I'll admit it -- a lot of times I do judge a book by its cover ... ESPECIALLY when it comes to YA fiction (which you can't deny DOES feature some of the most amazing covers of life, no?). When I found VIRTUOSITY in the listing of prospective GalleyGrab reads, I don't think anything about the cover particularly drew me in and made me want to read more. In fact, I vaguely remember only glancing at the wild-haired girl and assuming it to be some kind of cheesy chick flick novel, so I moved along to the next book instead. It wasn't until I read a description on Goodreads that I stopped and thought, okay, I really want to give this one a chance. 
 Starting with plot. Carmen is a 17 year old violin prodigy who seems to have the world at her fingertips. Not only has been accepted into Julliard, received a Grammy, and been gifted a multi-million dollar violin, she is also a current semi-finalist in a prestigious international violin competition. If she wins (and she has been projected to be one of the two remaining finalists) she knows that her musical career will immediately skyrocket, making her life dreams finally come true. 
 Insecure and nervous to a fault, Carmen relies on anti-anxiety medication to get her through performances and practices -- to the point that she begins to feel addicted to her pills, always requiring higher and higher dosages to achieve that same level of calmness and sanity. To make matters worse, Carmen finds herself falling for Jeremy, the man who happens to be her biggest competition and the one person who could stand in the way of her path to stardom. When Jeremy shows interest in Carmen as well, she is conflicted -- did he really kiss her because he is interested, or is he only trying to appeal to her weaknesses and throw her off guard before her final performance? 
 In the meantime, Carmen starts to truly investigate her life and her choices, wondering if these musical dreams are really her own at all. 
 I think it took me about a chapter to realize that I had been sucked right into this book, most likely because I have a particular weakness for anything dealing with musical prodigies. Despite the fact that she had parents who were atypically famous and opportunities that were atypically extravagant, Carmen was still a realistic, relateable character, both in her struggles with anxiety and her difficulties in finding herself and her own interests. 
 I was set to give this one five stars and to mark it as a favorite -- that is, until the love story seemed to take over. I really do enjoy it when YA novels take on difficult topics, like addiction and self-discovery, but it feels like such a let-down when the potential for teenage romance takes center stage over the bigger issues in such a way that downplays everything else. While I do appreciate that Jeremy's character is written as a catalyst for Carmen's process of learning to make adult choices, I still felt disappointed when Carmen seemed so willing to give up everything for a potential fling with a cute boy. 
 I wasn't particularly impressed with the ending, and I didn't enjoy any of the romantic aspects of the story, but I still give Virtuosity a strong 4 (or maybe 4.5 stars) because I think the writing was excellent, the characters were intriguing, and the outcome wasn't immediately obvious from the start, as is the case in so many YA novels these days. VIRTUOSITY was a refreshing break from the slew of paranormal fiction that's been on my plate lately, and I will likely purchase this title for my Kindle when it is released later this month.