Yearning For Samana by Manuela Mendez

Kira Kramer is 25 years old, works in a supermarket, loves her dog, and has recently broken up with her boyfriend, who cheated on her. She is just a normal, young woman living in Germany.

When she finds out that she won a two-week vacation in the Dominican Republic in a travel competition, she is absolutely unmotivated at first, because none of her friends have time and are unable to accompany her on that long journey at such short notice. Besides that, she does not speak a word of Spanish…
But the temptation to escape from the sad German winter is big, and so she travels alone to the peninsula Samaná in northeastern Dominican Republic about 10 hours by air, and goes on her first vacation in the Caribbean. She can’t know yet how much this journey will change her life…

She quickly finds a new friend in Samantha, her neighbor next door at the nice hotel “Paradiso”, and they set off together to explore the beauty of this Caribbean island. However, it doesn’t take long until Sammy falls in love with the charming local Miguel, and Kira also longs to find a new love. On a trip where tourists can watch humpback whales, which give birth to their babies before Samaná, she meets her former acquaintance from the flight, Martin. The first encounter on the plane had ended a bit rough and Kira would have never thought to meet the good-looking German again. But it turns out that Martin lives here in Samaná and works as a tourist guide…

Kira feels butterflies in her stomach and whenever she looks into Martin’s eyes, she can’t think straight anymore. When Martin invites her to walk across the bridge of Samaná and they have a romantic day together, Kira thinks that she fell in love with the handsome, young man. Unfortunately, Martin has to work a lot and Kira wants to do as much as possible on this vacation… Carlos, who is an overseas entertainer at the hotel “Paradiso”, really likes the cute, blond girl, and he tries very hard to win Kira's heart. After an extremely romantic birthday party of her new friends at the beach which culminates in the couple’s engagement, Kira can’t resist the incredibly good-looking club rep's courting. Inside her heart, feelings began arising for him, though she is actually waiting for Martin…

But suddenly, there is no sign of Martin anymore! No message, no call – nothing, and Kira gets disappointed with every passing hour. The thing she can’t know, however, is that Martin had a serious accident and is at the hospital. When he is finally able to send a message for Kira to the hotel, chance would have it that Carlos reads it and decides to use that advantage. He invites Kira to the capital Santo Domingo and Kira, who thinks that Martin has lost interest in her, comes with him. The day in La Capital is wonderful; Carlos turns out to be the perfect host and when he asks her to also spend the evening with him, Kira says yes. After a great concert given by Il Divo, who enchant Kira with their classical pop music, she spends an unimaginably wonderful night with Carlos and her heart runs riot. Kira and Carlos spend the last two days of her vacation together and Carlos gives his beloved “starfish” marvelous hours.

However, Sammy, who naturally knows everything about her friend’s affair of the heart, has doubts about the identity of the “club rep”, but Kira doesn’t care. In view of the upcoming departure, she wants to enjoy every happy moment.

When Kira is supposed to get on the plane back home, she doesn’t know what will happen next, and suddenly, Martin shows up again and makes her even more confused. But the plane doesn’t wait for her…