This Old House Series by Roxanne Snopek
This
series has been on my TBR list for a long time and it all started because of a
book party I went to. Roxanne Snopek was a new author for me and posted a
teaser for Cinderella’s Cowboy, I was hooked. The only problem was it was book
four in the series! I am one of those people that has to start a series from
book one. Well in that party I actually won book one and bought book four. All I
needed was the book money to get the other two. My luck was with me though and
a few weeks later I won book two at yet another party. You would have thought I
would start it right then and there but alas I was contracted by my word for a
ton of book reviews and blog tours. I knew once I started reading this series I
wouldn’t be able to stop until I was done. So finally on October 14th
I started reading Finding Home and finished book four at 3:30 am this morning (October
17th). I will brake them down for you now:
Finding
Home (Book One)
This
book had me hooked for the moment I found out Samara was a single mom. There
are not a lot of single mom books out there and being one myself, I like
reading them. Samara has lost her husband, has a child that learns different than
others and is starting a new life in the only place she has ever felt like
home. Finding a great deal on a house and wanting to get settled with her
daughter sounded perfect. Life had been really hard on her and she was hoping
this new start would make this better. Traveling to Montana by car was not easy
but once there she was excited to see the house she had bought. It was a
project house, a historic house being fixed up by students from the surrounding
schools for graduation credits. Being a teacher Samar loved the idea. That is
until she walks in and sees that her house is no were near ready to be moved
in, the realtor is ducking her, and the person in charge is the one man she has
never been able to forget.
Logan
Stafford can’t believe his ears or eyes when the one women he had been looking
for years is standing in front of him. Let alone that he is working on her
house. He views this as a second chance one that nothing is going to stop him
from grabbing. He loves kids and animals so the fact that Samara has a daughter
and a service dog are not a problem. He wants to prove to her she can trust
him, that he won’t let her down as so many others have in her life. The problem
is Samara is fighting what she feels, and fighting him.
This
book shows that is never too late to find your way back home. A lot of single
moms think love is something we have to wait for our children to grow up before
we have again. I don’t believe this at all, that’s why books like this make me
so happy. I am not giving anything away, we read romance for the HEA and this
is no exception. Be ready for love, laughter, and passion when these two come
together!
A Sweet
Montana Christmas (Book Two)
Book
two was better than I expected and a new kind of romance for me. Malinda and Austin
have been married for ten years and things ae not going well. Austin has been
working for years to build a life for his wife and she has been working as a
nurse as well. They have been working so hard for their perfect life they
hardly ever see one another. Then disaster hits, Austin’s company goes bust and
his only option is to live on the family honey farm in Montana. He just assumes
Malinda will join him so is devastated when she heads for her mother’s house
instead. She doesn’t feel her husband’s love and they had stopped communicating
long before the business went belly up. Malinda’s mother convinces her to try
one more time. Therefore, she packs up all her stuff and heads to join her
husband not realizing that the family farm is in need of major repair.
Austin
loves his wife and its killing him to not have her but when she shows up on his
doorstep he is just confused. She had asked for some time, she had wanted a
separation, yet there she was. His heart was souring and he was glad she was
there but he needed to know why and for how long? Everything in him wanted to
prove to her he was a changed man, that he would try harder for her. What
starts out as a temporary move starts to feel more like home. The husband and wife
are closer then before but there is still so many obstacles to over come. One
big one being that the house isn’t their but still belongs to Austin’s father. Another
is that Malinda wants to go back to civilization. Austin will do what he has
to, to keep Malinda, because in the end she is the only ‘home’ he needs.
What a
wonderful book showing that we don’t have to scrap a marriage as long as there
is love and respect and two people willing to work for what is important. This
is the kind of marriage most of us look for and one reason I loved this book.
So often we get to see the two characters come together but are left wondering
if they lasted. In this series we get to see this in book three and four.
Roxanne gave me what I love in a series, to learn more about the people we take
into our hearts.
The
Cowboy Next Door (Book Three)
In the
second book we meet Leda a pregnant young women that is determined to do right
by her baby. She is full of fire and spunk and grabs out hearts. In this book
we get to know more about her and her past, find out how her child is growing
too. She is living with Malinda and Austin and helping out with the farm. She
loves it a feels at home, even begins to feel good about were her life is
headed. That is until she goes next door and meets Eric Anders.
Eric is
older than Leda and feels he is wiser too. He tries to take control out of her
hands. He thinks he knows what she needs and how to give it to her. You know
the type, prideful, controlling, doesn’t listen, lol. This is Eric, or at least
part of his character. Eric tries to ignore the longing and desire he feels for
Leda because of their age difference as does Leda. Sometime though we have to
look at the person not the age or their faults.
The
Cowboy Next Door shows that we all have flaws and we all have things we wish we
could fix about ourselves. We have people in our lives that have told us lies
about who they think we are. Leda was told she was ordinary and would never be
anything important to anyone. So she believed it, she wanted more for her
daughter though. Eric had a rough childhood and grew up wanting to ‘fix’ other people’s
lives so they would live better. He meant well but went about it wrong with
Leda. This book demonstrates that if we can learn to accept people for who they
are and look for the good not the bad, Love can sine through a lot brighter.
Cinderella’s Cowboy (Book
Four)
The
final book in the series was truly full of lessons, love, banter, and fixing stereotypes.
Cynthia is a hard working woman that tries to do the right thing. She has
started a new company that is her passion. Unfortunately, her stepsisters have
come along for the ride. She loved them and they loved her, they got along for
the most part. They did call her Cinderella but that was because she worked all
the time and they played. As a teenager, she had a crush on Eric Anders, big
time rodeo champion until he got hurt and had to quit. There was also an event
she wished she could forget the cured her of her teenage crush. Now his
brother, playboy cowboy was asking for her help.
Chad
Anders liked being footloose and fancy free when it came to women and they all
knew it. He didn’t want to make the mistakes he saw growing up, people falling
in love then being left behind. He wanted things easy and to live his live on
his terms. Nothing and no one had ever made him doubt this until he meat
Cynthia. She was intriguing to him, she didn’t faun all over him or seem the
least bit interested. To her he was ‘Eric Anders brother’. After only a few
moments with her he decides to change her mind. Then there were her
stepsisters, Chad had been dreaming of them since high school. Who didn’t
though, twin bombshells with reputations for liking to have fun. He figured he
was due some and he could get some of his curiosity fed as well. Everything he
is normally attracted to in a women is at his fingertips, but he can’t stop
thinking about Cynthia. He wants to be with her, be near her, and talk only to
her. He even wished the sisters would go away so he wouldn’t have to be pawed
at by then, what is up with that? Cynthia turns his life upside down and she
really has no clue she is doing anything.
The two opposites
are drawn together against their protests and neither want to admit they want
each other. I like books like this because the banter between the two is
perfectly matched. They fight, argue, and under it all they find love. Defiantly
read all four of these books because they are fantastic. **This can be read as
a standalone though**
