I love that Caleb finally got his story!! Ellie and him have been waiting so long. Caleb's devotion to Ellie and Amelia was so sweet. And I loved how Ms. Yates weaved the story to get them together. This is definitely one of my favorites in the series.

This was a sweet but emotional ride. You could feel every emotion and every tear. Then at the end, every smile.

Well now I need to be Christmas and I need to go to Oregon and find me a cowboy.

We love a good hero who yearns and burns for a heroine, and Caleb did just that for Ellie; but because this is the best friend/sibling’s widow trope (which I’m starting to realize I am not a fan of), the story just didn’t grab me as much as it first did in the beginning. The angst and plot points kept on getting repeated and it was just the same thing over and over again. By the time I got 60% through with the story, I had to switch over to audio just so it could be over faster.

All in All though, it was an okay read sans the repetitiveness. I liked seeing a different angle of Ellie's feelings as she tries to sort through her differing feeling for her former love and this new flame with her late husband's best friend; and like I said we love a man who pines for the woman he has always loved.

Cowboy Christmas Redemption is a wonderful book that--at times--was tough to read. Ellie and Caleb have so many things in the way of their HEA--the former existence of Clint, Ellie's first husband and Caleb's best friend, constantly hanging over them is just the beginning. So many more of their obstacles are internal--her fear of turning into her mother, which turns into a fear of intense emotion; his belief that he could never be the man that Clint was and that he therefore doesn't deserve as much as his friend had, along with plenty of guilt over his past actions and feelings--as a result, there's almost as much going on in their heads as there is on the page. The constant pushing and pulling in their relationship and the conversations they have with each other (and with friends and families) weren't always easy to read, though they were necessary for them to come through to the other side.

Intense doesn't even begin to cover it!

If you're looking for a light-hearted holiday read, this definitely isn't it. But if you're looking for realistic characters who have genuine problems to work through that will do so in a way that feels true-to-life--and still manage to get to a HEA and a Merry Christmas for Ellie, Caleb, and Amelia, then give this one a try.

A word of caution: there is a continuing plot line here with Caleb's family that has been going on for several books now and looks to continue for a few more--those new to the series may feel a bit lost at times, not knowing all the details of the complicated relationships there. The focus here really is with Caleb and Ellie, though; as long as you don't get too bogged down in understanding all of the Dalton family drama, this wouldn't be a bad place to pick up the series. Just don't be surprised if you suddenly feel the need to add the first 7 books to your TBR, though ;)

Rating: 4 stars / A-

I voluntarily reviewed an Advance Reader Copy of this book.

this was a good read, the characters were great and I enjoyed the storyline in the book. I look forward to more from the author.

I loved this book. Caleb was afraid to act on his feeling for his best friends widow. He has had feeling for her since the 1st time he laid eyes on here. Ellie is still reeling from the death of her husband but Caleb is her very best friend and she doesn't want to do anything to rock the boat. She needs him.

So do hey act on their feelings? Read and find out you won;' be sorry.

Thank you netgalley and Harlequin for allowing me to read this title for an honest review

This was excellent. Friends to lovers, Alpha Hero to the 10th degree (woo!), 🤠 cowboy, and the dead husband's best friend. 🔥 🔥 🔥 Caleb was the best kind of Hero, rugged, sturdy, a little rough around the edges, and insistent on doing things on his terms but not in a way that railroads everyone else in his path. A good hearted man but a no nonsense one.

I very much enjoyed the romance, the push and pull, push and pull, and just the intensity of feelings between these two. Woo! Good stuff. Highly recommend.

Also, the audiobook was exquisite. The emotions really came through. Very well done.

Raw and real emotions, turbulent inner conflict, sorrow, guilt, and pain, exhilaration, passion, and adoration... As the story is told mostly by the fervent inner monologue of the protagonists, every feeling and all the turmoil in their hearts and minds are palpable forces that shape their characters, makes them grow and change them to be the people they were always meant to become.
I knew the story of Caleb Dalton and Ellie Bell was going to be an emotional roll-a-coaster, only this tale dived into such deep, dark storms of the mind and heart that it blew me away. There is no doubt that these two best friends loved each other, but were they ever going to be able to grow into the profound (romantic) emotions they awoke in each other, that was left to be found out in this unique tale of life, loss, and love, of family, friends, and lovers.
From sweet and adorable to ardent and heartwrenching, I felt all the feels and textures of the turmoil and mayhem in their minds and hearts. Yet, there is redemption, there is deliverance, there is hope eternal, and there is faith for the future. There is growth and maturing from the loss, there is peace from the childhood drama, and there are even those delightfully lovely holiday moments that will your heart to overflowing.
A beautiful, unputdownable emotion-filled, fervent and heartfelt tale that took my breath away.
~ Five Spoons

I received an ARC of this book through NetGalley in exchange for my unbiased opinion.

Caleb Dalton has been in love with Ellie Bell since he met her 14 years ago. Unfortunately, he first met her because his best friend was dating her. When Clint died while Ellie was pregnant, Caleb was there for Ellie and has continued to be there for her and her daughter Amelia, never revealing his feelings for her. However, when he discovers that Ellie has created a Christmas list of things she would like to do, including being kissed under the mistletoe, he wants to be the one she works through the list with. Can the pair of them find the happiness and love they deserve with each other?

I really did not like these two characters together, unfortunately. At the beginning, they seemed to go well together, but as the story went on, it seemed like they brought out the worst in each other. It made it hard for me to root for their HEA. This is book 8 of a series, and perhaps I would have had a better appreciation for their characters if I had read the previous books in the series. Sadly, this book did not make me want to go back and check out the other books in the series. I can see why other people would like this book, but it was not for me.

Cowboy Christmas Redemption by Maisey Yates is the eight book in the Gold Valley Series. I would highly suggest reading other books in the series before diving into this one. This will give you back story and help you to get to know the characters.

Ellie has placed Clint in the friend zone as he has always been there through the death of her husband. Birth of her child and so many more scenarios. As her deceased husbands best friend he has been everything she has needed but now she has a Christmas wish that only he can fulfill.

Only my favorite cowboy romance author could get me to touch this trope with a ten foot pole. I really dislike the “best friend or brother’s widow” trope. It’s so hard for me to invest in a new couple when the heroine’s first love is dead. It goes against my little happily ever after loving heart. I’ve been faithfully reading the Gold Valley series, though, and I wasn’t about to miss out of Caleb and Ellie’s HEA.

Ms. Yates is a wonderful storyteller and COWBOY CHRISTMAS REDEMPTION was no exception. I think her focus on the couple while weaving in dimensional secondary characters makes her stories stand apart from most other authors. I have to say, I am a sucker for a good pining hero, and Caleb did some A+ pining for Ellie.

Ellie was a really interesting character. She was always drawn to Caleb, and he is her best friend, but she wasn’t in love with him the way he loved her. I enjoyed watching her fall in love and grapple with the many different ways love can manifest with different people. It was an interesting angle for the story to take.

As I mentioned, I don’t really like this trope, and the repetitive cycle Caleb and Ellie were in got on my nerves. There was so much repeated angst, I am pretty sure 1/3 of the book could have been edited out. Also, naming Ellie’s dead husband Clint, and naming her new husband Caleb is way too close. I kept having to go back a reread.

Overall, I have been truly blown away by some of the books in this series, and I am SUPER excited to read West’s book, but this one was just okay. Enjoyable, but too repetitive and angsty. I did like the addition of a Christmas puppy, they make everything better!

**I received an ARC of this book in order to provide an honest review**

I read a lot of Maisey Yates romance, rarely missing a new release. I read her as much for the intensity of the romance as for its ethos. Because it aligns with mine. And so, even though from a critical viewpoint there’s something repetitive about her romances, I enjoy each and every one. In Cowboy Christmas Redemption, Yates has dropped some of the relentless interiority of her recent work and created something deeper, better developped, with a more expansive theme and characters.

On the sidelines to Yates’s recent Gold Valley books (this latest is #8) are Caleb Dalton and Ellie Bell. Caleb is Ellie and her four-year-old daughter’s shadow. Since Ellie’s husband and Caleb’s best friend died, Caleb has been Ellie’s ” … rock. Her salvation.” Caleb was there to tell Ellie about his death, hold her when she grieved, hold her hand when she gave birth to Amelia, been there to repair the porch steps, drive Amelia to pre-school. He’s been everything stalwart and good Ellie could ever want, or need. But four years have gone and as Ellie emerges from grief, she wants more than being Clint’s widow. She makes a Christmas wish list, checks it twice, and goes out to get what she needs and wants after four years of single-motherhood and grieving widowhood. She wants a new dress, shoes, to dance in a bar, and flirt with a man. She wants to “feel like a woman again,” to experience intimacy once more.

In Yates’s world, there is no casual, no matter how much the lady, or gentleman doth protest. And this is why I like reading her romances, because more than any other value, Yates gives equal weight to the significance of physical intimacy as emotional. The body matters in a deeply significant, meaningful way. Ellie herself echoes this sentiment when she says to Caleb: ” ‘Sex isn’t casual, even when we pretend that it is. And I think we have a lot of layers of pretending in our world. But even if we decide emotionally it’s not that big of a deal, it’s physically a potentially very big deal. With consequences.’ ” Though Ellie is a woman protective of her heart (there be reasons), she cannot bring herself to have sex with someone she doesn’t know, trust, and like. So, in true Yatesian form, she propositions Caleb, friend and protector; then, watches, in horror, as Caleb, safe haven, transforms into something monumental. Suddenly, her familiar friend (to echo the psalm and this may be the best expression of Yates’s core-theme) with whom she used to hold sweet converse is a behemoth of unknown power, a tornado of intense as Ellie’s never before felt. Because in Yates’s romance universe, there is no casual, or connection that can be purely physical.

The Caleb-intensity comes from Caleb holding a torch for Ellie since the moment his best friend brought her to the Dalton family picnic. For Caleb, it was love at first sight, not lust, yes want, but love. And he’s held onto that love, mixed as it became with guilt, knowledge, and shared experience, for fourteen years. Now that he has Ellie within his reach, he will make the most of his time with her. As with every Yates romance, there’s a fierce antagonism to the male and female principals’/principles’ interactions, as much pain and resistance as pleasure and attraction. Ellie and Caleb’s physical intimacy is a reflection of their love’s dizzying, dangerous eddy. This is reflected in Ellie’s sudden experience of Caleb as an unfamiliar other, even while he’s still her familiar friend.

For Caleb, things are differently but equally disorienting. His self-effacement in the face of Clint’s loss and Ellie and Amelia’s needs is suddenly erased and his personality, his wants and needs, come to the foreground. In a Yates romance, love clangs into her hero and heroine’s lives like a dissonant unabating bell. It tears them apart emotionally, holds them only by the thread of their physical connection, only to remake them, whole and then ready to love and commit. Their bodies, however, know all along what their hearts, minds, and eventually tongues must avow.

Yates’s heroes’ and heroines’ impediments to love are always rooted in their past, more often than not in unresolved family traumas at worst, issues at best. For Ellie, her emotional anchoring when she married Clint was his emotional safety, having suffering through a childhood with a mother whose boyfriends were always more important than Ellie. The emotions Caleb arouses are frightening, alien, and precarious to Ellie’s equanimity. As for Caleb, his psychic wounds come from never being as clever as his friend Clint, though he loved him, because Clint was favoured in Caleb’s home with Caleb’s parents. Caleb is guilt-ridden over his desire for Ellie all these years, for ever being jealous of Clint. In the end, Yates always resolves her less-than hero and heroine to being enough and perfect-for-you-me.

Love comes slowly, fiercely, and inevitably in a Yates romance. Ellie and Caleb’s complexity expresses her core-theme of redemption, connection, commitment, and love perfectly in Ellie’s self-confession: “He was the love of her life. It would have destroyed her to admit that before. But life was complicated, and so was love. With beauty and tragedy at the bottom of each valley, and the top of each hill.” I’ve loved every Yates romance I’ve read, but it’s the first time in a long while I suspect Cowboy Christmas Redemption may make my “best of the year” list. If you read one Yates romance this year, and she is awfully prolific, make it this one. With Miss Austen, in Cowboy Christmas Redemption, we found “a mind lively and at ease,” Emma.

Maisey Yates’s Cowboy Christmas Redemption is published by HQN Books. It was released in September 2019 and may be found at your preferred vendors. I’m grateful to HQN Books for an e-galley, via Netgalley.

Caleb Dalton fell in love with Ellie Bell 10 years ago, the first time his best friend, Clint, brought her around to meet the family. Now widowed and a single mother, Ellie considers Caleb her best friend and depends on him for help when she needs it.

When Ellie decides it's time to "get back out there", she puts together a Christmas wish list that includes things like, get a new dress,go dancing, kiss a man under the mistletoe, make out by the fire, and sex. After her first dance, she realizes she doesn't want the first man after her husband to be some random stranger. She wants Caleb's help to fulfill her list.

For his part, Caleb has wanted Ellie since before she married his best friend, but his guilt for his feelings is pretty entrenched. Because of undiagnosed dyslexia, Caleb has always felt stupid, like he was inferior to Clint. His dad offering Clint scholarship money for college when he didn't offer Caleb anything was the last straw. He knows Ellie already had the best man. Why would she ever want him? When he sees her list, he knows he can't let anyone else fulfill it but can he keep his heart from breaking when she ends it?

Of all the books featuring the Dalton family, I think I liked this one the best. Caleb has struggled all his life with his schooling. Not only was he dyslexic, he was also dyscalculic which meant that numbers gave him fits too. His dad was convinced he was just lazy and punished him accordingly until Caleb just quit caring. I felt so bad for the young Caleb who never understood, until Ellie came along and diagnosed his dyslexia, why things that came easily to his siblings and to Clint were next to impossible for him. School had to be a nightmare! Ellie's fear of committing to another man runs deep, all the way back to her mother. It always seemed like, if she had spent more time looking at Caleb's actions over the last 10 years, it wouldn't have taken her nearly as long to take a chance on him. She spent so long wallowing in her fear of turning into her mother, that she couldn't see that by caring for and loving her daughter, she was already better than the woman who resented her.

Fans of Maisey Yates will love this story. If you like romance with some steam, pick this one up. Fair warning: I did a fair amount of skimming with this one. There are a lot of words used - sometimes entire pages of them - that were NOT necessary to the story, other than to expound on the angst the characters were feeling.

The first one is Cowboy Christmas Redemption by Maisey Yates. What a fun read!




AUTHOR BIO:



New York Times Bestselling author Maisey Yates lives in rural Oregon with her three children and her husband, whose chiseled jaw and arresting features continue to make her swoon. She feels the epic trek she takes several times a day from her office to her coffee maker is a true example of her pioneer spirit.
BOOK SUMMARY:
As snowflakes fall in Gold Valley, Oregon, will this rugged cowboy finally win the woman of his dreams?

Cowboy Caleb Dalton has loved single mom Ellie Bell, and her little daughter, Amelia, for years. But since Ellie is his best friend’s widow, Caleb’s head knows Ellie will always be strictly off-limits. If only his heart got the memo. So when Caleb discovers that Ellie has a Christmas wish list—and hopes for a kiss under the mistletoe—he’s throwing his cowboy hat into the ring. If anyone’s going to be kissing Ellie and sharing this magical time with her and her daughter, it’s him.

Ellie has dreaded the holidays since losing her husband. But this year, she’s finally ready to make some changes. She never expects the biggest change to be the heart-stopping kiss she shares with Caleb. For almost five years, Caleb has been her best friend, her rock, her salvation. This Christmas, can Caleb prove he’s also the missing puzzle piece of Ellie’s and Amelia’s hearts?

As a part of a series, I always worry I am not going to understand all the moving parts. In this case, I had nothing to worry about. Even though it is a part of a series, it can be read as a stand alone book. I have to say, I read very few books where a male is the main character. I found it refreshing to look at romance from the view of a romantic male. For this reason alone I would highly recommend this book. However, there is a lot more to love! The stories behind the scene of Caleb's parents is interesting and will touch a lot of people.



Last, but for sure not least, is Coming Home for Christmas by RaeAnne Thayne. It is the ultimate Christmas story, and one that I couldn't resist as the last review. Go on, go read about it!

AUTHOR BIO:



New York Times bestselling author RaeAnne Thayne finds inspiration in the beautiful northern Utah mountains where she lives with her family. Her books have won numerous honors, including six RITA Award nominations from Romance Writers of America and Career Achievement and Romance Pioneer awards from RT Book Reviews. She loves to hear from readers and can be reached through her website at www.raeannethayne.com.

As always with Yates, I'm entertained and engaged throughout the story. Being a lover of all things romance and also Christmas I was thrilled with this story.

I hadn't read any other book of this series, but I was so happy I never felt lost. Maisey Yates did a wonderful job.

This story truly packed a lot of feels ad emotions. Here we have Ellie, wanting the holidays to be over with, but for her daughter, she's ready to make Christmas a time of joy. What she wasn't expecting was kissing her husband's best friend.

Man, this story. I still can't stop thinking about it. It made me so sad to find out the story behind Ellie, her husband, and Caleb. They used to be so close and when her husband passed away, things just weren't the same.

I was a bit of annoyed with Ellie, playing the push-and-pull card, but I'm glad that Caleb manned up and decided to really talk to her and voice out everything he was feeling. It made for a wonderful conclusion to the story.

I contributed this review to Really Into This

Check out all of our reviews at https://reallyintothis.com
Happy Reading, friends!

Special thanks to Harlequin for providing our copy of Cowboy Christmas Redemption by Maisey Yates in exchange for an honest & fair review.

I've been wanting to read Maisey Yates for ages! After trying my first cowboy romance (Big, Bad Cowboy by Carly Bloom) & LOVING it - I decided to go for it.

For me, the set up takes a bit. Some really heavy stuff is happening to all the main characters. Maisey doesn't add any fluff. Readers get a good sense of the family drama, grief, heartache & trauma these characters are experiencing.

Then, the open door romance hits. Things get steamy & I'm like, FALL IN LOVE, PLEASE! Just know going in that these characters aren't the best at showing their feelings & being vulnerable.

Overall, this is a great intro to Maisey's Gold Valley series. I read this as a standalone & did just fine.

This book was interesting because it was much darker than a typical holiday romance. All of the characters have very clearly dealt with loss, guilt, and have lived full lives, even beyond the loss of Ali's husband and Clint's best friend. Because of that, this book is a beautiful look at how people handle their grief and come back to themselves in their own time.
My biggest problem with the book was the way intimacy was handled. It's treated as if the only way for the two main characters to be intimate were to be absolutely miserable. Like the passion is so strong that it's painful and there's no room for any other emotion. It seemed frustrating in a book that's all about healing to ignore the fact that you shouldn't be miserable every time you sleep with someone.

I am a huge Maisey Yates fan. I can always count on her for a good, sweet romance. She doesn’t disappoint here either! This was the first of this particular series that I have read and I have no idea why now! I am in the process of going back and reading all of the others.

Caleb and Ellie are connected through the death of her husband who was Caleb’s best friend. They have both been through a lot and it has taken him a while to come to terms with his feelings for her. One of the things I loved was how Caleb faced this head on. I’m not sure I could have when I finally was honest with myself. How do you tell the widow of your best friend that you have feelings for her and her daughter? Where do you fit into their lives?

There were moments for me when I had a little trouble with Ellie. She was stuck in her own emotional needs it seemed. However, having spent years watching my mother refuse to let my father go helped me understand her more. Ellie simply had a hard time moving beyond her emotional ties to her husband. When she decides she is ready it’s like one step forward, two steps back.

Caleb and Ellie had amazing chemistry but I will say that this book was an emotional roller coaster. I wasn’t sure if they were going to make at times. Like I said Ellie struggles I felt more than Caleb. Although he does struggle with his feelings some. He just is much braver about putting himself out there. All in all this was an amazing story.

I love reading author Maisey Yates books and add my favorite holiday in there and I know I'm going to love the book even more. Cowboy Christmas Redemption definitely didn't disappoint! It was a perfect holiday read and I couldn't get enough of this story. It left me wanting more from these characters and I love that about her books. I can't say enough amazing things about author Maisey Yates books!