Embark on a journey to 1930s California in Ginny Kubitz Moyer’s spellbinding historical novel in which a woman must choose between friendship and her own secrets.
It’s 1938, and twenty-five-year-old secretary Frances Healey is ready for a fresh start. Hoping to forget her painful past, she takes a job working for Hollywood producer Lawrence Merrill. She quickly becomes absorbed in VistaGlen Studios’s biggest project: a movie about Kitty Ridley, the legendary stage actress who disappeared from the public eye in 1895. The movie will be the making of Belinda Vail, a beautiful ingenue who is hungry for a breakout role—and also happens to be Mr. Merrill’s love interest.
But the real Miss Ridley has other ideas. Now ninety years old, she writes a scathing letter insisting the studio halt production of the film. Hoping to change her mind, Frances and Mr. Merrill embark on a trip to find the actress—only to land in a Victorian farmhouse in the Napa Valley. But as she learns the truth of Miss Ridley’s life, Frances finds herself confronting the very past she’s been trying to forget. And with the arrival of the ambitious Belinda, loyalties will be tested, bonds will be forged, and Frances will learn where true happiness lies. Set in Hollywood and the sun-drenched Napa countryside, A Golden Life explores friendship, forgiveness, and the power of honoring your own story.
A Kirkus Reviews Best Indie Book of 2024
“. . . a delightful escape into the golden age of film, with compelling characters that make the novel simultaneously enthralling and contemplative . . . . irresistible . . . will enchant until the final page.” —Library Journal
“The author captures 1930s California with meticulous detail and has masterfully created characters with depth and authenticity. . . . the narrative thrums with suspense . . . A delightful human drama. . . .” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“In the expert hands of Ginny Kubitz Moyer, A Golden Life is a dazzling story set in Hollywood’s dream factory. Frances Healey, an ambitious, young secretary finds herself in the front office where scripts are approved and dreams are born. Frances has her own secrets, with moxie and grit, she navigates the business with an eye for storytelling and a heart that will change the course of the business of the studio. A fabulous read!” —Adriana Trigiani, author of The Good Left Undone
“A Golden Life is a wonderful portrait of an independent woman in 1930s California that explores the ways in which women’s lives were constrained by the mores of the time. The settings are beautifully drawn and developed—special and loving attention is paid to the beauty of the natural world. Ginny Kubitz Moyer writes with quiet authority and strong prose, creating a novel that is hard to put down and characters that remain long after the book is read.” —Laura Spence-Ash, author of Beyond That, the Sea
