Roberta
by Diane Carter-Brown

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Love knows no bounds—even when it crosses the boundaries of propriety. In the Highlands of Scotland in the late 1800s, James Alexander Cunningham sets out for Edinburgh to study architecture at the university. While staying at his uncle’s home, he encounters a presence that awakens feelings he has never known before. Roberta. Their love blooms—passionate, fated. Until tragedy strikes, and everything is lost. Decades later, another James Alexander Cunningham—also an architect—and his daughter, Roberta Alexandra Cunningham, share a terrifying recurring nightmare. Not only that, but their bond is unusually strong; Roberta has always turned to her father—not her mother—for comfort, protection, and a sense of belonging. But when she returns from university with a PhD in architecture, something shifts. A current stirs between them—intimate, unsettling. How can this be? Set against the lush backdrop of Oxfordshire and the wild, heathered hills of Inverness, this bold and deeply emotional story of love defies the rules of time, memory, and society. Only a handful of trusted friends know the truth. But silence weighs heavily on everyone. Will one of them slip?

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Diane Carter-Brown holds a PhD in anthropology, has worked as an art gallery owner, and studied at the Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture. A life spent in academia and the art world—and countless hours interviewing people—has given her a compassionate understanding of the human condition. Besides anthropology, architecture, and art, she enjoys travelling, history, music, and the daily observation of people. After many years abroad, Diane settled in the lovely South Okanagan Valley of British Columbia, where she lives in a pine forest—her closest neighbours being bears, birds, and the occasional human.

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Diane Carter-Brown