Author: Camille Di Maio
Publisher: Lake Union Publishing
Year: 2019
Genre(s): historical fiction, romance
Part of a Series: No
Rating:
Why I read it: Once Upon a Book Club selection
Summary: In 1958, Kate Morgan’s life looks pretty mundane—destined to work in her family’s San Francisco restaurant until she’s old or marries a longtime friend. She dreams of a life like the one she sees in the movies and longs to do more with her life.
Then her grandfather, who suffers from dementia, charges her to go to the Hotel del Coronado and find “the beautiful stranger.” Kate does so and manages to secure a job working on the set of the new Billy Wilder movie, Some Like It Hot. Kate finds herself surrounded by faces she’s only seen on a movie screen—Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe herself. But she doesn’t have time to be starstruck—she has to find the beautiful stranger and fast.
Her first clue comes when she finds out she shares the name of the hotel’s ghost. Is there a connection between her family and the ghost? And is she the beautiful stranger? As Kate digs deeper into the mystery, she learns more about her family’s history—and herself.
