The Lost Story of Via Belle is a dual-timeline novel by Melanie Dobson inspired by the life of Grace Livingston Hill. The book is not a fictionalized retelling of Grace’s life, but it draws on some of her circumstances and experiences.

In 1940, Via Belle is the pen name of Olivia Ashe. She’s written dozens of sweet romance novels with clear Christian themes. She and her husband had built a lovely lake-side home with a turret where she did all her writing. But first their daughter died, and then her husband passed away. Olivia’s next novel is due and her publisher won’t extend her deadlines any more. But she can’t find the words.

She’s invited to be on a panel of authors at a university. She’s the only one who writes novels: the others are more scholarly or literary. She feels distinctly out of place. But she’s able to share a few things. Then a long line of female college students stay and ask her to autograph their copies of her novels.

A Professor Simon Farrow stays as well, complimenting her on her work and how she handled herself on the panel. One invitation to dinner leads to another. Though Simon is much younger, they fall into a whirlwind romance. Olivia’s words come back and she finishes her novel in record time.

Olivia and Simon marry, in spite of her Aunt Hattie’s reservations. There are things about Simon that don’t make sense, but there’s always some reason to explain away his actions.

Yet, before too long, Olivia realizes she made a mistake.

in 2006, Harper Rayne is an aspiring screenwriter. Her best friend is a movie star with a producer-father, but he doesn’t take Harper’s work seriously. After blowing an opportunity to pitch her film idea, Harper accepts the invitation of her late mother’s friend to house-sit in a small town in PA where Via Belle lived sixty years earlier. Her mother had loved Via Belle’s books, and after Harper picks up her favorite, she begins to wonder if one of Belle’s books could be turned into a movie. As she looks into Belle’s life and tries to tour her home, Harper begins to think that the life of the author herself would make a good movie. But no one seems to know what happened to Belle: she went missing, and anyone who might know anything about her has no comment.

As Harper keeps digging, she finds not only more about Belle, but also surprising connections to her own life.

Melanie shares in her end notes that she had loved Grace Livingston Hill, and this book was inspired by parts of her life as well as those of Dorothy Sayers and Agatha Christie. Grace was married to a pastor and lived in PA, where she had two daughters; Belle only had one daughter who died young. After her husband’s death, Hill married a man much younger than herself, but their marriage was eventually annulled. Belle’s situation with her second husband is where much of the fiction comes into the story. Melanie shares some of her research here, including a tour of Hill’s home.

I enjoyed the beginning of the story. The middle seemed a little soap-opera-ish to me. But I loved how everything came together at the end.