Rita Bradshaw The Colours of Love

Set in the tumultous times of World War II, The Colours of Love by Rita Bradshaw is a story of a capable and resourceful woman who proves that nothing is stronger than a mother's love. Can love survive when all is lost? England is at war, but nothing can dim land girl Esther Wynford's happiness at marrying the love of her life – fighter pilot Monty Grant. Their short honeymoon results in a baby, but on the birth of her daughter, Joy, Esther's world falls apart. Esther's dying mother confesses to a dark secret that she has kept to herself for twenty years: Esther is not her natural daughter but the result of an exchange of babies after her own child was stillborn. Esther's real mother was forced to give up her baby to an orphanage by her furious family who were incensed about the unsuitability of their daughter's lover, and Joy's birth makes the reason clear. Harshly rejected by Monty, and with the man Esther believed was her father breathing fire and damnation, she takes her precious baby and leaves everything and everyone she's ever known, determined to fend for herself and her child. But her fight is just beginning . . .