May 1, 2020
Even as Australian Arie mourns the death of longtime fianc�e Diana, a world-skimming concert pianist, Scottish lass Evie gives up on poetry and looks to settle down. They are finally linked by a song Diana wrote for Arie, passed from musician to musician. Following Star-Crossed; a Random House Book Club selection.
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Starred review from August 17, 2020
With this sweeping romance, Darke (Star-Crossed) spins a tender tribute to the healing powers of love and music. For seven years, gentle Australian computer whiz Arie Johnson and fiery concert pianist and composer Diana Clare have been each other’s “Amen.” While away on a concert tour, Diana finally finds the perfect closing sequence to a love song she’s been writing when she decides to accept Arie’s marriage proposal—only to die in a plane crash on her way back to Australia. Darke traces Diana’s final song as it makes its way around the world helping strangers heal their heartaches over the next two years: businessman and pianist Bene Romero heard Diana play just before she died and takes the melody home to London, where he plays it to his fractious teenager, Beatrix. Beatrix then performs it with her first love, Felix Carter, in an Edinburgh train station. After hearing them in passing, Tasmanian poet Evie Greenlees brings the song full circle when she returns to Australia and meets the still grieving Arie. Darke’s accomplished plotting, colorful settings, and keen insights into love and loss make for an outstanding romantic panorama. Readers will be wowed. Agent: Dan Lazar, Writer’s House.
October 1, 2020
Music is the language of love in Darke's latest (after Star-Crossed, 2019). Piano phenom Diana Clare always found it easiest to express her emotions through music. Before her life is cut tragically short, she plays a love song for her fianc� Arie, not knowing that it will be the only time she'll play it for him. The song travels with Diana to Singapore, where she leaves her songbook on a hotel piano. Picked up by another traveler, the book travels to Scotland, where poet Evie Greenlees hears the song from it in a train station. Evie takes what she remembers of the song and her wanderlust back to Australia, where she's overheard playing it by her neighbor?Arie. As the song brings Arie and Evie closer, it will bring others across the world together when I love you is hard to say. Written with engaging prose and charming characters, The Lost Love Song is a sweet romance that shows the power of music during times of both immense joy and sadness.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)