Title: The Glittering Star
Author: Frances Dallalba
Date: 2024
ISBN: 978-0-6451162-7-4
Quote: "[W]hat does she understand about how wind farms can only be built in remote locations, which then destroys the visual aesthetics of that landscape? What about the impact they have on our unique local wildlife?"
Twenty-eight years before the main story begins, a woman hid a large white sapphire, well wrapped, in between the submerged roots of a tree beside the lake. Then she went home and married an old friend who had the same coloring as the father of the baby she was about to have. When the man her daughter Roberta always called "father" died in an accident, the woman told Roberta where to find the sapphire, hoping that Roberta would find her own father for herself. She will, but first she'll find an attractive young man...
It's another contemporary romance, with a few explicit scenes, from an author whose goal is to celebrate the unique and romantic environment in her corner of Australia. A tree kangaroo will pass through one scene. Roberta's temorary job, waitressing on a tour boat, will lead to moments of wealth and fame. And Nate, the attractive young man, is protesting the destruction of virgin forest to build a wind farm. When the clever local policeman handcuffs them together, Nate and Roberta hiss and spit, but you know they'll be purring and cuddling by the end of the book.
The story could have been written as a mystery--who now rightfully owns the sapphire? Roberta's mother had received it as a gift, but had it been stolen? As it's written, the romance pushes the mystery to one side. The mystery will be solved, but not by Roberta.
If you can relate to a heroine who's been allowed to indulge her "temperament," up to and including hitting people, because she's small and cute, and don't mind a little explicit premarital sex in a romance, The Glittering Star is for you.
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