Title: Love, Drunk Cowboy
Author: Carolyn Brown
Genre: Contemporary Romance/Western
Series: Spikes and Spurs #1
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Number of Pages: 384
Source: Sent to me by the publisher to read
Publication date: May 1, 2011
She's a self-made city girl...
High-powered career woman Austin Lanier suddenly finds herself saddled with an inherited watermelon farm deep in the countryside. She's determined to sell the farm, until her new, drop-dead sexy neighbor Rye O'Donnell shows up... He's as intoxicating as can be... Rancher Rye O'Donnell thinks he's going to get a good deal on his dream property-until he meets the fiery new owner. Rye is knocked sideways when he realizes that not only is Granny Lanier's city-slicker granddaughter a savvy businesswoman, she's also sexy as hell...Suddenly Rye is a whole lot less interested in real estate and a whole lot more focused on getting Austin to set aside her stiletto heels...*from amazon.com*
My thoughts on this book are all over the place, and honestly I think I was able to like this one as much as I did because I was so traumatized by the book I read before it that I just needed a nice, sweet contemporary romance-and this one delivered just that.
I really enjoyed all the characters-Austin was really likable and Rye was super hot. The romance between them was really sweet. I spent the first half of the book wondering if maybe this wasn't really an inspirational romance instead of a mainstream one and I'm not really sure why, except for the fact that there were a lot of religious lines thrown in and not a lot of action. (like th is line here; Pg. 123: A stone the size of Gibraltar replaced his heart. He hoped that she'd drop everything and go with him. But that was a fool's thinking.)
However, that all changed in the second half of the book and it left me confused because the two were texting each other some racy stuff and just seemed out of place for the characters. Even though it seemed out of place, it still worked for where Austin and Rye were in there relationship if that makes sense.
The secondary characters in this book were great. I really loved Molly and Greta-friends of Austin's Grandmothers who she met every Friday for ice cream, and all of Rye's brothers and sisters. They added a lot of humor to the story
There was one thing though that kept from enjoying this book more, and that was what I called country-isms. Every time I would get really into the romance between Rye and Austin something like this would be said:
Pg. 126 He slapped his thigh and and turned around three times in his motel room. She cared enough to worry about him?
Or this:
pg.127 He did a few fast moves of a line dance in happiness.
I know a lot of readers enjoy western romances, but for me these lines were really distracting and I had to put the book down before I could get back into the story again. There was one last thing that bothered me though, and maybe it's because I'm kind of from the country-how could Austin have lived to be 30 and not have been to a carnival or festival??? Despite the countryisms though, I enjoyed seeing Austin finally learn to stick up for herself to her mother and the struggle she went through before she knew what she really wanted to do with her life.
Some of my favorite what I called country-ism lines:
Pg. 114: It would take a special man to ever put me in a corral.
Pg 117: She slammed the car door with enough force to rattle the angels out of heaven.
Curran Crush Meter: Low
Martini Sigh Meter: Low
Barrons Hero Hotness Meter: Medium-low
Finn Sidekick Meter: High
Ethan/Merit Sizzle Meter: Medium
