large presence in Deep Cuts that it feels like a third character.

The way Percy and Joe work together feels like a real relationship. They each have their own unique personalities, complete with strengths and weaknesses, though they are not as fleshed out as I'd have liked. As everything happens from Percy's point of view, we spend the most time with her and her thoughts. She's a likeable character with her fair share of realistic flaws, which will be relatable to some and not others— though the latter group may find her unenjoyably unlikeable. Percy comes off as well-versed in music and confident in her opinions, but she lacks confidence when putting herself out there in any professional capacity for songwriting, self-conscious of her lack of musical talent and whether being a music critic is an art form of its own. This internal conflict reads well and creates an authentic character.

Brickley is good at examining the themes of the nature of talent, obsession, and belonging as her characters battle their passions, egos, and jealousies. The setting of the 2000s, moving through the music and technology of that time and prior, is really cool and evokes a powerful nostalgia for anyone who grew up during that time. The audiobook narrator, Jayme Mattler, is also excellent, completely aiding the reading experience and bringing Percy to life.

The book's biggest flaw is that it lacks depth when it comes to Percy and Joe's relationship. It started off exceptional, but fades completely as the two characters end up separated for some time. With a lack of further pivotal scenes between Percy and Joe, Brickley fails to maintain the irresistible and electric passion these two characters are supposed to share. Their dysfunctional relationship doesn't reach the heights and complexities of, say, Normal People's Marianne and Connell. It's a shame because Brickley does capture this at the beginning, it just gets lost. With that in mind, the book's climax and ending are underwhelming and Percy's character development isn't that great either. This story needs a protagonist that grows way more than Percy did and it's frustrating that we didn't get that from her. Ultimately, Deep Cuts is an addictive read (or listen) that falls a little short. I am interested to see what Brickley writes next.

I was intrigued to read this book having seen it compared to Daisy Jones and the Six, which I loved. I'm sad to say, I found it to be absolutely nothing like it.

The book is based around Joe, a songwriter, and Percy, a girl who wants to be his muse, but is really just his critic and sounding board. I found both of the main characters to be one dimensional and unlikeable. Joe was arrogant and conceited, but Percy, I just felt like I didn't know at all, aside from her critiques and suggestions to Joe. The pace was slow and there was so much filler, I was just bored. I kept going and really tried to connect to the characters and their story, but with so little character development, it was hard going. I wanted to plough through to the end in case something amazing happened, but around 80% through, I realised that I didn't care.

I must mention though that there were some brilliant music references, which I enjoyed.

I am absolutely an outlier on this book as it has so many amazing reviews, so don't just take my word for it, check out some other reviews and then decide if it's for you.

2 ⭐️ Thanks to Netgalley, Holly Brickley and Harper Collins for an ARC in return for an honest review.

After reading the blurb, I was really looking forward to this. Sadly the read did not quite live up to my expectations and despite being very well-written, I was so disappointed to not be able to connect with the characters.

My rating of this book is more a reflection of me not being the right type of reader for this particular book rather than the quality of the writing itself.
Whilst I enjoyed the exploration of the dynamic of the 'creatives in a relationship' there was a huge focus on analysing Indie music which I just couldn't connect with.
Ideal for those who enjoyed 'Daisy Jones and the Six' and 'Tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow.'
I am grateful to the publishers and Netgalley for an advanced listener copy of this well narrated audiobook.

Deep Cuts follows the story of Percy an aspiring writer and her relationship with Joe , as they navigate their lives from college to their late twenties. I really enjoyed the start of the novel, and Brickley made some great societal observations. For the most part I really enjoyed the trope of using a song to reflect the mood of the chapter. Being a Brit Pop fan, I particularly enjoyed the Mis-shapes chapter (Jarvis Cocker is my God) . Given the timeline of the book Percy is roughly a year or two younger than me .A lot of her cultural references were the same ones I had in my youth; and I did find myself quite frustrated with her stupidity at times. Were we so all self-obsessed in the 90's and noughties? I read a wide range of books including the occasional YA and I kept getting annoyed at how immature Percy was , it's the first book I have ever read that truly made me feel old.
The book has had a lot of hype , pre-publication and comparisons have been drawn with all sorts of books, some of which there isnt really any correlation other than having a music theme . There are 2 peripheral best friend characters Zoe and Noemie, and whilst I liked both characters there didn't seem to much to much to differentiate between the two, so to a certain extent Noemie was superfluous . The ending of the book bothered me, the penultimate chapter should have been the last one.
I really enjoyed the narration, which is unusual for me when the narrator is North American , she had a good range of voices for the different characters in the book.
Normally if a book annoyed me as much as Deep Cuts has it would be a 2 star read but Brickley does have a real talent for writing and there were parts of the book I really enjoyed. I just wished Percy had spent a lot less time mooning after Joe .

My Taylor Jenkins Reid loving heart really enjoyed this. Definitely going to recommend this to Malibu Rising and Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow lovers. I couldn’t put this book down. So lucky to have gotten the audiobook and listened throughout the whole day. The writing was so good, i loved the character study and development.

Daisy Jones and the Six fans, this is for you!
Messy, coming-of-age, critical, chaotic.
How many different ways is it even possible for the same two people to break each other’s hearts?

The 2000s, Percy falls into the orbit of couple Joe and Zoe. Joe understands her like no one else does - offering musical insights that she feels in her soul. Zoe is the best friend anyone could ask for.
Joe is a musician and Percy helps him with his songs until the fallout drives them apart.

<b>I like how this blog is about the way music inhabits and shapes every part of the life, not just emotional but physical too. This is not something that happens with other art forms, no? One does not typically read books or observe an abstract canvas while dancing or having sex—we can only think about them while doing these things, which is not the same because the art is not as present. You’re right it is a power both beautiful and scary but mostly beautiful.
</b>
Honestly, I think this was a case of really not for me. This has raving reviews so I know it will reach its audience.

Most of this book was critical conversations about music, lyrics, bridges, chords, melodies, etc. I am not picky with my music and an entire book about people being snobby about music just isn’t for me.

The characters were all toxic and mean and self-absorbed. Basically, to me this felt like a more technical version of Daisy Jones and the Six.

<b>Now, no matter how much she smiles or claps, her eyes harden when he sings. She wants to be the only one. She wants him as her deep cut, a B-side unearthed from a rarities bin, proof of her own specialness because she's the one who discovered it, because she doesn't know how to sing her own damn song.</b>

Physical arc gifted by Harper Collins.

DNF @ 30%. Don't listen to the Daisy Jones & The Six comparisons for this, they are not apt. Not every book about music and musicians has to be the next Daisy Jones and The Six. The people I do think this is going to appeal to are the literary fiction girlies. The ones who don't mind characters that make me, personally, want to roll my eyes into the back of my head. I just really don't want to read a book about a woman's contributions to a man's work being completely undermined while the woman, fundamentally, does very little about it. What I will say in praise is that I really liked the narrator. She had a wonderful voice and did a great job of differentiating between the characters. But the actual meat and potatoes of the novel just wasn't for me.

yes ? omg
I have so many things to say but I don't know where to start, and anyway idk how to explain with actual words.
But the "hurting oneself in order to be creative" alter my brain chemistry

thank you so much netgalley for the copies