KEPT FOR HER BABY - Kate Walker

Author: Kate Walker

Line: Mills and Boon Modern/Harlequin Presents Extra

Release month UK: September 2009/ North America: October 2009

The S-Factor: Sizzling and Simmering

Back-Blurb:

Staring at the granite-handsome features of Italian billionaire Ricardo Emiliani, Lucy knows she's made a mistake coming back to their palatial Lake Garda home. But she'll do anything for her baby son—even return to the husband who never loved her….

Ricardo branded his bride a gold digger. However, tiny Marco needs his mother, so he will keep Lucy captive on his private island until she proves herself a worthy wife—in every sense….

Review: ♥♥♥♥♥

Author Kate Walker has written an extremely perceptive, powerful and heart wrenching romance with Kept for Her Baby. The author addresses a medical problem one out of ten women In North America face after giving birth to a baby which is postpartum depression. Her heroine suffers so badly she actually doesn’t remember what’s she’s done or where she’s been and on top of that leaves her husband and baby in search of help.

Ricardo Emiliani in all of his relationships and affairs with women believes them to be all alike and only interested in one thing…..money! When he meets the lovely Lucy Mottram, he is immediately attracted to her and is determined to become involved with her. She turns him down and realizes what a mistake it was to do so. When she’s given a second chance she jumps on it and eventually becomes pregnant. Ricardo demands they marry for the sake of the baby. The passion they share continues to leaps off the pages. However, there is one problem, Lucy believes that he only married her for the baby and that’s she’s not good enough for him.

Lucy realized early in her relationship with Ricardo and later in their marriage that she loved him. However, she also realized another thing, that once the baby was born he would probably discard her. After the baby comes, they both make many mistakes; he for not paying careful attention to her moods and she for thinking that he only cared about his business and that he possibly found her unattractive. Because of the way their marriage began and after their baby Marco is born, Lucy suffers a depression and does very strange things. In the end, she’s afraid she’ll harm the baby so she leaves Ricardo a note and disappears. Now months later, she’s better and returns to the villa to plead with Ricardo to let her be a part of her baby’s life.

In the end, Ricardo allows Lucy to stay and get to know Marco but their relationship is up and down as far as trust, communication and their emotions are up and down, changing daily. It’s extremely obvious their attraction for each other is still as powerful as when they first met. How they get to the point of understanding what went wrong in their marriage and how they should move forward was very emotional and distressful to read. However, their journey in finding peace, happiness and realizing how much they loved each other was a beautiful ending.

As a mother myself and never having suffered from this sort of depression, my heart went out to Lucy’s character because I can’t imagine having the feeling of ever harming a child. The other day on US national TV, there was a short piece on postpartum depression where the doctor said that everyone after giving childbirth should be screened and evaluated for postpartum depression. Now that I’ve read Kept for Her Baby, I totally agree. I hope that anyone who reads this book, who has recently given birth or is about to will pay attention to the storyline.

For author Kate Walker I can only imagine this was an emotional book to write. My personal thanks to you for taking the courage to address such an emotional and sensitive subject. You created a very moving and beautiful love story.

Hero Hotness Factor♥♥♥♥♥
Heroine Lovability Factor♥♥♥♥♥
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Reviewed by: Marilyn