Novel about musical genius hits a bum note
Fiction: Us Conductors
By Sean Michaels
Bloomsbury, €22.60
‘I was Léon Termen before I was Dr Theremin, and before I was Léon, I was Lev Sergeyevich.” The opening line of Us Conductors, Canadian author Sean Michaels’s debut novel, lists the multiple identities of its protagonist.
It is a fitting opener for a complex character, based on the life of the Russian scientist Lev Sergeyevich Termen. Best known as the inventor of the theremin, an electronic musical ...