⭐⭐☆
When Hannah Montana is all
grown up and still leading a dual life, we get this completely fantastical
book.
Dara Thomas, box office gold and
Oscar winner is one lonely woman. She has one, just one, friend Carolyn
Detweiler who is also her business manager. But Dara is also a brainiac and has
an alter ego, Constance Darrow, a Pulitzer Prize winner, who is unaccountably
completely invisible except for her books. Rebecca Minton, professor of
American Literature is all but besotted by Constance and quite a fangirl of
Dara.
Rebecca writes to Constance and a correspondence
starts between the extremely reclusive writer and the professor. Both have been
single for a while, and unaccountably, just based on the fact that
Dara/Constance is communicating with Rebecca, her bff, Carolyn puts her
matchmaking cap on.
By some extremely implausible concatenation
of circumstance, Rebecca is a part of the audience during a TV interview of
Dara’s and realises that Dara and Constance are one and the same. Some more
stretches of imagination later, Rebecca finds herself consultant for the movie
adaptation of Constance’s award winning book in which Dara is the female lead.
There are more layers in the book,
including Dara’s estranged relationship with her mother and her ability as a
medium, that is, she can see and speak to the dead.
It’s all somewhat far-fetched, but
makes for a light throwaway read. Dara and Rebecca are quite likeable, though
the dialogue in some places is way too contrived. Carolyn comes across as
manipulative and controlling of Dara albeit under the guise of loving and
caring. Some of the scenes, especially with Rebecca, seem to have exaggerated
reactions from her – in particular, the scene where she realises Dara and Constance
and the same person and slyly tries to convey her knowledge while also trying
to assure silence and her reaction thereafter. But at the end of it all, a
pure, out-and-out romance with just the kind of public coming out-for-love that
makes all lesbians everywhere go ‘awww’.
⭐⭐☆
