Beautiful Inez

Bart Schneider, my uncle, wrote Beautiful Inez as a prequel to his earlier book Secret Love; the protagonist in Secret Love is a secondary character in Beautiful Inez. The story focuses on Inez, an unhappy married violinist who has an affair with another woman. I was a little wary of a male author depicting a Lesbian romance, but he pulls it off fairly well.

The character portrayals are multi-dimensional, and the interweaved subplots held my interest. The sad ending made me reluctant to finish the book, but it’s a good sign that I actually cared about what happened to Inez. The musical references and atmosphere of San Francisco in the early 60’s add substance to the narrative.