September 10, 2014

For Keeps by Deatri King-Bey

Got the midweek blues? Dump the doldrums and get engrossed in Deatri King-Bey’s latest, For Keeps!

Here’s Deatri to tell you about it. Take it away, Deatri!

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In my upcoming romantic suspense, For Keeps, Gina Guy’s daughter has witnessed a murder and the murderer is after the little girl. Child Protective Services is manipulated into the picture, and Jarvis Martin, a manager within the agency, steps in to protect the Guy’s rights. From the moment Gina meets Jarvis, she feels she can depend on him, but life has proven to her that the only person she can count on is Gina. Will they be able to stop the murderer? Can Jarvis earn her trust and love?

Heavy topic for a romance, huh? I’m known for taking non-conventional characters and topics and spinning them into a romance. I like to create dialogue. The moment I released the For Keeps blurb, people started asking me where the idea came from. I’ve often said that I have voices in my head that tell me their stories, then I relay those stories to you though my books. Basically, I put my psychosis to work.

Events usually wake those voices in my head and cause them to start speaking to me. The voices from For Keeps came about as the result of two incidents. A few years back, I noticed more reports of children being murdered down here (Arizona) by abusive parents on the news. This was a very noticeable increase. There was actually an event that correlated to the increase in deaths and abuse. I can’t remember the number, but there were like 2,500 reported cases of abuse that were never investigated during that time period. Big time scandal. Lots of people fired over that.

In incident two, I know someone who was reported to CPS by the hospital she delivered her baby in because there were narcotics in the baby’s system. Actually, hospitals must report when babies are born with drugs in their system. That sounds like a good thing, right?

Well, the hospital neglected to inform CPS that the mother had been a patient in the hospital and administered the narcotic by the nurses. The mother didn’t even realize what they were giving her was a narcotic until after CPS contacted her and told them they’d be taking her child from her for him testing positive for narcotics.  This mother went into a panic. She did everything her CPS case manager asked for, but CPS didn’t do their part. Then the case manager’s boss came into the picture and took steps to take this child away from the mother. It got really ugly.

To make a long story short, the original case manager came back into the picture and stopped the insanity. Had it not been for that case manager, this woman’s child would have been taken from her even though the hospital had supplied the paperwork requested by CPS. Sounds crazy, huh? Yeah, I couldn’t believe what was happening as it unfolded.

These incidents breathed life into Gina and Jarvis. There are good parents caught up in the system every day. There are bad parents that children need to be protected from. There are bad case managers and there are good case managers.

I don’t know, this seemed like the perfect backdrop for a romantic suspense. Next thing you know, Gina and Jarvis were telling me their story. I hope you enjoy For Keeps. This title is now available in Print, Kindle, Nook and ePub (via Barnes & Noble) formats. You can read the first chapter here.

Bettye, thank you for giving me the opportunity to share For Keeps. I appreciate it and you.

Deatri King-Bey

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You’re so welcome, Deatri! Sounds like my kinda book. I love stories where characters fall in love under unusual circumstances. Readers, you’re in for a treat!