Lara Johnson is coping with the emotional scars of losing both parents in a tragic incident and facing the challenges of starting a new school. Getting involved in a relationship isn't on her priority list. Certainly not this illicit desire for a man, who demands the best from her, yet leaves her breathless in his presence.
All Ike Thomas wants to do is to keep out of trouble and get through the one year internship required for his degree program. But trouble finds him, in the form of an intelligent and brave girl who turns his world upside down. Falling in love is forbidden. So why does it feel so right?
A love like theirs cannot be denied. But catastrophe lies in wait and one night changes their lives forever.
Bound to Fate is a story about surviving tragedy, forgiveness and the overwhelming love that pulls through against the odds.
Content warning: This book contains scenes that might be triggering for some readers.
As a lover of romance novels, Kiru wanted to read stories about Africans falling in love. When she couldn’t find those books, she decided to write the stories she wanted to read.
Kiru writes sensual stories featuring African characters whether on the continent or in the Diaspora. When she's not writing you can find her either immersed in a good book or catching up with friends and family. She currently lives in the South of England with her husband and three children.
Kiru is a founding member of Romance Writers of West Africa. In 2011, her debut romance novella, His Treasure, won the Book of the Year at the Love Romances Café Awards. She is the 2015 Romance Writer of the Year at the Nigerian Writers Awards and 2017 Author of the Year at the Ufere Awards.
I really enjoyed this book because the location and culture resonated within me. The storytelling was vivid and descriptive, that I felt like I was watching a film. I can't say that I considered this story a love story as much as a story about growth, hope, survival and second chances.
Lara Johnson moved to live with her Aunt in Enugu (Nigeria) with her younger sister after a tragic car accident left them orphans. The transition was rough for the introverted Lara, who was still having nightmare from the crash. She was in a new state, a new home and was beginning a new college. But she found comfort in a teacher, Ike Thomas, who was suffering from loss of his older brother. Their mutual grief and physical attraction soon turned into a relationship. Ike and Lara were young so there was physical intimacy but not much emotional intimacy. So when some devastating events occurred at a college party, Lara and Ike's infatuation didn't survive those issues. Lara and Ike's lack of communication resulted in Ike breaking things off. Lara was heartbroken but they their separate ways.
Five years later, Lara got a job working at a company owned by Ike's family and they resumed their physical relationship despite the fact that Ike was engaged to be married. Lara was still suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder so she was still having anxiety attacks regularly. This time around with the support of her best friend, Lara was able to get the help she needed and finally decide make her move to get what her heart has always desired, Ike Thomas. But Ike is engaged to another and his family expects his compliance as this union has business implications for the family empire. The decision is very complicated for Ike because following his heart will mean disappointing his family again.
I have to be honest here. I didn't like Ike Thomas. I felt as the older one in the relationship, he was selfish and self-centered. If he loved Lara, he would have noticed that something was very wrong after the house party incidents. In addition, Ike lacked remorse about his infidelity which turned out to be multiple incidents with different women. Ike's fiancee was a piece of work. That's another reason I questioned his character. How could he live with such a devious person and have no idea what a malicious person she was. I just couldn't get past all of that. I felt bad for Lara and hoped she would find a man better than Ike. She was a survivor and she was a hard worker. I wished that Ike had been as loyal as Lara was. Lara made me proud, not because she always made the best decisions, but how she rebounded if she made a wrong turn.
The author did a great job developing Lara as a heroine and making the reader empathize with her. This is my first book by the author and I am definitely going to check out more of her work.
*Special Thanks to KT Press via Netgalley for the e-book given in exchange for an honest review.
I loved this book!!! Seeing Lara's progression through loss, love, pain & healing as well as Ike's growth as a man, moving past expectations of others & just learning to do what made him happy, made me really appreciate the character development. I can't wait to see where Book 2 goes!!! Thanks for a great read!!!
Bound to Fate starts out with a forbidden love between Lara and Ike. Their attraction is instant and mutual, and their romance is sweet. I found myself rooting for Lara and Ike from the moment they met even when their relationship was forbidden. I couldn't wait to see how their innocent love progressed to a HEA.
As we all know, young love usually faces some challenges, and this is no different. Lara and Ike are in different spaces in their lives; being together would come at a cost that may be too high to pay. The blurb says one night changes everything, but it is more like a series of events that culminate in one big catastrophe.
Luckily for us, they meet again when five years of life has happened to both, but their attraction hasn't waned. However, they need to address those series of events from their past and the emotional scars they've acquired.
Ms Taye did a great job demonstrating the purity of young love, the foolishness of youth and the consequences of everyday decisions. The characters were diverse and well-rounded and carried the story from beginning to end. I cared about Ike and Lara and found my heart squeezing and melting in several places. I couldn't wait to experience their healing with them. This story is simple and yet complicated, and I thoroughly enjoyed the read. It reminded me why I love sweet romance.
Lara is starting over with her sister. After their parents death they moved to their aunts in a new city. Her first day at a new school is terrifying to her and when she meets her teacher, she can't believe how gorgeous, and young, he is. Ike Thomas is working on a year internship at a high school as a geography teacher. His new student has captured him, everything about her he can't resist. They begin a forbidden romance that he ends abruptly and devastates Lara. That night changes her for the rest of her life. What a great read! Such innocence that turn into devastation. How one decision effects the rest of life. I liked how strong minded and brave Lara is and even though Ike left her, how he was always so caring and concerned for her well being. The author wrote very well and keeps you hooked with a very steady passed story line. Looking forwarded to reading more! This gets four diamonds from a reviewer for Romance Authors That Rock!
Bound to Fate is a bittersweet story about forbidden love found, then crushingly lost in the most brutal way. Without giving too much away, it is the story of Ike and Lara who find love at a point in their lives when they both need each other the most but societal rules and the actions of unsavory characters conspire to keep them apart. This is not your typical Kiru Taye novel of overwhelming passion and hot steamy sex; this book deals with sensitive issues faced by a large number of people in society today. The author was faced with the challenge of weaving a believable love story around societal issues that are difficult to deal with, especially in an African context and i think she handled it with the grace the story deserved. The characters were utterly believable and the tragic circumstances they found themselves was delivered with the grace and finesse the story-line deserved. Kudos Kiru.
I love a book that can take me through a range of emotions. The fear elicited by an inappropriate crush (which I secretly wanted to succeed because it was so much more than a crush). Hope for the heroine who had been through so much in her life. A chastisement for the hero who should’ve known better and yet followed his heart anyway. Raw anger at characters who were downright wretched.
Bound to Fate ended up being different from what I’d anticipated, but it a good way. The harsher aspects gave it a depth I wasn’t expecting. It’s setting in Nigeria added to the atmosphere of the novel. The story moved along at a wonderful pace. Before I knew it I was halfway through without realizing where the time had gone.
Why I love this book? The story is about hope, survival, forgiveness and moving on. We're all bound to our past and memories. And they have an impact on our present and future lives. It is about embracing our past knowing you can't change it. This story is about a woman who lets love heal her wounded soul. This story is about a man willing to fight for his love. This is a story about an enduring love.
This is not your typical romance novel! It is a heart wrenching, heartfelt story of love, loss and forgiveness. Lara moves to a new town, new school following tragic events and falls for the wrong person. However, societal norms and expectations prove that love is sometimes ugly and complicated.
I don’t think this was the book for me. It is clear that it was well-written, but I had issues with a lot of the romantic content in it. This is a forbidden love, star-crossed lovers sort of second chance new adult romance. The premise is that after losing her parents tragically in her final year of secondary school, 17-year-old Lara moves to Enugu to attend a new school, there she meets and falls in love with a 21-year old teacher doing a job experience placement at her school, Ike. But even apart from the forbidden, star-crossed nature of any relationship that could exist between them, there are evil intentions set to tear them apart with tragic consequences. Years later, Lara is still putting the pieces of her life back together when she once again meets Ike.
What I will say is that whilst there is the forbidden teacher-student attraction in this, the author is careful to write this so that there is no sketchiness around age legality or power imbalances. I really appreciated that aspect about this because in the set up, I was worried what was going to happen. But that’s the last time I give Ike a free pass because he’s a whole entire f-boy with no self control regardless of how good his intentions or how hard his love for Lara, and he doesn’t really take responsibility- there’s always an excuse why, even if at the literal time he’s taking the action, he has an internal dialogue about why it’s a bad idea. I also didn’t like that in the critical moments, he kind of made her pain about him in a way. I love the depth to which conversations and approaches to mental health and mental illness were discussed in this book, but then Dr Jocelyn was a little to free with Lara’s medical information. Everytime I felt a little settled in the book, something would happen to upset me a bit. I think the solutions were a little too easily won and I’m a little irritated that they’re building one of the villains of this story to be the next heroine. I dislike her so much, I hardly care. But I’ll give it a chance.
This book features unpopular romance teams like infidelity. Also major content warnings around sexual assault as there is graphic discussion about it here. It fits in the story but protect your mental health if you may be triggered. Even though I think this rounded up to quickly and had some elements I didn’t like, I think the right reader who enjoys forbidden love and morally ambiguous characters and is not a stickler for “nice, likable” characters might like this.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
When I initial read the synopsis of the story I was a bit intrigued by the story plus I always try to read more African stories. After the first few pages I was shocked by the direction of the story. I don’t mind a student having a crash on the teacher but the teacher also falling for the student from that point on I knew this story would devolve into a cliché story.
As much as the story is trying to tackle a really heavy theme of sexually abuse. Lola’s trauma and how she deals with it feels a bit inconsistent. One minute she can’t handle someone holding her wrist yet her life is made up of one night stands which the author does not properly explain how she deals with those types of relationships are all those hook ups with gental guys? And then once she has her breakdown and starts her therapy, her speaking about the event is all the healing that she needs, that part of the story was wrapped up so quickly.
The book hinted at some event that happened to Ike and his older brother which the author seems to have forgotten about. And the only person that Ike and Lola was focusing on for justice was the ex boyfriend, what about the other guys who where part of the abuse? Oh yeah the author forgot they exist as well.
The book was a good read. However, it was a slow read. You knew the back stories for all of the characters but they were not as developed as they could have been. The plot was thin. There was no intrigue because you knew who "did it" from the beginning. Being set in Nigeria made it different from other books of this genre. The ending was rushed.
This book was average when it could have been excellent. Even though the couple received the HEA, there were things left unresolved. Yes, Gloria was found out but really got away with murder as usual. Yes, Malcolm was already in prison for something else when his actions were found out, what about the other 3 guys involved? Finally what happened with Jane who should have been fired.
The ending was rushed but the book is worth reading. I'm considering the next book in the series.
Wonderful read. It shows you how one decision can affect the rest of your life.
Lara is a very brave and strong young lady. Ike, even though I didn’t like him all the time in the book, he is a very caring man and you can feel his concern for Lara.
I had never read anything by this author before, and honestly I picked it becaus of the cover. I was not disappointed. The author did a wonderful job with the story it caught at the beginning and help me all the way through. I can’t wait to read the next one.
This was a challenging love story. Sweet, innocent Lara experienced so much loss in her life. When she finally saw some light in her future with Ike...it was forbidden. I enjoyed that this story was based in Africa and different from the typical American surroundings in most books I read. The ups and downs Lara and Ike experienced to finally conquer love were rough, but worth the read.
Star crossed love, unbidden love, bound by fate. Some of the story is hard and difficult to read but its what makes the story so believable. I enjoyed the read and even the tuff times as it made the story so much stronger. I wish some charges or vengeance would have been dealt. Happy endings, but left some things unresolved as the PA and her lose gossiping mouth, unbecoming of a powerful employer. She should have been given her walking papers. No clarification to fellow employees.
I enjoyed reading Bound to Fate. It felt like I was reading about someone who went through this experience and was retelling the story. It was so hard for me to stop reading it because I was so keen on finding what exactly that night. I love how Ike did not give up on her from day one. Great story line
I enjoyed the connection shared between Lara and Ike from beginning to end. The dedication between Ike and Henry along with Lara and Ada is to be commended. This is a great novel but the reason I rated it as a three is because of the amount of grammatical errors aligned in the story.
Don't really know what to say about this one. Nice explicit sex scenes, very nice woven plot, and on occasion funny. However, the story seemed to drag at some places and rush the next. I'll read the sequel because the author can craft a story. I just hope the next book has a steady pace.
Fate has a way of placing us where we need to be when we least expect it. I loved the story. It made me realize that there is someone waiting for each of us whether we yesterday or 10 years ago. LOVE will find its way to you.
It was a great book very descriptive I felt like I was in the story. It was also filled with emotion it also has some suspense about what had happened in their lives. With the help of the Doctor they were both able to over come their fears.
I can see the plot to keeping these two love bird away from each other. However, I’m having a hard time with a woman who sets another young woman up for rape and she not be just as guilt as the one who raped her. There is just a little to much forgiveness going on here!
I enjoyed this book. Everyone has had a crutch on a teacher. Bullies come in different sizes, and unexpected individuals. The twists and turns will keep you turning. The unexpected will make your mouth fall open. Laughter, tears and jubilation kept me engrossed.
This is a great story about love, loss and sexual assault. Ike and Lara came together after many years and a great split and found each other. Very touching and compelling story.
This is powerful and moving. Well worth the time reading.
It reminds me of The Bride Price, another African-themed novel I read in Form 2 while others picked the more popular books during reading class. That "unpopular" book changed my life.
I love reading about ike and lara story, a little sad what happen to Lara, but i am glad Malcom got what he deserved. And Gloria will be getting hers next.