Not Yours to Keep: A Novel

by Zelly Ruskin

Overview

SheKnows.com “The 19 Best Books We Read in 2024” * Zibby Awards Winner: Best Family Drama Category * Shelf Unbound 2024 Best Indie Books NOTABLE INDIE * 2024 Somerset Awards short list for Literary and Contemporary Fiction

Called a “sensational debut” by Rea Frey, this psychological thriller delves into themes of reproductive rights and healthcare, confronting the complexities that define family—or the risks that lose it all.

Billie Campbell, a Massachusetts adoption specialist grappling with fertility issues, dreams of adopting a baby, but not just any baby—her pregnant client’s baby. While her longing threatens to send her down a dark path, her husband, Tyler, is keeping secrets: he’s full of doubts about becoming a father, and he’s also trying to figure out who is sending him upsetting anonymous texts and photos. On the other side of town, Anne, a woman scarred by childhood abuse, obsesses with a second chance at becoming a family with the two people she regrets ever having let go of: the baby she gave up for adoption twenty years ago and the man of her dreams.

Their lives become entangled when the client’s newborn is abducted, and Billie becomes a prime suspect.

Amid the chaos unleashed by the abduction, Tyler uncovers a link between the person tormenting him and the abduction—but now Billie has disappeared too. The race to find both her and the baby is on; but will they find them before it’s too late?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781647427245
Publisher:	She Writes Press
Publication date:	10/08/2024
Pages:	336
Sales rank:	223,360
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Zelly Ruskin is a social worker who worked in adoption and foster care. She loves traveling, hiking with her (now adult) children, and, as a survivor, is passionate about and volunteers for Brain Aneurysm Awareness. Zelly and her ridiculous doodle, Strudel, currently live in New York City.

Editorial Reviews

2024 Best Book Awards Winner in Best New Fiction
2024 American Fiction Awards Winner in Mystery/Suspense: General

“Two women are pulled together by their complicated relationships to motherhood in the tense but humane thriller Not Yours to Keep...whose suspense is directed by the intense emotions brought forth by the loss—or unrealized gain—of a child.”—Foreword Clarion Review

“An often intriguing narrative about loss and enduring hope.”—Kirkus Reviews

“Part emotional story of adoption and motherhood, and part heart-pounding suspense, Not Yours To Keep will have you racing to the end as you are swept into the lives of three people on a collision course.”—Lyn Liao Butler, best-selling author of Someone Else's Life

“A missing newborn, an adoption worker struggling with infertility, and an abused woman desperate for a second chance at motherhood, all collide in Ruskin’s page-turning debut. About the ache for love, the desperate choices of birth and adoptive parents, and the struggles to make and keep a family, Not Yours to Keep is a stunner.”—Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author of Pictures of You and Days of Wonder

“With a gentle hand and tender heart, Not Yours to Keep examines what it really means to be a family. With captivating prose and a plot that will have you on the edge of your seat, Ruskin explores the ways we cleave to hope no matter how much adversity or unexpected change we face. Most definitely a novel that will keep you glued to the pages as you race toward the unexpected conclusion, Ruskin’s debut is a gem and a true winner!”—Jacqueline Friedland USA Today best-selling author of He Gets that From Me

“Zelly Ruskin’s ability to combine her career and personal experience with fertility issues and adoption procedures into the fictional mystery Not Yours to Keep makes for a compelling read. This debut novel will both rivet and educate couples facing such life-changing dilemmas and decisions.”—IndieReader

“One missing baby. A missing woman. Lots of secrets, lies, twists, and turns. In this heartfelt and heart-pounding domestic suspense, I found myself racing to the breathtaking conclusion. A sensational debut.”—Rea Frey, #1 best-selling author of Don't Forget Me and The Other Year

From the Publisher

Zelly Ruskin’s ability to combine her career and personal experience with fertility issues and adoption procedures into the fictional mystery Not Yours to Keep makes for a compelling read. This debut novel will both rivet and educate couples facing such life-changing dilemmas and decisions.”

—IndieReader

With a gentle hand and tender heart, Not Yours to Keep examines what it really means to be a family. With captivating prose and a plot that will have you on the edge of your seat, Ruskin explores the ways we cleave to hope no matter how much adversity or unexpected change we face. Most definitely a novel that will keep you glued to the pages as you race toward the unexpected conclusion, Ruskin’s debut is a gem and a true winner!”

Jacqueline Friedland USA Today best-selling author of He Gets that From Me

One missing baby. A missing woman. Lots of secrets, lies, twists, and turns. In this heartfelt and heart-pounding domestic suspense, I found myself racing to the breathtaking conclusion. A sensational debut.”

Rhea Frey

Part emotional story of adoption and motherhood, and part heart-pounding suspense, Not Yours To Keep will have you racing to the end as you are swept into the lives of three people on a collision course.”

Lyn Liao Butler

One missing baby. A missing woman. Lots of secrets, lies, twists, and turns. In this heartfelt and heart-pounding domestic suspense, I found myself racing to the breathtaking conclusion. A sensational debut.”

Rea Frey

2024-06-25
In Ruskin’s thriller set in 2012, a married couple hoping to adopt a child contend with a dangerous stalker with dark secrets.

Billie Campbell and her hard-driving attorney husband, Tyler, are in their 30s and considering adoption after unsuccessfully trying to conceive a child. Adopting a child won’t be easy, though, due in part to their financial struggles. Billie finds herself becoming increasingly distraught and frustrated, and her job at a local adoption agency makes matters worse, as she keeps witnessing people living the life that she wants but can’t have. Her anguish parallels that of a mysterious woman from Tyler’s past named Anne, who also yearns for a child she can’t have. As she begins stalking Tyler and Billie, he keeps Anne’s identity a secret from his wife, which also threatens to undermine their quest to build a family. Ruskin uses this explosive dynamic to place Billie and Anne on an inescapable collision course, foreshadowing disaster at every step. The labyrinthine twists and turns that follow are, indeed, messy, but they also contain moments of real sweetness and profundity, as when an adult adoptee talks about her relationship with her adoptive dad: “Sometimes, after a particularly tough day…my father would come in, open the window to my room, and help me step out onto the roof. We’d lie there looking at the stars. He’d pull out some chocolate, and we’d share it without ever saying anything.” The author’s depiction of Anne’s increasing instability is particularly heart-wrenching and thought-provoking. The story engagingly examines what drives a person to commit villainous acts, and whether such acts are necessarily committed by bad people. By story’s end, it’s clear that, for some people, the answers to such questions can be nuanced and complex.

An often intriguing narrative about loss and enduring hope.

Kirkus Reviews