It's been difficult to put into words why I dislike this book so much. It's a self-published book, which I normally avoid because you never know what you're going to get, but this had such high ratings that I couldn't resist. Now, I have survived to tell the tale. Heed my warning.

First, the only good thing I can say: there's a lot of drama, a lot of external issues threatening the union of our hero and heroine. If you don't mind weak characterization and shoddy writing and only care about plot, then you'll like this book. Every time I think it has to end, it doesn't. There's always something new and interesting around the corner, which forced me to keep reading and keep being disappointed.

As I mentioned earlier, the writing and characters are crap, and they go hand in hand. The exposition is all over the place. O'Connell info dumps readers with families trees and neighbors' backstories, most of whom the reader never meets. It's exhausting, boring, and frustrating. It made it difficult to find relevant and important information. However, if there's something you want to know more about, O'Connell doesn't deliver.

She also tended to solve her own problems early in the book but drag them out for the entire story. For example: racism. Cord is half Indian, so the entire town is against him, even his own family. Fine. Stupidly, (the villain in this is remarkably stupid) he's attacked IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY RIGHT AFTER CHURCH LET OUT, which means there's a ton of people around. After the fight, most of the townsfolk go up to the sheriff to make sure he knows that Cord was provoked. It seems that Anne and Cord have won over the townspeople, but in the next chapter, they still think she's trash for marrying him. Even Cord's family's racism towards their own brother surprised me. Even when they learned how Anne and Cord got together, they still assumed he forced her! Everyone in this book is dumber than a rock.

So yeah, lots of inconsistent characterization, plot development, and exposition. As a side note, the fight scene was poorly written, which I would know as a martial arts instructor. That was infuriating to read. The only reason this isn't 1 star is because it was sometimes decent, and there was plenty of drama to keep me hooked. Then the climax blew it, and I was so frustrated!

Without giving too much away: the climax promised to be great with tension and deviousness and Cord needing to defy nature to save Anne. Why did it fail miserably? BECAUSE THE ENTIRE CLIMAX WAS TOLD FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF HER SPINELESS, WEAK, COWARDLY, RACIST RELATIVES who suddenly repented after hearing the villain's REAL plan for Anne. Nope. Do not care about them. It completely deflated the entire climax, and I have rarely been so disappointed in a book. ( )

Where it's pretty realistic about racism, everything else is basically a miracle. Cord gets beaten practically to death, but survives because...Anne. The colt is starved practically to death, but survives because...Anne. The horse, Keeper, is ridden practically to death, but survives because...you guessed it, Anne. Everyone sees that Anne is a pretty spunky gal who escapes from her abusive father, but no one believes that if Cord was truly the monumental douche-wagon they thought, she would have bounced right out? And Anne goes from a sheltered town-living lady to a hay-baling ranch wife with no trouble at all?

The writing itself was amateurish in style and in need of a copy editor to fix the technical issues. I would recommend skipping right past this to [b: Sing My Name|9755694|Sing My Name|Ellen O'Connell|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1328349810s/9755694.jpg|14644978] which relies less on implausible miracles and has a much better style. ( )

Despite the hero's family constantly assuming the worst about him, even when it was irrational, I rather liked this story. It dragged on a little but it was sweet. ( )

I stayed away from this one for a long time because it was so heavily promoted by the author. But I did read [b:Dancing on Coals|12913453|Dancing on Coals|Ellen O'Connell|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1323838287s/12913453.jpg|18068349] by this author and really enjoyed it so I gave in and bought this one. I enjoyed it. A good story line that didn't shy away from some brutality but also had charm. I am a fan of marriage of convenience stories and this one worked well. The plot did not revolve around whether or not they would sleep together but how they would work out their marriage which I think is much more realistic. The bad guy was a little OTT but it didn't really cause me to dislike the book. Worth the read. ( )

There were things I loved about this story and things I didn't. The first 10% or so were wonderful and engaging, then about the next 30-40% slowed way down for me. While I don't question the reality, I didn't like the lack of the novelty of the situations facing Anne and Cord. There was a certain lack of subtlety until certain events, or certain events brought out a different kind of racism/terror/issues.

In general, while I think this book was something special, it felt like a whole lot of rinse and repeat. Like a weird lack of cohesiveness where I'd be making my way through this lovely and difficult journey of the couple's romance only to be slimed again with the same type of situation I read 10 pages ago. There would've been more impact, in a sense, if some of the situations had been more simmering, ongoing, and not so constantly in-my-face over and over again. And largely, the aim of this book felt like it was trying to make everyone else ok with Anne and Cord, and that Cord was just, like, the best ever. I thought the truth and the strength in this story was Anne insistence that was the case, everyone else be damned. So in the end, the happy ending wasn't theirs, but everyone else seeing that Cord was a solid dude and treated Anne well. And I guess I'm of the 'fuck-em' mindset.

This is not to say Cord's difficulties with his family or everyone else aren't well done. Believe me, I think they were. I've been around enough racism toward American Indians that I absolutely believe this was the truth-it remains the truth. It is painful and real. It just means that I felt that it caused them trouble, rightly so, and once they had moved past it and were just plain in love and devoted--I didn't need everyone else. Their development as a couple and as people came to an end, and it was just time to watch everyone else.

( )