ARC REVIEW Cowboy Courage by Carolyn Brown

Longhorn Canyon #6, Yay! It's Hud finally. A second chance romance. Rose, Hud's middle school crush, shows up in town to help her great aunt run her B&B and gift shop while she's on vacation with the Fab 5. Rose is at a crossroads in her life right now she can either re-up in the Army or do something else with her life as long as it's not going back to her family in the commune. One thing she knows for sure she's not going to make a decision based solely on a guy, not even a guy she's never stopped thinking about since she left without saying goodbye. Hud knows it's her choice whether to stay or not and seeing how there is not a opportunities for a multilingual language specialist he's worried he's going to lose her before they even get the chance.

In a funny Murphy's Law sort of way Rose and Hud are pushed to their limits. Both Rose and Hud have to face some truths before they can finally admit their feelings but when they do nothing will keep them apart not even a tornado in January. I really enjoyed this book. I loved Hud and Rose. I would love to see more of Great Aunt Luna she's my kind gal. Overall, this is a fun read Hud is a real sweetheart and Rose is a bright head strong woman  who picks her battles wisely. I am really looking forward to Pax's story next.

  

CHRISTMAS ARC REVIEW Christmas with a Cowboy by Carolyn Brown

I've started my Season's Readings, I'm going to try every Monday to post a New or Favorite Christmas read. 

Longhorn Canyon Ranch #5, Maverick Callahan hasn't been the same since he got back from his Ireland vacation with his Grammy Iris. Since then he has been helping his cousins set up their ranch but when Grammy falls out the pear tree and has to have her hip replaced and her foreman goes off to visit family she needs help around the ranch. She already has a housekeeper, the granddaughter of her best friend whom she invited over to spend the holidays.
Bridget O'Malley lost her best friend, gained guardianship of a new born baby, Laela, and lost her grandmother all in a couple months of each other. So when her grandmother's best friend, Iris, calls and offers her a place to stay and spend the holiday while making some money she jumps at the chance, even if that means leaving Ireland for a couple of months. 

Bridget and Maverick met in Ireland on his last night there and spent the night together, since that night neither has been able to stop thinking about he other but they didn't exchange number or even get each other's last names. When Bridget gets to Texas she never expected to find her cowboy is none other than Iris's grandson. But she's not he same girl she was a year ago she's a mother now and just can't fall into bed with a good looking cowboy. Maverick knows as soon as he sees Bridget again it was fate. He wants her to stay but he just a cowboy with nothing to his name, he has nothing to offer her except his love. Bridget is torn between her love for Maverick and her love of Ireland, she worried that things aren't going to last, that her homesickness will make her miserable, she worries about a lot of things but her love for Maverick isn't one.

Overall, it's a real sweet romance, things get hot and heavy between Mav and Bridget but in the typical Carolyn Brown fashion (she mainly leaves it up to your imagination). I loved Laela, and how quickly Mav bonded with her and Iris is a hoot. I love all the characters and it was such a nice easy read.   

ARC REVIEW Cowboy Rebel by Carolyn Brown

Longhorn Canyon #4, I am so glad the series has extended beyond the initial characters, the introduction to Emily's brothers in the last book and cousins in this book has the hopes of at least three more books after this one. This does well as a stand alone Nikki and Tag's relationship between the wedding where they met and the start of this book was basically Tag flirting and Nikki turning him down. The beginning of this book Tag shows Nikki how serious he is about starting a relationship with her and as usual the more time they spend together the more they like each other. Pretty early in the relationship Tag is exposed the Nikki's crazy mama and Nikki is faced with just how wild Tag's past was when an old friend of his tries to hold her for ransom. Thankfully the guy's an idiot. That all happens in the first half of the book the second half is more of their internal struggle dealing with their personal demons and facing a committed relationship.

Overall, it was a good read. If you are not familiar with Carolyn Brown she leans more to the explicit free, leave it up to the reader's imagination sex. The one thing that kind of bugged me, and she's been doing this quite a bit, all the country songs mentioned most of the time I don't mind because so many people can relate to music especially Tag's fascination with the song 'Live Like You Were Dying' however it seemed that every song on the radio was pertinent to that exact situation at that exact moment. Otherwise this was a really good book I love reading Carolyn Brown and I can't wait to read the rest of the series.   

ARC REVIEW Cowboy Brave by Carolyn Brown

Longhorn Canyon #3, Yay this isn't the last one! Longhorn Canyon Ranch is a working ranch that in the summer takes on some city kids on the verge of being troublemakers and teaches them about ranching and other stuff. We've already seen the oldest of the Maguire brother's find true love and their best friend/foreman find true love, Justin wasn't looking he didn't even think he was ready to settle down but the moment he set eyes on Emily Baker everything changed.

Emily is the events coordinator at a retirement community and one group she deals with heard about the Longhorn Canyon Ranch and their work with kids and asked Emily if she could arrange a special trip for them to the ranch. By all appearances Emily is a city girl but there is more to her than meets the eye. The attraction between them is instant but Emily is determined not to fall for a cowboy. Justin has never felt this way about anyone and he's determined to show Emily he means it. Aside from Emily's family that she hasn't told him about another obstacle is Justin's mother who took an instant dislike toward Emily automatically assuming she's a golddigger.

Overall, this was another really good read from Carolyn Brown. I loved Emily and Justin and all the hyjinks that the Fab Five get into are hysterical. Even though Justin's mom kind of plays the part of the bad guy in this book Emily really is her own worst enemy. The Bonus Book Second Chance Cowboy by A.J. Pine is a book I have previously read it's the first book of the of Crossroads Ranch series and is really good. So as a two for one deal this one is really good one both books are entertaining and fantastic reads.   

ARC REVIEW Cowboy Honor by Carolyn Brown

Longhorn Canyon #2, Happenstance at it's finest. Claire and her niece, Zaylie, try to avoid traffic and get lost and crash into a tree during an early snow storm, luckily there is a empty cabin not to far away. Levi is out looking for a lost cattle and his ATV runs out of gas he goes to the empty cabin the boys at Longhorn Canyon keep for just emergencies. Levi never expected to find a gorgeous woman pull a gun on him. I loved this one just as much as the first book of the series, each is a stand alone you don't have to go out and read the first one unless you want to. I practically cried throughout the whole book. Zaylie is freakin' adorable, and all the animals Levi picks up, so cute. Claire and Zaylie are snowbound at the ranch through Thanksgiving and when the roads clear they keep finding excuse after excuse to stay a little longer.

Levi falls for Claire pretty quickly but he's so worried that he's not good enough for her, he's the ranch's foreman and that's all he'll ever be. Claire is so use to doing everything herself that letting Levi do the simplest thing for her seems like a foreign concept. It's a heartwarming story about learning to compromise for love and that everything happens for a reason good or bad. I love Carolyn Brown's writing; she hits those heartstring like you wouldn't believe. Overall, the characters and the whole situation are really good. It was a quick and enjoyable read. 

ARC REVIEW Cowboy Bold by Carolyn Brown

Longhorn Canyon #1, This was a great start to a new series. My opinion on it is really split there are things I really enjoyed about the book and others things that I didn't, nothing to do with Brown's ability to write, I teared up more times than I realize. It's just personal preference stuff that got on my nerves, like Cade being a Longhorns fan, as a Texas native I'm not much into football but my FIL says we root for the Aggies so we root for the Aggies. The friendly rivalry between Cade and Retta when it came to the Longhorns versus the Sooners got old real quick. There were some other things but I enjoyed the book for the most part. The family dynamic the Maguire family was nice the three brother's running the ranch and having a summer camp experience for troubled kids, where they get to learn the hard work that goes into the ranch and the value behind the hard work. I love that idea. The kids were great to they really win you over for the story. Retta and Cade's romance almost seemed like the secondary story line, the kids and the camp for me stood most for me I really enjoyed that aspect of the book. Like most of Brown's book the characters take it slow they really take the time to get to know each other and it's nice and kind of realistic the progression of their relationship, but I was disappointed in the ending. 

Overall, the kids are the best part of the story, especially Sam. As the start of a new series this was a great introduction to the characters, to Longhorn Canyon, and what all they do there. (the cover model looks a little like Scott Eastwood, yummy)