Starling Darling
A funeral, a detective, and a night in Rome that changes everything
“I never wanted to be a mother.”
Lucia Starling’s mother says the unforgivable. Five years later, Lucia must contend with the past when her estranged mother Rowan, a prominent museum curator in New York City, has died. After being bequeathed Rowan’s 18th-century jade necklace with a handwritten letter, Lucia is desperate to escape her grief by fleeing to Italy.
What begins as a journey of heartache becomes a logistical nightmare. While in Rome, worlds collide during a tense encounter between Lucia and two strangers, Oliver Ström and Victor Hedlund. The result afterward is catastrophic; her hotel room is burglarized–and with it, her passport alongside Rowan’s necklace.
As Lucia quickly devises a plan to find both before they’re lost on the black market forever, she runs into Oliver in the last place she’d ever expect. Forming a tenuous alliance, they voyage on a daring mission to catch the culprit, soon learning that Lucia’s stolen necklace is only the beginning.
“Beautiful, a stunning tribute to the fractured relationships between mothers and daughters. Absolutely, phenomenal women’s fiction. Literature I will highly recommend for years to come.”
— Sunny
“This book had me giggling, laughing, gasping, and even crying.”
— Natalie
“The writing is so eloquent and poetic. A wonderful depiction of grief and love. A story about forgiveness, self-love, and empathy. LOVED. can’t wait for more books by Erica.”
— Sydney
“I went into this as I do every book - wanting to be blown away but not expecting to be. And yet I enjoyed this book so much that, unplanned, I inhaled it in a day and couldn’t put it down until it was finished.”
— Kirsten
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