Member Review

Cover Image: A True Cowboy Christmas

A True Cowboy Christmas

Pub Date:

Review by

Rachel Leigh-Ann F, Reviewer

I was provided an ARC from the publisher through NetGalley—rather unexpectedly. Which is appropriate, as this one was a delightful surprise for me. But before getting into why, here’s the setup.

Gray Everett, widower father of teenage Becca and eldest brother of Ty and Brady, has just buried his notoriously angry, bitter drunk of a father, Amos. To Gray’s dismay, Amos left the ranch to all three of his sons, in spite of the fact that the younger two left home and Gray alone seems to contribute. After some bickering, Gray realizes he is in need of a wife. A proper, rancher’s wife, to help around the place and give his daughter a more stable bit of family.

His eyes fall on the nearest neighbor, Abby Douglas. Stable is her middle name. She’s down to earth, kind, and famously competent. The local cafe—yes, just one—has seen constant changes in name and management, but Abby has kept it going from her own position for years. Unknown to Gray, Abby has also nursed a profound crush on him for even longer than that. So when he up and proposes the day after his father’s funeral, she’s both intrigued and completely disbelieving.

I am not a diehard cowboy lover. A dabbler, at best. So when the hero prosed on about the virtues of the land, hard work, legacy, and the Colorado sky, I wasn’t flooded with fellow feeling. The other side of that is that he dumps on glamour, trends, and progress. The word “princess” is used as a pejorative twice, which annoyed the hell out of me. The first 10-20% of the book was hard for me to read. Gray dominates the narrative, and Abby’s crush on him—while it would make for great fanfiction—makes their initial romance feel rushed and underdeveloped.

HOWEVER.

Not only was basically everything I was wrinkling my nose over addressed directly in the book, but it was done in such a knockout way that I’m still reeling. Abby and Gray both have significant issues thanks to their respective parents’ A+ Parenting. Abby’s is the kind of self-repression and loathing that is depressingly common in real life. The portrayal of her anxieties and feelings is amazing. It definitely makes up for her seeming lack of agency in the beginning. And that ties into the conflict between her and Gray.

Childhood Crush romances don’t usually work for me because it always seems like there isn’t enough conflict or enough anything. Literally half of the work is done—unless the author covers the fact that a crush is not real love, especially when done from afar. Abby has to learn who Gray is, and I love it.

It doesn’t quite stop this really being Gray’s story though. His issues with his family, both living and dead, take up a lot of space. They absolutely should. In fact, the more I think about the things that bothered me in the beginning, the more it all feels necessary to serve the story.

Both Abby and Gray begin their marriage of convenience with an imaginary person. The manufactured dream of a longtime crush, and the idealistic solution to the Marriage Problem. Neither considered that the other would do anything unexpected or undesirable. Seeing Gray realize that all of his relationships had already been similarly affected may have been my favorite thing while reading. He has very concrete opinions that he drops like facts. When it comes to people, those static impressions carry less and less weight as he contemplates the part he has to play in his relationships with them.

As a holiday read, it probably doesn’t tick all of the boxes for people who like Christmas books. There is no religious relevance that I could see. It was a difference in ideology and a point of contention for them, and not a major part of the plot. I prefer it that way, since I don’t like Christmas much myself, but I feel it’s worth pointing out.

It’s always memorable when I start out a book less than excited by the premise, less than engaged by the first few chapters, and then gripped and totally in love by the end. I eagerly await the next book in the series, and I want to check out Crews’s backlist. Seriously, I am obscenely impatient for Ty’s book because that man is an enigma and I NEED TO KNOW.

Recommendation-wise, I would tell basically anyone to read this. The writing style is fun, the niche elements are never too heavy for people who are indifferent or actively dislike them, and the emotional content is so so good.
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