The Sun and All the Other Stars - Karla Montalván English version

The Sun and All the Other Stars is a richly layered literary romance about love, art, and inheritance— told across centuries and anchored in the emotional life of a Cuban American woman searching for meaning beyond heartbreak. Marisol Varela is a muralist living in contemporary Madrid, grappling with the collapse of her engagement and a haunting family for generations, the women in her lineage have been denied lasting love. Convinced that her romantic fate has been sealed long before her birth, Marisol turns to past life regression therapy in a final attempt to uncover the source of her family' s sorrow. What she discovers reshapes everything. Transported across time, Marisol relives three former incarnations— each marked by desire, survival, and the limits imposed by society. In Renaissance Florence, she is a rebellious female painter fighting for artistic recognition in a world that excludes her. In 1808 Madrid, during the final years of the Spanish Inquisition, she lives as a sharp-witted prostitute drawn into political intrigue and espionage. In 1980s SoHo, she inhabits the life of a gay man navigating love, community, and devastating loss during the height of the AIDS epidemic. Threaded through each lifetime is Dario, an enigmatic Italian poet whose presence defies logic and chronology. Their connection— intimate, unresolved, and ever-evolving— forces Marisol to question whether love is eternal, illusory, or shaped by the social forces that bind each era. Blending romance, historical fiction, and speculative elements, The Sun and All the Other Stars examines immigration, gender, queerness, and artistic expression through a deeply human lens.