Rainbow Rhapsody

Rhapsody Walker is a young black superstar singer with a Michael Jackson-like following, who comes to personify '60s-ish idealism in this emotional and multilayered story. Rhapsody is into his music and not much else until a life-threatening injury (sustained during one of his flamboyant performances) makes him reevaluate his materialism and the purpose to which he dedicates his talent. Guiding him, as they have since he was an infant, are his wise grandparents, Curtis and April, who raised Rhapsody on their orange grove in Florida. They are believable, memorable characters, but Rhapsody is less so. Though his evolving views on life, race relations and world peace are commendable, the evolution of his character from playboy musician to activist is too facile to be credible. His decision to write music with a ``message,'' for example, seems to be rather one more episode in a thin plot than a true epiphany. An unusual and often refreshing story, Borsten's second novel is most notable, in the end, as a missed opportunity. (Apr.)