Review: DAUGHTER OF MINE by Laura Fabiani

Tiziana Manoretti is a successful young engineering technologist who lives with her parents and leads a happy, active life until she discovers a long-held secret about her origins. She feels betrayed and angry, and decides to go on a trip to Italy, and specifically Gaeta, the village where she was born. There Tiziana hopes to find some answers and reflect on the revelations recently gleaned from her parents. While there she wastes no time in meeting new people and experiencing the local cuisine and culture.

This novel contains romance, suspense, humour and a hint of mystery. The chapters are fairly short and the plot moves along at a fair pace; it kept my interest. Occasionally, I found elements of the story a bit hard to believe but certainly not enough to hinder enjoyment of it. The characters are distinctive and well developed, and although I did find a few of the physical descriptions of the males slightly ‘cookie-cutter-ish’, the character of Giacomino (a man whose mother tries to find appropriate and newly arrived tourists to marry her son) lent quite a humorous touch. The descriptions of Naples, Rome and Gaeta were vivid, colourful and made reading the novel feel like one had recently visited the country. I also enjoyed reading about the local cuisine and life in Italy where

“…Italians sped, ran through red lights, and honked other drivers out of their way, hurrying along to jobs where service to the public was always in slow mode.”

Daughter of Mine is a charming, engaging novel complete with several twists and turns to keep the reader’s interest. Anticipation of what will happen next also keeps the pages turning and ends the story with a satisfying conclusion.

I'd like to thank the author for giving me the opportunity to read and review her book and I look forward to reading her next novel.