Score

The second installment in Kennedy Ryan's Hollywood Renaissance series follows two timelines: a present-day Hollywood romance set against the making of a Harlem Renaissance biopic and a college-era love story that ended in heartbreak.

In the present day, Verity Hill, a Golden Globe-winning screenwriter, meets filmmaker Canon Holt in Los Angeles. Canon wants Verity to write a biopic about Dessi Blue, a relatively obscure Black singer who rose to fame in 1930s Harlem. Verity accepts eagerly, but her excitement turns to dread when Canon reveals that the film's composer is Wright "Monk" Bellamy, a musician Verity dated in college whose relationship with her ended badly over a decade ago. Canon also announces his lead actress: Neevah Saint, a Broadway understudy whom Monk discovered.

The novel shifts to October 2014. Verity, a 21-year-old junior who recently transferred to Finley College, a Georgia HBCU (Historically Black College or University), watches Monk perform at a campus club. She is dating Petra, a premed senior, in an open relationship, but the attraction between Verity and Monk is immediate. Petra orchestrates a threesome, after which Monk tells Verity he could never share her. When Verity and Petra later break up amicably, Verity and Monk reconnect at a campus art exhibit where she is strangely fixated on a copper sculpture called Flame. Over dinner, they discover deep parallels in their creative ambitions and family wounds. Monk's pastor father destroyed their family through infidelity, making fidelity a hard line for Monk. Verity lost both parents in a fire at age 11 but refuses to discuss the details. They begin an exclusive relationship.

Their connection deepens through the winter. Verity's aunts, Roz and Grace, who raised her, press her about medication and reference a difficult period at USC, her previous college. In February, Monk finds Verity awake at three in the morning, vibrating with energy while working on a screenplay. She murmurs "I love you" as she drifts to sleep, and he whispers it back. Signs of instability emerge: an uncharacteristically bold classroom presentation, very little sleep, and restless energy, early indicators of hypomania she mistakes for confidence.

In March, a full manic episode takes hold. Verity impulsively spends her tuition money, behaves erratically at Monk's studio, then goes to a bar where she drinks heavily and dances on tables. Monk races to the bar and finds Verity in the men's restroom with a stranger whose hands are on her body. Devastated and connecting her apparent infidelity to his father's betrayal, Monk ends the relationship. Still gripped by mania, Verity runs across campus, smashes through a glass door into the fine arts building, and shatters the protective case around the Flame sculpture, believing she must extinguish the fire consuming her. Campus police handcuff her, but Dr. Sonya Garrison, her art professor, recognizes a psychiatric crisis and arranges hospitalization.

A flashback reveals the source of Verity's trauma. When she was 11, her father, Will, in the grip of paranoia and likely undiagnosed mental illness, accused her mother, Bernadette, of infidelity and shoved her. Bernadette fell and hit her head on the coffee table. Verity ran to her Aunt Roz's house. When they returned, the house was engulfed in flames and Bernadette lay on the grass with no pulse. Will, momentarily lucid and overcome with grief, ran back into the burning house and did not come out.

In the hospital, a psychiatrist diagnoses Verity with bipolar disorder, explaining that the depressive episode at USC, her stability on antidepressants, and the manic episode at Finley form a classic pattern. The antidepressant likely worsened the mania. Bipolar disorder is highly genetic, and her father almost certainly had an untreated form. Verity withdraws from Finley without explanation, changes her number, and cuts contact with everyone except Dr. Garrison, resolving that she loves Monk too much to burden him with something so volatile.

Two years later, Verity has stabilized through medication, therapy, and the support of her best friend Tessa, whom she met in a bipolar support group. On her last night in New York before moving to LA for a screenwriting fellowship, she encounters Monk at a Harlem stoop party. He demands she admit she ruined what they had. Unable to reveal her diagnosis, she confirms it, and they part bitterly.

Nine years later, Verity discloses her bipolar diagnosis to Canon after a former employer warns him she once failed to deliver a script. Canon keeps her on the project. Verity and Monk come face-to-face at Canon's house for a team dinner, and she proposes a truce for Dessi's sake. At the table reading, Verity explains how she and Canon expanded the story after Neevah discovered letters revealing that Dessi and Tilda Hargrove were lovers, and speaks openly about her own bisexuality. Monk, observing her passion, begins to question what really happened at Finley.

Months of collaboration rekindle their chemistry. During a screening, Verity tells Monk she never slept with the stranger that night at the bar, and that losing him broke her heart. After a triumphant shoot of the Savoy ballroom sequence, they kiss for the first time in nearly 12 years and negotiate a casual arrangement that both quickly recognize is more than casual. They begin a secret affair.

On location in Santa Barbara, a crew member impulsively kisses Verity; she pushes him away, but Monk witnesses from a distance and misinterprets it, making pointed comments about infidelity in front of the cast the next day. That evening, he apologizes but admits he does not fully trust her. Verity realizes the only way forward is the whole truth. She tells him everything: the bipolar diagnosis, the manic episode, her father's illness, and the night she broke into the fine arts building. Monk responds with compassion, asking to be part of her life through whatever comes. Verity agrees to exclusivity but cannot promise marriage or children, citing her parents' devastation. They commit to taking it day by day.

Back in LA, they stop hiding and exchange declarations of love. That night, Monk finds Verity awake at two in the morning, soaking wet, working feverishly on a new show concept called Black Pearl. He recognizes the pattern from Finley. Verity becomes defensive, and they argue. Alone after Monk leaves for New York, Verity has a moment of clarity: She has been slipping toward hypomania. When she learns Tessa is hospitalized, she flies to New York to support her friend and reestablish her own stability. Monk, realizing he cannot lose Verity again, is packing to return to LA when Verity appears at his door. They reconcile, each admitting their fears and need for each other.

Months later, Neevah recovers from a lupus and kidney failure diagnosis after her sister proves a compatible donor, and the final scenes of Dessi Blue are shot. Inspired by Neevah's openness about her illness, Verity discloses her bipolar disorder to the studio executive overseeing Black Pearl and receives a series order as showrunner.

In the first epilogue, set two years later, Monk and Verity live together without marriage, honoring Verity's boundaries. Monk has won an Oscar for the score. During a family visit, Verity surprises him by saying she wants to try having a baby.

In the second epilogue, two more years later, Verity visits her parents' graves for the first time since their funeral, accompanied by Monk and their infant daughter, Dessi. She tells her parents she has forgiven her father and says she is thinking about marrying Monk. In the final exchange, Verity asks Monk her signature question: What would you save in a fire? Holding their daughter between their hearts, he answers that the two of them are the only things he would save.