All the Stars in the Heavens

Book 25 of my 2017 Reading Challenge
read from April 24 - May 1

All the Stars in the Heavens by Adriana Trigiani 

Summary (via Goodreads)
The movie business is booming in 1935 when twenty-one-year-old Loretta Young meets thirty-four-year-old Clark Gable on the set of The Call of the Wild. Though he's already married, Gable falls for the stunning and vivacious young actress instantly.
Far from the glittering lights of Hollywood, Sister Alda Ducci has been forced to leave her convent and begin a new journey that leads her to Loretta. Becoming Miss Young's assistant, the innocent and pious young Alda must navigate the wild terrain of Hollywood with fierce determination and a moral code that derives from her Italian roots. Over the course of decades, she and Loretta encounter scandal and adventure, choose love and passion, and forge an enduring bond of love and loyalty that will be put to the test when they eventually face the greatest obstacle of their lives. 
Anchored by Trigiani's masterful storytelling that takes you on a worldwide ride of adventure from Hollywood to the shores of southern Italy, this mesmerizing epic is, at its heart, a luminous tale of the most cherished ties that bind. Brimming with larger-than-life characters both real and fictional - including stars Spencer Tracy, Myrna Loy, David Niven, Hattie McDaniel and more - it is the unforgettable story of one of cinema's greatest love affairs during the golden age of American movie making.

My Opinion
Between the setting and grandeur of the era and the author's lovely writing style, this book was so easy to get sucked into.  It was a great escape, light but not sappy.

The book was written in 2015 and the setting was the 1930s but this quote unfortunately applies today..."[Edna Ferber] told me something that has stayed with me. Ferber said, 'Beware the clowns.' The leaders who start out as jokes - people make fun of them, they're caricatures, cartoons in newspapers, and people decide they are harmless. Those men are the most dangerous. The day comes when they use their power against their own people."

A Few Quotes from the Book
""Every picture is a love story." Gable steadies his gaze on the water. "Even when they call it something else. They might call it an adventure, a mystery, a historical, or a Tom Mix western, but they're all love stories.""

"You know, all of us that work on the crews, in the offices, deliver the mail, sew the costumes, and paint the sets, we all work for our families. We take care of each other. The stars are different. Do you ever notice how strange nice, decent people act when they meet a movie star? They act like some deity came off the mountaintop to greet them. The stars are separate from us. And maybe that's why people pay to see them. They know there's something about them that they can never be."