EMBRYO

Yet another pregnancy melodrama--with lots of gynecological detail somewhat alleviated by the snappily wisecracking dialogue, Successful magazine editor Marie Preston and psychiatrist-husband David have been striving mightily to bring 38-year-old Marie into her first pregnancy. . . to no avail, despite endless medical checkups and advice. But then she meets Tom and Bonnie Roundtree, who have been helped (they've got a beautiful blond toddler) by remarkably successful Dr. Raymond McPartland. So Marie goes to McPartland's happy, bustling clinic and undergoes a culdoscopy, which the handsome doctor assures her will allow for a fast bloom. And within the month Marie is indeed pregnant. What she doesn't know, however, is that during the culdoscopy the doctor not only cleaned out a blocked tube but also put ""something"" into her. Marie only gets suspicious after a demented patient of Dr. McPartland starts giving her hysterical warnings. And then Marie's own investigations reveal that McPartland was formerly Dr. Richard Monroe--who was sued by a mother when he failed to warn her that she had a mongoloid foetus. Is Marie having a. . . ? ? No, as it turns out, Marie is the unwitting host for a genetic experiment and has been implanted with the live embryo from a perfect Swedish beauty and perfect Dutch father--the donors for all the McPartland pregnancies (which is why all McPartland babies look alike). Knowing this, how badly does Marie want to be a mother? A far-from-compelling gimmick--and one that's awfully similar to the one in Mary Higgins Clark's The Cradle Will Fall--but Klein goes through the predictable motions with swift, unpretentious, oddly likable finesse.