Oh my, but what an intoxicating take J.M. Snyder has woven with A Cowboy's Heart. This is a tale that's equal parts sweet and sexy, full of lust and longing, and culminating in one of my favourite happily-ever-afters in a very long time.

Tommy is a shy young cowboy, helplessly infatuated with his boss, and hopelessly inexperienced when it comes to love. As much as he craves Hal's attention, and fantasizes about his touch at the most inopportune times, he's also very much aware that he must preserve the secret of his sexuality from the other men. When they pressure him to hit the saloon and hook up with one of the working women, he reluctantly agrees to go, if only to have a few drinks and keep up the charade.

Lila is one of the working girls, but one with a dangerous secret. She's really a young man named Stephen, born and raised in a brothel, and addicted to his femininity - both as an expression of his true self, and as a means of getting close to men without risking rejection. He spies something in young Tommy, convinces him to provide an escort upstairs, and then shocks himself by revealing his secret.

What follows is an honest, touching, and (at times) troubled tale of separating lust from love, infatuation from intimacy. Tommy comes across as a really sweet young man, a virgin who is as eager to please as he is to learn. He has a hard time dealing with Lila's gender, and nearly exposes her on more than once occasion, but he respects her choices and ultimately comes to love her for who she is. Lila is definitely more street-smart, and has long since lost the innocence that makes Tommy so endearing, but she's also genuine about her feelings. You can't help but want the two of them to end up together, and to cheer every development that brings them closer.

I've already said this is a happily-ever-after tale, but it's truly the story behind the ending that's so delicious. To say more would be to spoil the magic, so I'll just leave you with this, my favourite line from the story:

"I love you . . . Male, female, whichever you want to be is fine with me. It isn't the way you dress or the body you were born with. It's you. It will always be you."

( )

More than a whole novel, this was more a nice, sweet novella; it’s odd to use the word “sweet” in relation to a story regarding saloon prostitutes, but this one was indeed sweet and very romantic. Probably a quite ordinary western romance plot, the one about the young cowboy falling in love for the soiled dove and sweeping her from her feet to ride together towards the horizon… with the exception that Lila is transgender and the reason why young Tommy fell so hard for her is that he couldn’t care less for women and he has actually a crush on his boss, Hal.

When Lila realizes that the virgin cowboy she picked isn’t actually scared of women due to inexperience, but that he actually prefers men, she feels safe to reveal him her secret. If I hadn’t known that what Lila did was not only possible, but even ended up in some newspaper of the time, I would have probably questioned the possibility for Lila to pass not only as a woman, but to even exercise the older profession in the world, implying intimate contact with men. Actually what I questioned was not that, but more the fact that Lila, after meeting Tommy, basically will not continue with her trade: true, she is falling for Tommy, and Tommy is paying her, but nevertheless, I think at the time the life of a prostitute wasn’t so easy. The author managed it making the time span of the novella quite short, less than a week.

I’m sure life will not be easy for them, Tommy is really young and naïve, he has no real money, and even if they manage to find a place where to start anew, they are bound to have problem, how they will manage to buy the land, the cattle? But I suppose that is not the purpose of the novella, the target was to write a romantic, happily ever after story, and that target was totally achieved. Lila is a good character, she felt real, a soiled dove with a tender heart, someone who is able to comprehend Tommy’s fear and not making fun of them; that is probably the reason why Tommy falls in love, other than, simply as that, Lila is also the first, and only, experience he has with sex and desire, but why we cannot believe that your first real love can be also your forever one?

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1475057318/?tag=elimyrevandra-20