Susan Elizabeth Phillips - Nobody's Baby But Mine

Genius physics professor Dr. Jane Darlington desperately wants a baby. But finding a father won’t be easy. Jane’s super-intelligence made her feel like a freak when she was growing up, and she’s determined to spare her own child that suffering. Which means she must find someone very special to father her child. Someone who’s more comfortable working out his muscles than exercising his brain.
Cal Bonner, the Chicago Stars’ legendary quarterback, seems like the perfect choice. But his champion good looks and down-home ways are deceiving. Dr. Jane is about to learn a little too late that this good ol’ boy is a lot smarter than he lets on—and he’s not about to be used and abandoned by a brainy, baby-mad schemer. 

Comment: I'm currently going through this series by the author. I'm finding this series quite entertaining and full of interesting elements and although they aren't complete perfection to me, I'm enjoying myself quite a lot.

This is the story of dr Jane Darlington, a very intelligent woman who suddenly realizes she wants a baby. However, she doesn't have anyone to have him with despite the knowledge time is passing by. Her neighbor needs to come up with a birthday present for Cal Bonner, one of the Chicago Stars players, so she can gain the favor or another player she wants to sleep with. Jane agrees with being Cal's date for one night after seeing how un-bright he is, and considering she's so smart, her baby will be normal, the way she never was while growing up. But the night doesn't go as well as she thought an when Cal finds out the truth, what could happen?

Of course only on romance novels and movies could we have such a plot, but to be honest, sometimes the pleasure isn't on how real things are, but how engrossing is the tale and the possibility of dreams like that. This author delivers funny and strangely poignant romances and despite being an achieved romance or not, they can always entertain us in such a way that we feel part of this escapism device, no matter how unlikely.

Thus relies the power of this author's writing style and plots: even with things we don't actually believe could happen, we still root for them and feel distracted and captivated.

Personally I liked this story a lot. It has many funny moments or at least scenes where we can visualize the funny part because despite everything, the author takes care of structure, base lines, plot and development. I think many authors attempt being funny by presenting scenes completely dislocated from any resemblance of structure. I, for one, can't understand that. Anyway, this is only to explain why I like these stories so much and why I think the author knows what she's doing. I also think the best thing is how the author keeps a balanced style, with narration, description and inner conversations enough to keep the story going without being boring.

This plot seems quite unbelievable these days, how Jane could remain unknown to Cal as long as she did or the way they dealt with the situation doesn't seem realistic but for plot's purposes it was ingenious. I liked how the fact they both assumed wrong what the other was like is something that actually we all do every day, and it provided interesting and, again, funny scenes from then on.

There was a lot of miscommunication between the main couple but I liked how they went to solve things, how all it took was truth and admitting what was in their hearts.

The romance was cute, full of good scenes and their characters were developed quite well. I liked how they both had serious issues to deal with in their lives and how that also played an important part in the story.

The secondary characters were very important too. As always, there's a sort of secondary romance which is full of details and complements the main story line. Very clever.

I can't wait for the next book. Books like this, being part of well thought series can be so amazing because the reader feels part of that world, of how things work. It's quite the feeling.

I think the author did a great job in creating, thinking and developing this story and that's more than many can do. So, good work for ms Phillips and I recommend this series to all contemporary romance readers.

Grade: 8/10