Behind every great love song is a great love story, from the author of Star-CrossedNAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY PUBLISHERS WEEKLY • “A tender tribute to the healing powers of love and music . . . Readers will be wowed.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)Concert pianist Diana is finally ready to marry her longtime fiance, Arie; she’s even composing a beautiful love song for him, and … she’s even composing a beautiful love song for him, and finishes it while on tour. Before she can play it for him, though, tragedy strikes—and Diana is lost to Arie forever.
But her song might not be.
In Australia, the world has gone quiet for Arie and he lives his life accordingly, struggling to cope with his loss. In Scotland, a woman named Evie is taking stock of her life after the end of another lackluster almost-relationship. Years of wandering the globe and failing to publish her poetry have taken their toll, and she might finally be ready to find what her travels have never been able to give her: a real home. And through a quirk of fate or circumstance, Diana’s song is passed from musician to musician. By winding its way around the world, it just might bring these two lost souls together.
With heart-wrenching emotion, The Last Love Song explores what it means to be lost, what it means to be found, and the power of music to bring people together.
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The opening description for this book reads, “Concert pianist Diana is finally ready to marry her longtime fiancé, Arie; she’s even composing a beautiful love song for him, and finishes it while on tour. Before she can play it for him, though, tragedy strikes—and Diana is lost to Arie forever. But her song might not be.”
How could I not want to read this? I adore music and romance, so I dove in and discovered two things: there’s a lot of omniscient voice (where the narrator tells you things that the characters don’t know) and there are so many characters it’s hard to keep them all straight.
At first I didn’t like either of them. Then the more I read, the easier it got.
The novel reminds me of the movie Love, Actually with its many stories and characters that seem unconnected but somehow weave themselves together into a cohesive whole. The Lost Love Song is like that, and more.
The path of life is not a straight line. There are meanderings, lost footings, silent slippings through still forests, and raucous stompings over dusty roads that eventually connect you with the places that shape you, the people that lead you to where you need to be. Where you were always meant to be.
This is the wonder of The Lost Love Song. In the beginning, Arie, an unremarkable computer nerd, falls in love with Diana, a gorgeous, brilliant pianist, who composes a beautiful love song before a tragic accident claims her. But the song lives on in a journey that winds around the globe, intersecting with people’s lives in mysterious ways, giving hope as it passes from one person to the next. The characters who make up this story are anything but ordinary. They seem so improbable at first. And the author’s writing style is anything but ordinary. The word choices, the descriptions, the myriad of details, and the dialogue are all inventive, unique, emotional. Jumping from one character story to the next sometimes felt jarring, then I settled into the new person and began the next part of the journey. And, oh, what a journey, filled with wrong turns, bad decisions, lots of second guesses, along with kindness, understanding, wisdom, and joy.
Words live. Songs live. Memories live and fade and change and allow the heart to make room for more, for another love. The Lost Love Song will be this other love, winging its way into your life and your heart, to live on, for a long time.
The best reason for five stars is because when I finished the book, I actually missed the two main characters! Well written and totally original story.
It was a very unusual plot and very enjoyable.
Enjoyed it! Touching love story!
Simply put, I loved this book. It broke my heart, but I kept reading and then it mended it. It does jump around quite a bit and that is the only reason for the 4 stars instead of 5. The end justifies the time invested. If you need a really good book and have just a modicum of patience, buy this book, you will be glad you did.
Really enjoyed this book. The main character was really a song that traveled and effected many people as it traveled changing lives. Music has away of doing that and this book showcases the power of a wonderful song.
The Lost Love Song
By Minnie Darke
This is such a beautiful and poignant written story about finding love, second chances and and music that heals broken hearts. This book was pretty special and love tis emotional and heartwarming love story. The story was sad and the grief was captured so beautifully. I loved the writing and the immersive story that really drew me into the story investing my time with these characters. Truly a fascinating read I loved..
Diana may be gone, but her love song lives on, and will do anything to work it’s magic to bring happiness back into the lives of those it touches, especially that of her beloved Arie.
As a musician (hobby, not professional), I couldn’t resist this one. Music and songs, how could I? I loved the idea of a love song making it’s way around the world, and could only wonder if it would ever make it’s way to the ears of the man it was meant for. This novel ended up being heartbreaking, but beautiful. I just wish I could have heard the love song for myself.
The Plot: A Second Chance at Love
Concert pianist Diana blew into IT tech Arie’s world like a force to be reckoned with. He understood her and was caught up in the whirlwind that was her for seven years. On the eve of her departure for her upcoming tour, after discussing marriage yet again, Diana begins to write a song. A love song. As her way of saying, yes, she’s ready. But, on a routine flight from Singapore to Paris, tragedy strikes and every soul on board is lost.
Arie is lost. Diana was his life, his world. Two years later, he’s still reeling from her loss, still clinging to the past, unable to move forward, unwilling to acknowledge it’s possible. Half a world away, struggling poet Evie is in Scotland. After years of traveling the world and never making it anywhere as a poet, a piece of music played by two teenagers on cello and flute tells her it’s time to return home.
Both struggling to figure out where to go now, Arie and Evie become unexpected temporary neighbors. There’s a spark, but Arie may be too unwilling to let go of the past to move forward and Evie is only willing to settle for a future. But, through it all, Diana’s song has been making it’s way across the world, on a mission to bring happiness back into Arie’s life.
The Lost Love Song is a very sweet story. At its heart, it’s about the ties people form and how music has a hand in shaping it. Not only is it about the love between Diana and Arie and Arie and Evie, but also musicians across the world, whether familial or romantic. It’s a beautiful story full of hope while also focusing on the process of grief, making it a little bittersweet. One thing I wasn’t a fan of was how slowly it went at first. It took forever for Arie and Evie to meet, but it allowed a good breathing space for them to develop on their own, for the reader to get to fully know them, before their stories meshed. Another disappointment was that there wasn’t more about the song going around the world. Told in interludes, the reader gets to meet various musicians around the world, their stories, and how the song impacts them, but it chooses to focus on only some of them instead of showing how it touches so many musicians everywhere and is passed along the way.
Similar to Something to Live For, it focuses mostly on the male. In this case, it’s mostly Arie’s story, though Evie does get to say a fair bit, especially as the story goes on. It doesn’t have the light fluffiness typical romance has. Most of the novel feels quite heavy as the characters’ grief is ever-looming and the disappointments many of them also carry never really dissipate. But the romance is sweet, meandering as usual but also straightforward with a worthy heroine.
The Characters: A Beautiful Triad
The Lost Love Song is about Arie, Diana, and Evie. There are a number of supporting characters from Arie’s well-meaning friends to Diana’s mother to the musicians who help move the song around the world. They are the supporting bass clef while Arie, Diana, and Evie are hard at work crafting the melody. They’re there to add depth, to help further express the three main characters, to show the effects of Diana’s song.
Even though Diana dies early on, she’s still a powerful force throughout the novel. A vibrant young woman with a passionate heart, her song carries her legacy, touching hearts and creating and mending relationships around the world. Arie was always her support, her stability, so it was interesting to see how he developed once the life was taken out of him. He’s incredibly steadfast and unwavering. Once Evie touches down in his life, he’s shaken and unsure, and much of the novel explores the small but mighty shifts in his life. Evie has been hurt, cast aside, and never seems to really get anywhere, but she clings to hope and knows what she wants and is unwilling to settle for anything else. Not quite the force Diana is, she’s more grounded while still believing in love.
The Setting: Mostly Australia
Most of The Lost Love Song takes place in Australia. At first, as a Northern Hemisphere inhabitant, it was jarring and difficult when it was summery in January and freezing in the middle of the year. I don’t think I ever fully acclimated, especially as the novel also takes the reader to Scotland and Canada, but I did like how it explored the world a bit, mostly in terms of weather. It also helped shape the power of a single song and how universal the feelings it evokes are.
Overall: Bittersweet
The Lost Love Song is a bit of a slow read. There’s a lot of grief to process at first, and it never really goes away. But it’s still magical in its own way as it shows how music can bring souls together. I loved the idea of the song drawing Arie and Evie together, of both of them recognizing it and having it in common, almost as though it was Diana guiding two worthy souls to happiness. There’s a healthy dose of kismet, but is handled so artfully that the story just winds together perfectly, as though everything in it really was meant to be. Once in a while it did seem a little unbelievable, but the characters really do a good job of pulling it together because of how well developed they are. Overall, a very sweet, albeit heavy, read.
Thank you to Netgalley and Ballantine Books for a free e-copy. All opinions expressed are my own.
I loved, loved, loved this book. It was a heartbreaking, magical, poetic and beautiful love story. How one unfinished love song brought many people together was incredible. It really warmed my heart when Evie, said, “It would always be the song that told the short, bittersweet story of the time she fell in love with a man who could almost love her back, but not quite.” Did he love her back? Would that one song eventually bring Evie and Arie together again? You’ll have to read this exquisitely written book to find out. I rushed through it at first. Then slowed down towards the end because I did not want it to end. I even listened to Spiegel im Spiegel, a song mentioned in the book, while reading that section. I was transfixed by that beautiful piece and pictured Diana playing it in a red dress. I have not read any other books by Minnie Darke but you can bet that I will be reading more of her books. This one is highly recommended by me.
Thank you to Ballantine Books and NetGalley for the review copy.
4.5 stars rounded up!
The Lost Love Song is refreshingly sweet, heartwarming, and hopeful. Minnie Darke magically weaves a tale of love that’s modern and unique. It feels like a classic love story, but new and different.
As the lost love song is passed from place to place and character to character, the reader gets the sense that the world is not so small, but it’s our connections with others that make it seem that way.
And that’s what I loved so much about this book: how all the stories were connected, how all the different types of loves were inspired and spurred from a simple love song. How something so seemingly small can have such a big impact. And that with each passing, the song grew and changed because the recipients loved it and made it their own.
I’m also discovering that I really just adore books set in Australia.
Our main two characters are Arie and Evie. They’re both well-rounded and flawed, making very human mistakes and choices. The same can be said for the secondary characters. It’s through them that the love song makes such a momentous journey. I love it when authors show that we learn from our mistakes, and sometimes it’s only through the mistakes that we arrive where we should be. Life is messy, and it shouldn’t be any other way.
As a hopeless romantic and a music lover, I am the perfect audience for this lovely story. Minnie Darke does such a beautiful job describing this most influential love song, I only wish we could hear it. The Lost Love Song was a joy to read, and I hope it gets all the attention it deserves.
Thank you to Random House Publishing (Ballantine Books) and Netgalley for an advanced reader’s copy!
What a wonderful story of love, loss, tragedy, heartbreak and the incredible healing power of music. This book was my introduction to this author and I am so glad I got the pleasure of receiving an advanced copy of this book to read. It would be a gift at any time, but during the time of a global pandemic a that much more special. Arie, a painfully shy man falls for Diana, a world renown concert pianist. And so begins seven years of a beautiful loves tory that Arie hopes will go on forever. When Diana returns from a tour he is hopeful that she will accept his marriage proposal and unbeknownst to Arie she is ready to say yes. Sadly, that doesn’t happen, but the beautiful love song she wrote for him manages to make its way all around the world and touch people in many ways in its different. If you’re a fan of Love Actually you will adore this book even more! The love stories, the people and the journeys they all travel with Dianas beautiful love song as the backdrop will draw you in immediately and you will not realize that hours have gone by until you check your watch. If this doesn’t make you feel hopeful than I cannot imagine what will. It is a truly wonderful written love story by someone who understands what true love really is. I look forward to reading more by this author.
4-4.5 stars
This was a very emotional and ultimately heartwarming romance. I loved the premise of the book, but I don’t think I was quite prepared for how heavy and sad the beginning would leave me. I actually had to step away from the book for a bit to regroup and get my feelings in order. It’s not that the book itself is sad, but a tragic event (see CW below) sets in motion a domino effect that touches so many lives.
I really loved the journey that Arie and Evie both took through this novel. Each had to find their way after being lost and decide on their own when and if they would ever be ready to move forward. It was heartbreaking, but also uplifting seeing them stumble and get back up. The author captured the grief and vulnerability so well and I found the writing truly wonderful. The romance itself is closed door, but there was something profoundly moving and tender about it.
The book is broken down into several parts and interludes and features numerous characters. This was both a positive and negative for me. As much as I loved how cleverly the author wove each and every character into the story, there were times that it felt like too much. I could see the number of characters and connections possibly being an issue if I enjoyed this as an audiobook. I think the mini stories detracted somewhat from the main storyline between Arie and Evie and caused the flow of the novel to stall in certain places. The overall effect, however, was very powerful. I especially loved and appreciated the Coda chapter at the end. Overall, The Lost Love Song was a heartwarming novel and I look forward to reading more by this author in the future.
CW: airplane crash, death of loved one
*I voluntarily read an advance review copy of this book*
Superb tale of serendipity rising out of tragic loss
What a well-woven tale of lives intersecting randomly to carry an outpouring of love around the planet! The sadness from the beginning of Arie’s story remains present throughout but morphs, with the help of time and a well-traveled tune, to a bittersweet remembrance and allows him to rebuild a life open to new romantic possibilities.
I really adored the way the author snaked her way around the globe, from Melbourne and Singapore to the United Kingdom, Canada, the U.S. and even through several states in Australia. And the randomness of how Diana’s tribute to her feelings for Arie gets released to the public. It’s imaginative and a plot that seems difficult to assemble, like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle that individually don’t make sense but, with time and patience, finally come together seamlessly.
The secondary players in Arie’s story, befittingly many of whom are amateur or professional musicians, add some side interest and an extra zing of romance, but Evie and Arie are, without question, the focus and heart of this emotional and wonderful novel. Bittersweet but hopeful: yes, that’s the way I’d sum up my feelings at its conclusion. And I think I will be ready and waiting for the next work Minnie Darke has in store.
Thanks to Random House/Ballantine publishers and NetGalley for providing an advance copy of the book; this is my voluntary and honest review.
4.25/5
The cover is a bit misleading as the story is not all happy and light (tissues, maybe?)…but I loved it.
It’s fiction, so if you can look at far-fetched instances as “fate”, luck, coincidence or a God-thing, underneath it all are multiple stories of how (as Forrest would put it), “Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.”
It all centers on a lost love song and how it touches characters during different times/experiences in their lives. Foremost there’s love, but also restlessness, loneliness and loss, and ultimately hope as they each deal differently with the messiness of life. So while at its core it’s a “feel-good” story, there’s a lot of things to get through along the way there.
Beautifully written and highly recommended.
Thanks very much to #NetGalley and #BallantineBooks for providing me the ARC. The opinions are strictly my own.
This book broke my heart then slowly put it back together again. What an absolutely magical love story! The couples in this book are connected through one song that Diana writes for her fiancee Arie. The Last Love Song is an amazing love story that deals with love, loss, grief, and young love. I loved the cast of characters and each adds their own story to this amazing book. I loved this book and have to say it is truly one of my favorite books of the year! I received an advanced readers copy and all opinions are my own.
Arie can’t believe his luck when they concert pianist Diana falls for him. In the seven plus years they are together Arie pushes for marriage and feel she should comply. after all they have moved into a home she loves as her piano must have its own bay window. She leaves him to tour the world and so when he gives her what borders on an ultimatum she agrees and starts to compose a love song just for him. But before she can finish she and the song are lost. Or is the song out there for someone to find and play.
Different reasons people fall in love is a theme explored in the novel. along with moving on after heartbreak. and tackling the facts of what make you worthy of love.
The story starts with being told in Arie AND Diana’s point of view. The way they fall in love, the way they place each other up on pedestals no one can topple. The way the color red seeps into everything “Diana” is just an absolutely stunning literary masterpiece of a tragic love story.