Denver hits play on her phone, and the girls start to sing: When “Merc” emerges from mic check, they catch a glimpse of his glinting, diamond-encrusted Air Force 1’s through the throng of fans. Cellphone, backing track, and portable speaker in hand, she, Dali, and Shak drive to Newark, New Jersey, hoping to get noticed in the crowd outside the Prudential Center before the show. But Denver’s got eyes on a much bigger prize-fame, fortune, Grammys, greatness.ĭenver decides to make her own opportunity for a big break when she hears RB superstar Sean “Mercury” Ellis is performing nearby. Together with best friends Dalisay Gómez and Shakira Brown, Denver forms Angelic Voices, an RB trio whose otherworldly harmonies win them first prize in the local corn festival talent competition: $50 and a bushel of corn (split three ways). 2), a novel in verse, is the story of 17-year-old Denver Lafleur, a singer/songwriter with a talent that cannot be denied, nor contained by her small Pennsylvania hometown. That formative experience on the extreme roller coaster that is the contemporary music industry helped shape Charles’ most personal book to date. “There were four of us-and then there were three of us,” she says. It was a whirlwind time with major highs, major lows, and friends and bandmates lost along the way, she tells Kirkus via Zoom from her home in New Jersey.

The group performed with Boyz II Men, appeared on BET and Showtime at the Apollo, and-yes-had a song on the radio. “I used to be that girl,” says New York Times–bestselling author Tami Charles, who joined an all-girl RB singing group in the 1990s, when she was just 13.

The girl who hears her own clear voice on the radio at night. Cuts a record on an honest-to-goodness label, tours the world. The girl who forms a singing group with her friends in middle school, performs at all the local events, wins prizes, gets noticed, gets signed. You know that girl-maybe you are that girl-the one with sky-high talent and the drive to match.

Tami charles muted