I thought this book had a really intriguing premise and the music backdrop added an interesting level to it, particularly due to the intense relationships that exist between teacher and student in such a competitive field.

As far as how the book handled social issues, I found the race and first generation Filipino aspects of the story more compelling than the #MeToo aspects. While the ending tied things up nicely, I felt it skimmed the surface to a large degree, especially in the jump from him being her teacher to him being more and in the resolution at the end. She lacked agency throughout and needed to be told by others what to do and how to feel.

I also struggled with Claire, mostly in how she related to others. She treated her mother and her best friend very poorly and was incredibly nonchalant about her craft which just pissed me off. She was just very egocentric and not remotely relatable.

I also thought the book was more graphic than I’d expect from a YA book. Not only is the relationship extremely inappropriate but it’s also discussed in far more detail than I’d expect for something like this, and in a way that didn’t add to the story in a substantive way.

Overall, I thought this was an okay debut, I just wanted more depth and more deftness with the character development.

'Private Lessons is the story of a seventeen-year-old girl who confuses idolisation with affection when she starts to attend lessons with a charismatic, male piano teacher, Paul Avon. She has always loved playing but things become exponentially more serious when she realises that she's desperate for even a hint of Paul's approval and her feelings begin to spiral out of hand.

This is a beautiful and heartbreaking story of a girl who becomes so obsessed with being loved that she is taken advantage of, and how she makes it through this. With a devastatingly, heartbreakingly vulnerable protagonist, this is a painful and necessary story in light of the #MeToo movement.

I think that this book is one of the most difficult things I've ever read. The writing style is easy and readable, jumping between harshly realistic whilst Claire is in the real world and beautifully poetic whilst she's playing the piano, but this book contains a lot of difficult content that is not for the faint of heart. It's the kind of thing that you don't want to read but you know you have to, and I found myself crying more than once at what Claire was going through. A lot of what happens is stuff that, as someone who has gone through my teenage years already, was so believable for me and that really hit me hard. I have thankfully never been through anything at all like what Claire has in this novel, but I know how easy it is to be swept up in trying to impress people and how quickly you can lose yourself to please others, and that made this story especially poignant.

Claire makes mistakes in this book, and normally I'd call a character out on such problematic thoughts, actions and feelings, but I can't bring myself to with her. The mistakes that she makes are not mistakes made by the author in writing the story, but very intentional reminders that Claire is only seventeen-years old and trying to fit in. She's an incredibly vulnerable, innocent young girl who is desperate to be loved and found beautiful, and that's something that both the reader and the other characters can tell about her. It's painfully believable the way others take advantage of her and, in terms of emotional connection, she is probably the character I've cared about the most so far this year.

Many of the characters in this story are bad for Claire, at least at certain points, but all of them are completely believable. Every single character in this story is going through something that is affecting their emotional or mental health, and it's so impressive to see such three-dimensional characters that aren't completely over-exaggerated. It's heartbreaking that Paul is so realistic, rather than a caricature villain, and that Claire's friends so quickly swept her into lifestyles that she wasn't comfortable with. Rather than getting annoyed at Claire for her mistakes, I wanted to protect her.

The final part of this book is, thankfully, a little easier to read. Seeing the character growth in Claire and her mother particularly, and the way they are able to leave others behind, is so important to tie this story together and Cynthia Salaysay handled this incredible well. I literally couldn't put this book down until I finished the entire thing and I'm so glad that I powered through such an uncomfortable but hopeful tale of growth and recovery.

PRIVATE LESSONS by Cynthia Salaysay | Grade: C | No spoilers ahead.
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I’m not going to lie: this one was pretty rough. I’m a sucker for relevant YA novels that have something to say. And this one fits the bill: a Filipino-American teen finds herself embedded in an extremely toxic teacher-student relationship during the #MeToo era. But this interesting premise comes crashing down around some serious downfalls in the telling of this story. First of all, I found the protagonist very grating. She felt unreal, cliché, and frankly, frustrating. Her decision making seemed completely irrational and inhuman. And this sense of unrealistic characters extended to just about all of the characters in the novel. These characters made it very hard to get connected to the story and feel any sort of empathy for what they are going through. Apart from the graphic writing of the sexual scenes that felt more like erotica than YA fiction, I did, however, feel as though the relationship between Claire and Paul was plotted out well. The vile and manipulative nature of the relationship was clear, but did not beat readers over the head with it. The sensitivity and care given in detailing this relationship is what helped keep the story relevant to modern times and current audiences. Signs like these showed the potential of a good writer peeking through. One that may simply be a little misguided in her first published work. In conclusion, I am willing to chalk this up to an initial blunder in what will possibly be an author who I will enjoy in the future. A very special thank you to @netgalley and @candlewickpress for an advanced copy of the novel. While I of course appreciated this opportunity, my review is presented without bias.

This was just boring. The writing and events of the book felt very surface level. The subjects being talked about were very serious and could have been poignant, but everything fell flat. 

I didn't feel any vulnerability in Claire. She was just walking through the motions—felt very monotonous. Obviously a teacher/student relationship is NEVER okay, but I felt like it needed to be developed more. It kind of came out of nowhere. There was so much talk about Paul (the teacher) was so manipulative and controlling, but I didn't see that at all. I think there should have been tension building as the story progressed, with the climax being the specific act that happened between Claire and Paul. Then what follows would be the fallout and Claire processing the aftermath.

I think the author wrote some beautiful prose when describing Claire's connection with music and the piano—it felt very personal. Unfortunately, the story was disorganized and lacked any depth. 

ARC was provided by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to Netgalley for this ARC.

I'm not going to lie - I wasn't very impressed by this book. From the blurb, I felt like it was going to really hone in on the #MeToo movement but it almost feels a bit swept aside in this story.

I also didn't empathize with the main character. It was difficult to get a grasp of her true feelings and motivations. The voice is quite muted and that's okay but because of that it's difficult to get a sense of who she is and why she is so determined to play the piano. Wanting to go to a good college, yes, very relatable but even so it doesn't feel like a strong enough motivation.

There was also the potential to showcase more of the relationship between the mother and the daughter which ultimately fell short.

It was interesting though to see how immersive books about music can be. Even though we can't hear the music, there are at times, you can feel it through the words.

Shy, lonely Claire, 17, lives in Fremont, CA, with her widowed Filipino mother. To enhance her college applications she decides to take her piano playing to the next level. She convinces a renowned but tough teacher to take her on as a student. Leaving her quiet life to study in San Francisco every week introduces her to new friends and experiences, some of them devastating. Claire puts it all into her music. She grows and matures as she comes to terms with her own misperceptions and the transgressions of others. Throughout, beautiful music emanates from the text.

4.5 out of 5 stars!

I would not recommend this book to young teens-- I think a decent age approximation should be fifteen and up? While the book and characters make it clear that something that happened isn't good, younger readers might misinterpret it.
Claire is a seventeen year old girl who plays piano. She starts out a little NLOG with her friends, though she's already been established well enough that it feels like an added bit of fluff, rather than her whole agenda. While I don't know much about piano myself, Ms. Salaysay doesn't make lack-of-piano knowledge a stumbling block, luckily!
As I was reading this, I was getting vibes off certain characters, and I was very pleased to find out that the vibes were purposefully put into place there. Several characters call things out that Claire cannot let herself see-- an important look at a support system that teens should be aware of. Claire makes mistakes-- she's a teenager, after all, and the book walks us through some of the ways she is impacted by them.

Claire's relationship with her mother swings up and down, like all teenage relationships, deepened by the loss of her father. Realistic and deep, it's one of the highlights of the book.

I think this will find readers in my high school library; the character development is solid and the pacing is good.

DNF. While I liked the writing style and classical music references, I was not expecting this book to be nearly as sexually explicit as it was. Not my thing at all.

***Thanks to NetGalley for providing me a complimentary copy of PRIVATE LESSONS by Cynthia Salaysay in exchange for my honest review.***

2.5 STARS

I loved the premise for PRIVATE LESSONS. The scenario of teacher grooming student happens too often. Paul’s methods of withholding praise was a particularly unkind manner of grooming Claire, so eager for his approval. Although I never took music lessons, I knew a piano teacher very much like Paul with his coldness and sexual inappropriateness.

PRIVATE LESSONS is a better book than my enjoyment of it. Reading Cynthia Salaysay’s debut felt like a chore rather than a pleasure. I had difficulty connecting to Claire’s narration and her character and didn’t feel her supposed passion for piano. Did nobody tell her how to interview? Her blasé attitude and lackluster audition with Paul didn’t convince me she cared about piano. Claire acted like her mom could simply print money with her sense of entitlement. Claire wanting to please and feeling inadequate felt authentic, especially with her mom’s Filipino roots.

Salaysay’s writing, while adequate, had more telling than showing often feeling like words on a page without much excitement. Still, in the #MeToo era of confronting abusers like Paul, private lessons is an important and timely story.

Since Private Lessons will be expected to publish on May 12th, 2020, I will do my best not to spoil anything.

In a brief, Private Lessons is about a seventeen-year-old girl named Claire Alalay who lost his father at a young age. The way she copes herself after she lost her father is only through music especially when she plays the piano. So, she decided to take private piano lessons with Paul Avon, the best piano teacher. For that, she needs to go through Paul's audition and get a place for it becomes one of Paul's students. In her journey through her piano lessons and her life in general, there's a lot of things she has to go through. The need to practice hard day by day to get Paul's approval, grief over her father's death, and people taking advantage of her.

I..have a mixed feeling over the story, honestly. I couldn't get through the story. It seems really hard to connect with the whole story. One part, I do understand and another part, I felt nothing. There are parts that I feel uncomfortable. I know for the fact that this happened around us, so the character is really understandable with the whole situation she has to face it. It wasn't easy for her too. Claire is naive somehow at the same time, she was really irritating to me. I don't hate her, it just annoyed me with her attitude.

The story has been crafted well. The way the author portrays the real deal on how cunning people around Claire. It may not easy to read for me but I manage to finish the book so that I can be sure Claire is okay. It may not be my cup of tea but it is what it is. Don't get affected by my review, this is what I felt and it might be different for you.