A Song for the Absent

A Contemporary Romance Novel by Kosuke Onishi, Esq. When a woman who once sang at the Metropolitan Opera loses her voice to grief, can music teach her to love again? Maya Reeves was a rising star in New York's opera world until her father's illness pulled her home to Portland — and into silence. Eleven years later, an unexpected audition for a new musical, A Song for the Absent, forces her to confront the voice she buried and the past she cannot forget. On stage she meets David Brenner, a brilliant composer whose music translates longing into sound. Together they build a world of melody and memory, where every note is a confession and every pause a truth too fragile to speak. What begins as performance becomes intimate revelation — and soon, Maya must decide whether she can risk her heart for a love born from art. From the author of The Verdict of Ashes and The Prosecutor's Bible comes a sweeping romance about grief, redemption, and the power of music to heal what silence breaks. Set against the backdrop of Portland's theater scene and the echo of Broadway, A Song for the Absent is a story of a woman who finds her voice — and in doing so, finds her life again.