Composed Through Chaos

Book cover for 'Composed Through Chaos' by Kirsten O'Connor, featuring a woman with red hair wearing a denim jacket and headphones, standing outdoors against a blue sky with clouds.

A contemporary YA novel about finding your voice when silence feels safer.

Sixteen-year-old Kendel keeps her sleeves down, her head low, and her music turned up. Home is a place she can’t quite trust, and school is a stage where everyone’s acting like they have it together. Her plan? Stay invisible, survive, and wait for the future to start.

Then Aiden walks into her school. He’s observant, unpredictable, and somehow sees straight through her walls. What begins as an awkward partnership turns into a creative collision; a shared song that sparks a connection neither of them expected.

But as the melodies grow louder, so do the questions Kendel has spent years avoiding. To find her voice, she’ll have to risk using it; even if it changes everything.

Composed Through Chaos is a raw, poetic story about friendship, love, and the courage it takes to speak up. For readers who know what it’s like to carry untold stories, this is for you.

About the book

  • Scenic landscape with a large body of turquoise water, rolling green hills, and mountains in the background under an overcast sky.

    What you'll find inside

    In a house built on control, she learns freedom has its own soundtrack.

    This isn’t a story about having it all figured out.
    It’s about survival, secrets, and the quiet rebellion of finding your own voice.

    Told through the eyes of sixteen-year-old Kendel, Composed Through Chaos traces the spaces between silence and song; where control suffocates, music heals, and love becomes a lifeline.

    Inside, you’ll find a raw, unflinching look at what it means to risk being heard, and the courage it takes to play the first note.

  • A modern house situated on a hilly green landscape with snow-capped mountains in the background under a cloudy sky.

    Who is this for?

    For readers who love YA that’s real, raw, and refuses to sugarcoat life.
    Perfect for fans of The Fault in Our Stars, All the Bright Places, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower, and for anyone who’s ever felt trapped, unseen, or on the edge of something braver.

  • Modern wooden house with a large glass window, set against a mountainous landscape with dry grass and small trees in the foreground.

    Excerpt From Composed Through Chaos

    He looks up.

    And it’s like being caught in a spotlight she didn’t consent to. Not because he’s staring. Not because he’s flirting. But because his eyes hold hers for a beat too long, like he’s listening.

    Not to the hallway.

    To her.

    He doesn’t fit into any category she recognises.

    He feels like a chord she doesn’t know how to play; slightly off, unresolved, and impossible to ignore.

     Panic sparks low in her chest. Kendel looks away fast, heart hammering, as if he’s seen something she’s spent years hiding.

    [Read the full sample chapter →]

  • Modern house with wooden exterior and stone steps leading to a patio, set in a landscape with green hills and snow-capped mountains in the background.

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