Kindle Edition Download from Smashwords (eBook) Amazon Category:  Women Type: Fiction On the remote island of Puerto Franco, young Leah wades into the sea and disappears. Her body is never found. Thirty years later, visual artist Mar arrives on the island with her daughter, Lemay. She anticipates a haven where she can work on her craft, away from her controlling and womanizing husband. Instead, Mar finds herself in the midst of a close-knit community haunted by the curse of Puerto Franco. Visitations from Leah’s spirit and a growing love for the dead girl’s brother Sebastian, draw Mar into an undercurrent of obsessive love, hatred, and revenge. On a still summer’s day on the island of Puerto Franco, darkness falls after eleven-year-old Leah wades into the sea and disappears. For days, her distraught mother Cristina and her little boy Sebastian watch the search boats scour the waters for the missing girl. Leah is not found. Sickened and devastated by the fishermen’s decision to call off the search, Cristina shuts herself off in her home, convinced that Leah will return. Meanwhile, freakish weather and unexpected storms lead the islanders to believe that Puerto Franco has been cursed. They blame Cristina who will not put Leah’s spirit to rest. At a complete loss of what to do, they turn their back on her and Sebastian.   Thirty years later, Mar, a visual artist, arrives on the island with her young daughter, Lemay. Her motivation is to paint in peace, away from the strains on her marriage caused by her husband’s womanising and domineering nature.    However, on meeting Clara, the owner of the retreat, and eventually Sebastian, Mar is soon drawn away from creative solitude into the lives of the community and its dark past. The sense she gets that the island harbours too many secrets is heightened when she is contacted by Leah’s spirit. On Leah’s ‘spiritual’ lead, Mar unravels the origins of the curse on Puerto Franco through a history of tragedies and suppressed anguish.

A remarkable reading experience
Other reviewers have offered a synopsis of this remarkable novel, so to avoid repetition allow me to skip it. We writers tend to be unforgiving readers, and are rarely carried away by the work of our contemporaries. Leah, with its impeccably woven story, its superb descriptions and true-to-life dialogues, its soul-searching passages, and the richness of its language, is a book to go back to.
Ms. Haffar has, most successfully, captured the nuances of human nature inside a very small space -an island where the forces of nature are duplicated in the lives of its inhabitants, and where occasional visitors cannot but shed their city veneer. The past casts its shadow on the present, while the present encompasses the predicaments of all times. In short, a masterpiece in its genre.

Beautifully Painted Characters.
Leah is not just a book with many of the traditional elements of romance, it is a life art experience. This is a moving tapestry, every bit as perceptive as we come to assume are the paintings created by the main character Mar. This is a psychological book, which deeply explores people and the moments that create them. We actually brush up against the paranormal, how closely will depend on the minds of the reader. The beautifully crafted words provide the frame; our imaginations are drawn to paint the colours.
We may not at first know all Haffar's rich characters, but most will know a Mar, a Lemay, an Oscar. By the end we know the island and its inhabitants so well that they must long live in one's consciousness. On the evidence of this book, Dana K.Haffar deserves a great deal of success.

Atmospheric and ghostly- recommended!
Leah is a lovely novel with many strong points. The story focuses on Mar's journey toward independence and Sebastian's struggle with the death of his sister and mother. The story is a unique kind of romance set on a harsh, unforgiving island.

The setting, actually, is one of my favorite elements. Puerto Franco, a small island with a tightly-knit community, is an active force in the story. Ms. Haffar brings the setting to life in vivid ways; the island is practically a character with its own personality. She uses the harshness and beauty of the scenery to create an atmospheric layer that really is gripping. I love novels that use setting as a catalyst, and I love the wildness of this setting in particular. Sebastian's relationship with the ocean that took his family is yet another intriguing way Ms. Haffar uses Puerto Franco to shape the story.

The story itself is a very open one; the plot is deep and goes back thirty years, and the ending avoids tying everything up neatly. Sebastian and Mar help each other through a vital point of change, but life isn't a simple thing and neither is their story. I won't spoil the ending, but definitely read Leah for a gutsy, unexpected close to a heartfelt story.

My favorite element is the suspense. Ms. Haffar skillfully weaves suspense through nearly every scene; when I wasn't reading the book, I was almost always thinking about it. The questions raised hovered in my mind and kept me wondering; the story has many twists I didn't see coming, and the mystical elements enriched an already complex and atmospheric story. The supernatural touch is elegant, creepy, and gripping.

Ms. Haffar has written a memorable novel in which skillful use of setting, suspense, and storytelling converge to create a book well worth your time. I definitely recommend reading Leah.