Princess Luna has married into the family of The Baldasseri Royals and six months into her marriage to Prince Rini, she learns they are expecting a baby. The same day, as she waits for her husband to return from the gold mines, a tragedy occurs. RECLAIMING THE PRINCE’S HEART is a really emotional story, full of ups and downs. 

During a sudden earthquake, the mine roof caves in, and some workers are trapped or killed. The series is set in San Vitano, a small fictional European country, something like Monaco only inland. Italy, Switzerland and Slovenia are their neighbours, with a mobile workforce. When Luna is informed that her husband is missing, she’s naturally distraught. By the next day, she is also conscious of the other families without their men. Her kind heart rewards her, because a journey to Slovenia several days later, to meet the family of a miner, turns up the information that a man with no memory was found by the road. He’s in a basic village hospital, if she cares to see him. Luna has never stopped hoping her husband will be found, but there’s been no sign. She has to make sure.

The patient with amnesia looks like a thinner, scruffier, version of Rini, and can’t speak Italian, the usual language in his country. When Luna tries out her Romansh, a local dialect, he understands. If this is Rini, they have a lot of work ahead of them. And he may not want the same things he did before, including a title, engineering, or marriage.

This sweet amnesia story does make us wonder how much we are the sum of our memories, and how much we learn each day and react in the present. Luna may be pregnant but she’s blooming, with no complications, and supportive enough to put Rini’s needs before hers. The royal family has money and status, of course, but they all feel very seriously that this carries responsibilities.

I had not previously read any of this series by Rebecca Winters, and I find it a refreshing change from stories about business tycoons who trample on staff or competitors. RECLAIMING THE PRINCE’S HEART is a good old-fashioned romance within a marriage, about starting over, communicating, and knowing love when you find it.