Great Expectations: Read an extract from Melody Trumpet by Gabrielle Tozer

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At first glance you may be fooled into thinking that Melody Trumpet has an idyllic childhood. Her parents are opera superstar Viola Trumpet and renowned conductor Barry T Trumpet and they are determined to provide the heir to the Trumpet dynasty everything that she could possibly need and more.

There is one catch, however – it is essential that Melody lives up to the promise of her heritage and be a musical genius. Surely this isn’t too much to ask? The other catch is that Melody can’t hold a single key in tune and shows little to no musical talent.

Her parents quickly realise that the only way to handle things is to hide her away and bring in the experts.  Naturally, they enlist the help of Mr Pizzicato, the man who managed to train a chicken to sing opera, to give Melody secret lessons at the Battyville Elite School for Musically Gifted Children.

And so, begins the attempt to transform Melody into a musical genius but perhaps while her parents are attempting to transform her, they are missing her most important gift.

Everything comes to a head when Melody is invited to open the debut performance for Battyville Elite School for Musically Gifted Children. Can Melody manage to learn to sing or play any kind of instrument before the performance or will the lie her parents have been telling the world be exposed and the Trumpet name be destroyed?

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Gabrielle Tozer is an award-winning and internationally published author and freelance writer based in Sydney, Australia. She has published five books, including the young adult novels Remind Me How This Ends, which was on the Children’s Book Council of Australia’s 2018 Notable list and longlisted for the State Library of Victoria’s 2018 Gold Inky Award, Faking It and The Intern, which won the 2015 Gold Inky Award.

Her first picture book, Peas and Quiet (illustrated by Sue deGennaro), was published in 2017, as was her YA contemporary short story ‘The Feeling From Over Here’ (featured in Begin, End, Begin: A #LoveOzYA Anthology, the Book of the Year for Older Children at the 2018 ABIA Awards). In 2019 she will be releasing her first children’s novel, Melody Trumpet, and she is currently working on another young adult novel. (Yes, that’s why she still hasn’t brushed her hair.)