TEXAS MAIL ORDER BRIDE by Linda Broday

Publisher:   Sourcebooks

Published:   January 6, 2015

ISBN: B00NEUAM7O

Genre:  Historical Western Romance

Format:  Ebook - Netgalley

Obtained via:  Publisher  

Reviewed by name and email address:  Gina Gina@loveromancesandmorereviews.com

THREE HEARTS

Delta Dandridge hasn’t had an easy life but she’s made do with what she has and kept did what she could to keep a positive outlook.  When she spies an ad for a mail order bride she heads west to Battle Creek, Texas and her groom, Cooper Thorne.

Along with his two brothers, Rand and Brett, Cooper Thorne is part of the Battle Creek Bachelor’s club.  In fact, he’s the club president.  The last thing Cooper is looking for is a bride, especially a Southern Belle who starts meddling in Battle Creek business.  Between her heading over to the mercantile and getting a job to starting a women’s garden club he becomes more and more sure marriage, especially to such a troublesome woman is not for him. 

Sure he believes that.  Yup.  Cooper Thorne is not remotely attracted to Delta Dandridge and she can’t leave town fast enough for him.

And she really irritates him when she starts helping out around town.  Uh huh. 

Cooper soon learns there’s a fine line between being irritated because he wants her and telling himself he doesn’t.  But Cooper and Delta aren’t without their secrets—secrets that have followed them to Battle Creek.  Are they the kind of secrets that can forge a solid marriage—or that will tear it apart?

I’m a long-time fan of historical western romance.  The only genre I like better than historical westerns are time travels where a modern woman ends up back in the 1800s’.  When I was offered the opportunity to read and review Linda Broday’s TEXAS MAIL ORDER BRIDE I jumped at it and I’m glad I did.

Broday does a nice job with Delta’s development from arriving in town to find she’s been duped into believing a marriage is in the offing to picking herself up and making her own way.  Delta is true to herself and her heart—and she has a good heart.  She opens herself up to each person she meets and even when she finds herself falling in love with Cooper, she is willing to be his friend if nothing more. 

Cooper and his brothers each go through their own growth – together as a family and in coming to terms with their own past. 

A few times I had the impression that TEXAS MAIL ORDER BRIDE was originally intended as a standalone rather than book 1 of a series because of the different tangents that the author went off on in Brett and Rand’s stories.  Particularly the outcome of someone in Rand’s past would have been a great mystery to leave for another story rather than wrapping it up nice and neat in what felt like a hurried ending. 

I never really felt that Cooper and Delta connected—she and Rand seemed better suited to each other and I could easily have seen the two falling in love with Cooper being happy for them.  There were what in a cozy mystery would have been some fun red herrings – Jenny, the widow, Brett’s living situation – that were tied up a little too neatly for me. 

I did like the townsfolk and I appreciated how Broday had a first grasp on the language and manners of the time.  She didn’t resort to letting modern concepts fill in the gaps in the story so I felt very much like I was watching the story unfold in the late 1800’s.

This is an objective review and an endorsement of this book.