Western Womens Fiction

When her tinsmith father and brothers head West, Polish immigrant Marie Kotlarczyk has no choice but to go along. Family, after all, is family. The Dakota Territories are anything but welcoming to the Kotlarczyks, and as the months trip by, Marie must pick up the hammers she’s secretly desired but also feared. When she faces the skeptical people of Flats Town, the demands of the local Army commander, and her public failures, her inner voice grows destructively, forcing Marie to decide exactly who she is and what it means to be a woman smith.

Some cowboys aren't cut out to be Prince Charming - and Claire Kowalski knows that better than anyone. She gave her heart to Ford Jarvis two years ago, yet that didn't keep him from disappearing into the sunset. Now that he's back in Big Verde, Texas, she's determined not to make the same mistake twice. But the ruggedly sexy cowboy still knows how to push all her buttons, and avoiding him is nearly impossible when she needs his help.

She ran away to see the world. He was left behind with the fallout. Do these childhood sweethearts still have a chance at happily-ever-after? Salt Lick, Kentucky. Prodigal child Clem Calhoun is home to beg for forgiveness. But returning after a seven-year stint in the military has her more nervous than a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.

Ben Monroe was the ultimate bad boy - and everyone in Haller Creek knew it. But now as a sheriff's deputy, Ben spends his time breaking up bar fights rather than starting them, and staying away from trouble...until Becca Henderson comes back into town. She's just as beautiful as Ben remembers - and just as far out of his reach. Coming home is exactly what Becca Henderson needed. A place of her own, a successful new business, and a chance to reconnect with the sexy cowboy she had a crush on in school. Ben has always blazed his own path and never let anyone stand in his way.

Gloriana wanted to write and travel. She wanted to be bold and brave. She wanted love, children, and dogs. She is miserable in her four-year marriage and daydreams about divorce and running away from all her problems. Then she has the worst day of her life. Her marriage is a shambles and she is suddenly a widow. Now, Glory must pick up the pieces of her life and create a new way of living. When she meets a cowboy, her life begins to take unexpected turns. Can a woman living in the Pacific Northwest create a life of happiness with a cowboy from Oklahoma?

First rule of life on the run: never get attached. Nevada Sweet knows that better than anyone - it's just too dangerous to stay put. And until now, she's never wanted to. But she gets more than she bargained for when she walks into the Chestnut Creek Café looking for a job. Despite the protective wall she's built, her coworker Joseph has her imagining a life she isn't yet convinced she deserves.

Ever since losing his best friend in a motorcycle accident, Taggart Baker wants to make every moment count. No dare is too dangerous, no adventure too crazy for this cowboy. But after one bad brush with the law, he realizes it's time to ditch his hooligan friends and grow up. Now he's running his own ranch next to the Longhorn Canyon spread in Texas. Still, no one would ever call him tame.

Emma Brinkman is the most eligible bachelorette in town and staying that way. After learning twice that romance is a lie, she’s focused only on making the mine she and her sisters inherited a booming success. To do that, she’ll need to put her trust in a notorious scoundrel. But no matter how flirtatious, handsome, or persistent he may be, Emma is interested only in his expertise in coaxing gold from the earth. The illegitimate son of a duke, Beranger North is a reputed playboy and a self-made man who found his fortune excavating the rich and profitable American West.

In the inhospitable lands of the Utah Territory, during the winter of 1888, thirty-seven-year-old Deborah Tyler waits for her husband, Samuel, to return home from his travels as a wheelwright. It is now the depths of winter, Samuel is weeks overdue, and Deborah is getting worried. Deborah lives in Junction, a tiny town of seven Mormon families scattered along the floor of a canyon, and she earns her living by tending orchards and making work gloves. Isolated by the red-rock cliffs that surround the town, she and her neighbors live apart from the outside world.

Texas socialite Delaney Cartwright knows she can't go through with her wedding. But she can't simply call the whole thing off. The nuptials to her nice, predictable childhood friend are the social event of the season (not to mention that her mother would freak). To fan the flames of this dying ember, Delaney abducts her fiancé for a night of passion - and grabs the wrong guy! A guy with smoldering eyes and an irresistible country-boy swagger...

Clinching is the technique used to bend a driven horseshoe nail to hold the shoe to a hoof. Rainy Dale is The Clincher, a 20-something high school-dropout turned farrier (horseshoer) who is haunted by a secret she carries. Estranged from her California D-list actress momma and her ranch hand Texas daddy, she tracked down her childhood horse in small-town Oregon - a land full of cowboys and their horses - then stayed to build a life with her tools, steel, and forge. She’s sleeping in a garage and trying not to fall for her landlord, the hapless and hopeful chef, Guy.

Wearing a too-tight “Santa Baby” costume held in by a double pair of Spanx, Paige MacGregor runs headlong into a gorgeous, grey-eyed hunk of a long, tall cowboy. And not just any cowboy, but country-Western star Cash Colton, visiting Twilight to perform in a charity concert. Most women would melt at his feet, but Paige knows all too much about self-assured men with cocky attitudes, so she tells him to get lost. Cash is in town, nursing his own broken heart, but Paige has knocked him off his feet. He’s convinced she’s perfect.

Annie Lakes has had the same recurring nightmare for years. Her heart pounding in her chest. A panicked voice, begging her to run faster. Her own bloodcurdling scream. But now Annie is starting to realize it's more than just a bad dream. She's starting to remember things about the night her cousin Jenny disappeared all those years ago. Things that make her believe her family was involved - and what they're hiding is much worse than she ever imagined. But she can't unravel this alone. She needs someone she can trust, someone like sexy Detective Mark Sutton.

Mary Louisa Roberts won the race of a lifetime - or so she thought. In competition with desperate homesteaders, ruthless land seekers, and a sheriff determined to see her fail, Mary rides out on a horse to strike her claim in the Oklahoma Land Rush of 1893. When she finally thrusts her flag into the dirt, 160 acres becomes her own. But with that claim, she risks more than she could ever imagine.

Nora Sheridan, a loving wife and mother and talented artist, lives with her husband Dan, an architect, and their two young daughters Suzie and Kristin on their sprawling horse ranch in Akers Ridge, Oregon. Nora's world is shattered when her family is the victim of a violent crime, tragically taking their lives and ending hers in the ways that counted most. Now alone and in her mid-30s, Nora struggles to cope with her life that hardly seems worth living with the help of her best friend Marilyn and her father-in-law George.

Imagine living exclusively for others and waking up one day with a chance to start over. The terrifying new beginning reeks of abandonment and betrayal. The choice for Seattle resident Monica lingers between now and then and them and her. Izabel's idyllic existence on Orcas Island is turned upside down during the birth of a friend's child. Suddenly, pain rips through her own body, and life as she knows it shifts, hinting at a forgotten past and propelling her toward an uncertain future. On another island, young Daisy awakens surrounded by infinite shades of blue.

Growing up in Valentine, Texas, can make anyone believe in happily ever after. But newly declared recovering romantic Rachael Henderson has decided that love stinks. After having not one but two grooms ditch her at the altar, she announces her disenchantment in an uncharacteristic act of rebellion. She feels liberated...until she's arrested by Sheriff Brody Carlton. Once upon a time, being hauled against the taut, rippling body of her first crush would have had Rachael planning the wedding of the year. Now it spurs her to create Romanceaholics Anonymous, a 12 step program for love addicts.

Struggling to operate her ranch, Terra Lee Bradford realizes the full extent of the Glory B’s dire financial straits. Cameron Stoner’s neighboring ranch, on the other hand, is thriving. Yet he’s overwhelmed with problems trying to tame his three motherless children - not to mention his libido. Concocted as an instant solution to everyone's woes, their marriage of convenience soon turns into a lusty battle of wills. He'll be damned if he'll give her his heart, and she refuses to settle for less!

Brooklyn Myers escaped her broken home and her embittered, unloving father by eloping to Reno at the age of 17. But when she was pregnant with their first child, her husband abandoned her as well. Not welcome back home in Thunder Creek, Brooklyn stayed in Reno and raised her daughter, Alycia, on her own, doing her best to make sure Alycia never knew the heartache and rejection Brooklyn herself had known.

Heather Lindsay loves falling in love - even though her blueprint for romance has failed her time and time (and time) again. But now that she’s signed on to design an outdoor-wedding venue for her friend’s home renovation show, Heather’s found a new focus: her career. Only it’s not long before she’s being distracted - by the hunkiest man who ever swaggered down the streets of Red Oak Falls. The show’s new ranch manager, Waylon Peterson, a.k.a. Prince Harry in a cowboy hat, has every woman swooning. He’s also got a bad-boy rep that’s made him the hottest mess in town.