Silver Shadows, Golden Dreams — Margaret Pemberton

It's not every child who is named after a motor car, and when little Daisy Ford discovers she's been abandoned by her mother, she resolves to put the name - and her unhappy years at the convent orphanage - behind her for ever.

Quite unaware of her haunting beauty, frighteningly innocent of the harsh ways of the outside world, Daisy makes her way to Hollywood, determined to become an actress in the great tradition of the stars she admired as a child. Taking the name Valentina, and refusing to reveal any details of her past, she is discovered by the brilliant Hungarian director Vidal Rakoczi. Handsome, tempestuous, his devilish good looks matched by his devil-may-care temperament, Vidal is as controversial as he is talented.

Instantly recognising the potential of Valentina's ethereal loveliness, he draws out her innate acting ability and casts her in his latest film. What starts as a professional relationship between the fiery director and his ravishing new star quickly develops in to much more. Drawn to one another as irresistibly as moths to a candleflame, they embark on a love affair as ecstatic as it is destructive.

Steeped in the glamorous and nostalgic atmosphere of 1930s Hollywood, Silver Shadows, Golden Dreams is a love story in the grand manner, a novel of high romance that will cast its spell over every reader.