About the Book
Book Title: Hidden Among The Stars
Author: Melanie Dobson
Genre: Historical Fiction (However, this is a time-slip novel, so there is also a contemporary component to the story)
Release date: September 4, 2018
From the award-winning author of Catching the Wind, which Publishers Weekly
called “unforgettable” and a “must-read,” comes another gripping
time-slip novel about hidden treasure, a castle, and ordinary people who
resisted evil in their own extraordinary way.
The year is 1938, and as Hitler’s troops sweep into Vienna, Austrian Max
Dornbach promises to help his Jewish friends hide their most valuable
possessions from the Nazis, smuggling them to his family’s summer estate
near the picturesque village of Hallstatt. He enlists the help of
Annika Knopf, his childhood friend and the caretaker’s daughter, who is
eager to help the man she’s loved her entire life. But when Max also
brings Luzia Weiss, a young Jewish woman, to hide at the castle, it
complicates Annika’s feelings and puts their entire plan—even their very
lives—in jeopardy. Especially when the Nazis come to scour the estate
and find both Luzia and the treasure gone.
Eighty years later, Callie Randall is mostly content with her quiet
life, running a bookstore with her sister and reaching out into the
world through her blog. Then she finds a cryptic list in an old edition
of
Bambi that connects her to Annika’s story . . . and maybe to
the long-buried story of a dear friend. As she digs into the past,
Callie must risk venturing outside the safe world she’s built for a
chance at answers, adventure, and maybe even new love.
Click here to purchase your copy!
About the Author
Melanie Dobson is the award-winning author of nearly twenty historical romance, suspense, and time-slip novels including Catching the Wind and Chateau of Secrets . Three of her novels have won Carol Awards; Love Finds You in Liberty, Indiana won Best Novel of Indiana in 2010; and The Black Cloister won the Foreword Magazine Religious Fiction Book of the Year.
Melanie is the former corporate publicity manager at Focus on the
Family and owner of the publicity firm Dobson Media Group. When she
isn’t writing, Melanie enjoys teaching both writing and public relations
classes at George Fox University.
Melanie and her husband, Jon, have two daughters. After moving
numerous times with work, the Dobson family has settled near Portland,
Oregon, and they love to hike and camp in the mountains of the Pacific
Northwest and along the Pacific Coast. Melanie also enjoys exploring
ghost towns and abandoned homes, helping care for kids in her community,
and reading stories with her girls.
Visit Melanie online at
www.melaniedobson.com.
Guest Post from Melanie
Hallstatt’s Hiding Places
Backpacking across Europe—that’s how my husband Jon and I decided to
celebrate our fifth wedding anniversary. We savored the old world
culture and charm as we hiked along Italy’s coast, toured medieval
castles in Germany, and cruised the canals in Belgium; we both left a
bit of our hearts in an ancient lakeside town called Hallstatt.
The moment we stepped off the ferryboat and into this storybook
village, we crossed through a portal of sorts, traveling back several
centuries in time. The rugged, snow-capped mountains around us and
alpine lake, the quaint village with its church steeples and cobblestone
lanes and waterfall that spilled into town—all of it captivated us.
Along the shore, hidden partially by trees, we could see spires of an
abandoned castle, and I wanted to know its story. No one in Hallstatt
could tell us who’d lived in the castle—at least, not in English—so my
husband agreed to a new adventure. With a swan as our escort, we glided
across the lake in an electric boat so I could study the rusty turrets,
boarded windows, and wooden boathouse resting in the water like a felled
log.
Instead of quelling my curiosity, the match of inspiration ignited my
mind. Who had lived in this castle, and what happened there? I began
writing in my journal that night, trying to capture my rogue thoughts on
paper, hoping that one day a novel would emerge from the ashes of this
castle’s story.
When we returned home, I began researching more of Hallstatt’s
history and discovered that this region, in all of its beauty and
mystique, had been infiltrated by an enemy in 1938. This town and the
surrounding Salzkammergut became a mountain retreat for Nazi officials
who built mansions on the shores of its many lakes and used salt mines
to hide “ownerless treasure”—the gold bullion and artwork they’d stolen
from the Jewish people.
The Nazis intended to build a Fourth Reich in this alpine fortress,
but the Allies had other plans. Near the end of the war, these lakes
became a dustbin of sorts, collecting whatever the enemy dumped into its
waters—weapons, counterfeit banknotes, concentration camp lists—as they
fled south from the Allied troops. The Devil’s Dustbin, locals call it.
Lake Hallstatt plunges more than four hundred feet between the
fortress of mountains. Because of its depth and the many hiding places
in the underwater forests, caves, and shifting sands, divers continue
finding World War II artifacts today. Some still believe there’s a
treasure trove buried on the bottom, but no one has reported finding any
gold.
After our trip, a story about this castle and what happened to the
heirlooms of the Austrian Jewish people continued to burn inside me
until I finally put it on paper. So I built Schloss Schwansee—Castle of
Swan Lake—in my mind, inspired by the castle along Lake Hallstatt, and
created a cast of historical and contemporary characters who are
searching for lost treasure.
Hidden Among the Stars is a time-slip novel about a castle
and treasure and fairytales, but most of all, it’s a story about God
using ordinary people across Austria to resist evil in their own
extraordinary way.
Blog Stops
Giveaway
To celebrate her tour, Melanie is giving
away a grand prize package that includes a $25 Amazon gift card,
Catching the Wind paperback, and Hidden Among the Stars paperback!!
"Thanks to the publisher for offering me a free copy. I was not required to write a positive review and all opinions are my own."
