Aloha, Mozart

This debut novel hits all the right notes-following in the spell-casting footsteps of Ann Patchett's Bel Canto. Would you risk your life-or your soul-for the sake of art? Born into an impoverished Hawaiian family in the 1960s, Maile Manoa's quest for a life in music lures her to the high-stakes world of European opera. In Salzburg, Austria she attracts the attentions of powerful men and falls in love . . . with a troubled young musician, with the city, and the intrigue that surrounds her. When Werner von Wehlen, the famous conductor at the center of Salzburg's glamorous music festival, offers her a leading role, she is forced to confront the Nazi heart of the classical music scene and von Wehlen's treacherous past. On the evening of her brilliant premiere, with Soviet tanks threatening to invade the city, Maile must choose between recognition on the world stage . . . or leaving the city with her life, and her conscience, intact.