The Starry Child

Rating:
Summary: Wow!
Review: Lynn Hanna sure knows how to write a beautiful book! This is a lovely story about a mother and daughter and the man they meet who will try to straighten out the mess their lives have turned into.

Images of Scotland take the reader there, and the characters will endear themselves to you. I love a good paranormal romance novel and this is one I highly recommend to all.

I hope Lynn Hanna has many more books in the works.

Rating:
Summary: Wow!
Review: Lynn Hanna sure knows how to write a beautiful book! This is a lovely story about a mother and daughter and the man they meet who will try to straighten out the mess their lives have turned into.

Images of Scotland take the reader there, and the characters will endear themselves to you. I love a good paranormal romance novel and this is one I highly recommend to all.

I hope Lynn Hanna has many more books in the works.

Rating:
Summary: Beautiful imagery, wonderful characters, magical story!
Review: Paperback: 321 pages
Publisher: Novelbooks, Inc.; August 25, 2003
ISBN: 1-59105-236-X
...

The spellbinding story of Rainey, Sasha, and Matt is now available at NOVELBOOKS, INC. with a brand new cover and new editing! Don't pay outrageous prices for the old, out of print copy, when you can have this wonderful brand new version!

Rainey and Sasha are as close as a mother and daughter can possibly be - Rainey being very protective of Sasha since she stopped talking, and started exhibiting bizarre behavior after her father's death.

Enter Matt, a linguistics professor, who hears Sasha talking in the old Gaelic on a video tape. He is sure he can help this distraught mother and her unusual daughter, and sets about proving just that.

THE STARRY CHILD is a delightful and haunting tale told by award-winning author, Lynn Hanna. I can't wait for the new and improved copy of the sequel, CIRCLE OF TIME, to be released in April of 2004 by NOVELBOOKS, INC., and the (finally!!) third book of the series tentatively scheduled for release in August of 2004, also by NOVELBOOKS, INC.

If you missed this enchanting tale the first time around, be sure to get it NOW!

Rating:
Summary: Starry Child
Review: Rainey Nielson is a young widow, due to a fatal commercial plane crash three years ago. Her eight-year-old daughter, Sasha, hasn't spoken a word since. Rainey brings her to medical psychiatrists, special schools, and anything that has come across her path that seemed to have a faint hope of working. But nothing has gotten better. Sasha drifts farther and farther away from Rainey as each day goes by. Whenever thunder strikes, Sasha gets a glazed look about her and will immediately climb on top of the highest object in the room, stable or not. The people from Child Welfare feel that it's best to take Sasha away from Rainey for a while. Things are getting desperate. Then one night, Rainey's neighbor, Emma, watches a video from Sasha's fifth birthday party, before her father died. In it, Emma notices, Sasha doesn't only speak English, but the almost dead language of Gaelic. This is a new mystery - where would Sasha have learned Gaelic? Emma suggests her son's friend, a linguist. But Rainey isn't so sure. What if this Macinnes fellow wants to use Sasha for his own research? What if he's going to expose her like all the others have tried to do? Rainey will do anything to keep Sasha safe, after all, she's the only person she has left. They need each other. But through Matt Maccines, Sasha and Rainey find a new world. A world of Scottish legends and stolen crowns and mysterious waterfalls. Through this legend, Matt and Rainey discover the secret of Sasha'a silence, but also a deep affection for each other that will bring them together as a family.

Rating:
Summary: A STARLIT FAIRY TALE
Review: Sasha has not been able to communicate verbally with anyone since she was five. She became a quasi-elective mute when her father died in an airplane accident. By eight, she is a veteran of special schools and misguided experts. One of these "experts" is bound and determined to have her institutionalized so he can use her as a chemical guinea pig. Her mother fights like a soldier for her and refuses to institutionalize her and protects her from gawking strangers, intrusive strangers who misinterpret her muteness as evidence of abuse. One intrusive little boy and his ill mannered mother make trouble for Rainey and Sasha when Sasha ignores the boy's entreaty to play on the see saw with him. The boy's mother meddles, makes inappropriate comments and later reports Rainey to Child Protective Services.

As another reviewer noted, the villians stand out in stark contrast to the other characters. In the old west, they'd have a show down in Dodge City and wear hats that identify their good or bad guy status.

Hope comes in the form of a neighbor named Emma. A lady from Scotland, she recognizes Sasha's intermittent speech as Gaelic. She points Rainey, Sasha's mother in the direction of a Gaelic professor with the idea of reaching Sascha.

Rainey heeds her gentle advice and the rest of the book is filled with misty, starry skies, Gaelic flavored history and the identity Sascha has claimed as hers. A cliche romance ensues, and Sasha is on the road to recovery. She travels a long and bumpy road from California to Scotland, where she reconnects with the soul of a dead Scottish princess.

Replete with Celtic legends, language and flavor, this book is much more interesting than most romance novels. Sasha, her mother Rainey, Matthew the professor and Emma the good hearted neighbor are the good guys. You cheer when they win.

Rating:
Summary: Wrapped in Magic
Review: This is truly a romance that will wrap you in its magic! Supposedly, the mute child in this story carries the spirit of a legendary Scottish princess, and with her tenacious will, she forces her mother to team up with a handsome professor, Matt Macinnes, in order to find the mythical crown and make right was was wronged in the past.

Lynn Hanna is a master at weaving an intricate fairy tale of romance and Gaelic legend. I highly recommend The Starry Child with a cup of hot chocolate to keep you warm during dark winter nights....

Rating:
Summary: Wrapped in Magic
Review: This is truly a romance that will wrap you in its magic! The mute child, Sasha, in this story carries the spirit of a legendary Scottish princess, and with her tenacious will, she forces her mother, Rainey, to team up with a handsome professor, Matt Macinnes, in order to find the mythical crown and make right was was wronged in the past.

Lynn Hanna is a master at weaving an intricate fairy tale of romance and Gaelic legend. I highly recommend The Starry Child with a cup of hot chocolate to keep you warm during dark winter nights....

Rating:
Summary: An exquisitely beautiful paranormal romance
Review: Three years have passed since Alan Nielson, a caring father and wonderful husband, died. Alan's positive outlook on life brought energy and stability to anyone he touched. His widow Rainey has had to bury her own grief over the loss of her beloved spouse because their daughter Sasha has not coped at all with the loss of her idolized dad, who affectionately dubbed her the "Queen of the Woodland fairies". Instead, Sasha has not spoken one coherent word since she learned that her father was never coming home again.

Sasha occasionally speaks in gibberish, leaving the medical profession and unsympathetic neighbors to believe that she should be committed to an institution. Rainey's friend, who never heard the child speak before, recognizes the gibberish as a form of Gaelic. She convinces Stanford University Linguistics Professor Matt MacInnes, who speaks fluent Gaelic, to visit the Nielson home. Shockingly, the little girl and the teacher easily communicate. However, Sasha's story is even more frightening as she describes the tale of a long dead Scottish princess whose mission on earth is being carried out by a small American child.

THE STARRY CHILD is one of the most imaginative love stories to have been published in several years. The mixing of the mystical myths of the Celts with modern day California is brilliantly designed, making for a unique, crisp story line. The three main characters are all warm and real as they struggle to deal with a perilous inevitability that most likely will lead to their doom. If this is any indication of her creative juices, Lynn Hanna has a long time destiny of her own as a very successful writer.

Harriet Klausner