A Season in Lights: A Novel in Three Acts

Passion, ambition and escape. In the colorful artistic underworld off-Broadway, Cammie, a dancer in her mid-thirties, has just landed her first part in a show since coming to New York City. Yet the tug of familial obligation and the guilt of what she sacrificed to be there weigh down her dancing feet. Her lover, Tom, an older piano player, came to the city as a young man in the 1980s with a story eerily in tune with Cammie's own. Through their triumphs and failures, both learn the fleeting nature of glory, the sweetness of new love, and how a dream come true isn't cherished until it passes. The bright lights of the stage intoxicate, while degradation and despair lurk close behind the curtain. Their sagas are marred by two pandemics, AIDS in the 1980s and COVID-19 today, which ravaged the performing arts community, leaving a permanent scar on those who lived through them. The poignant intersection of their stories reveals a love affair unbound by time, reaching across decades through the notes of a piano's remembered song.

"A Season in Lights is an intimate, heartfelt ballad to creativity and the passion of the artist. Phillips' writing is as lyrical as a love song and as uplifting as a dream. It is not only one of my new favorite books, but possibly one of the most important odes to New York City's artists and the fragility of life since Rent." - Nicole Evelina, USA Today bestselling author of The Guinevere's Tale Trilogy and many other stories of strong women from history and today

"By drawing us into the glitz and glam of New York City's creative scene, and by examining the gritty reality beneath the shine, Phillips taps all the senses while reminding us that, no matter what happens in life, the show must go on - especially for those who dare to dream. Want a sensual but poignant romp behind the curtain? This book delivers." - Julie Cantrell, New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of Perennials