In Concerto, when the hero and heroine first meet, they are young and full of dreams and a great deal of ambition. Catriona is a talented singer who would love to become an opera singer, and Umberto is the son of an opera diva and is a famous pianist composer in his own right.

A little Catriona’s senior in age and career, Umberto decides to offer her some advice. I write:

‘You have a most unusual and beautiful voice, almost unique in its individuality.’ His face suddenly became serious. ‘Tell me, do you want to sing more than anything else in the world?’

Catriona nodded wordlessly.

‘Well, your future depends primarily on you yourself, and your capacity to work. I saw how single-minded my mother was … Nothing else must get in the way if you want to make it to the top. Nothing.’

Nothing else did get in the way until you came along, Catriona told him silently, but aloud she said, ‘I’m very well aware of the dedication it will demand of me.’

He rubbed his chin pensively, his green eyes appraising her. ‘Yes, I think you probably are.’

‘And you,’ she said, emboldened by the champagne, ‘your star is rising. You allow nothing to interfere with your ambitions?’

His eyes were alight with amusement, but he answered without prevarication. ‘Of course not. It’s a sacrifice we musicians must make.’

I wonder how this passage makes you feel? My young and somewhat naïve heroine is rather impressed by this apparently wise and accomplished man, but I feel a twinge of concern in this scene.

Of course, to be a musical virtuoso is an admirable thing. Umberto’s music is powerful. But to suggest that the only way to ‘make it to the top’ is to ruthlessly cut out everything in life that is not purely channelling the ambition… to me, that is not just ambition; it is blind ambition.

What of love? Friendship? Growing as a person. Taking time to just be in the moment. Watching the sunset and the waves ripple on a lake.

I don’t believe a person can really create wonderful art – whether painting or writing or composing or singing – unless they are connected: to themselves, to others and to nature; to the world around. Could Catriona really become an amazing opera singer without making room in her life for learning, for experiencing, for thinking and for feeling? How could she possibly move people with her art unless she had a warm and open heart herself?

As it turns out, Catriona does not pursue her ambition. When she unexpectedly falls pregnant, she gives up her dream, for she no longer wants to sing more than anything in the world; she wants to be a mother. Instead, she trains as a music therapist, so that she may still use her musical talent while bringing up her little boy.

Umberto, meanwhile, has also given up on his ambition. When an accident robbed him of his sight, his dreams crumbled. He assumes that he can no longer be a composer now that his blindness is standing in the way of his ambition. Rather than try, in fact, he quits composing entirely.

When Catriona comes to Umberto’s Lake Como mansion to work with him in the capacity of music therapist, she is shocked to see that he is depressed and hopeless – this man who once advised her ‘your future depends primarily on you yourself’. How can she make Umberto understand that it is not his blindness that stands between him and his dream of composing but he himself: his arrogance, his ego, his closed heart?

The great American author Maya Angelou wrote: ‘The desire to reach for the stars is ambitious. The desire to reach hearts is wise.’ Now that it is Catriona’s turn to offer guidance, will Umberto see that it is hearts he so badly needs to reach now, not the stars?