Once More A Family

by Paula Detmer Riggs

Once More A Family by Paula Detmer Riggs released on Apr 23, 1999 is available now for purchase.

248 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published May 1, 1999

About the author

Paula Detmer Riggs was born in 1944 and earned a BS from the Miami University in 1965. She is a member of the Romance Writers of America and Novelists Inc.. She's worked professionally as a ember of the writing faculty of San Diego State University, Long Beach State University, and Irvine State University. Paula Detmer Riggs has written for Silhouette Desire and Silhouette Intimate Moments.

Reviews

[Ana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Grady and Ria had a nice marriage and a son, Jimmy, they loved so much, and then something went horribly wrong. Their son was kidnapped and then their marriage broke from the strain. Two years later, Grady finally found their son and psychologists think he needs his parents to be togetherso that he could recover from the emotional scarring.

Grady is a great guy who spent his entire life trying to prove that he’s good enough, that he’s better than his brothers. But in the end that drive is guilty for him missing a lot important moments of his son’s life. He still feels the guilt. Guilt is still his problem. But he was great at the beginning, fighting to get Ria back, not hiding his feeling. And his patience with Jimmy is astounding. He is the one responsible for Jimmy’s “recovery”. He did have a moment of stupidity, mainly because of the already mentioned guilt, but he’s still good.

Ria is a great mother who, 3 years ago, had a great relationship with her son. But this Jimmy, the sullen, uncooperative boy isn’t like he the boy that was taken from her. She tries hard to make him remember, and so we come to the thing that bothered me the most about this book. She kept comparing this Jimmy to the one from the past, wishing for him to be the boy he was. Life changed him, and even though kids are resilient, he can’t just miraculously become the happy child he was.

Near the beginning there were a couple of scenes from Jimmy’s POV, and I loved it. I got to see what he’s thinking, the way he’s so scared to trust in something good, in the love that both Grady and Ria offer. But thanks to the patience of his parents his turnaround after he remembered his kidnapping was believable

Rating:

3.5 stars.

[Fiona Marsden · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this one up from a list of faithful heroes. It's a reunion story set in Indiana in the US. Grady Hardin has followed his father and brothers into law enforcement, despite struggling with dyslexia throughout his schooling. It's left him with an inferiority complex but finally things are working out right. He's had a promotion, he has a beautiful wife, Ria, and his wonderful three year old son, Jimmy.

He's just put away the son of a Russian drug lord, pretty much everything is sweet. Until he gets home and finds drug lord daddy has taken his revenge, stealing away Grady's son Jimmy. Fast forward three years and Grady and Ria are no longer together. Neither of them coped well with the loss and they've been divorced for two years. Finally Grady gets the phone call he's been waiting for, after three years of sending out flyers all over the country, chasing up leads that came to nothing, Jimmy has been found.

Forced together for Jimmy's sake, we can see the love is still there, but Ria in particular, with her background of crazy mom and numerous foster homes, isn't prepared to take any more risks. All that matters is Jimmy and even there she struggles because he isn't the same boy.

This was an interesting story. I didn't expect there to be quite so much of the smexy but it made sense in the context. It was nice to see Jimmy regain trust and his parents as well. Nice ending.

[Debbie DiFiore · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great second chance love story. Loved the H. He was awesome.