Tuesday, November 1, 2016

TEMPATING TEXAS by Kimberly Raye



Publisher:     St. Martin’s Press
Published:    November 1, 2016
ISBN:        978-1250063977
Genre:       Contemporary Romance, Romantic Comedy
Format:     Print
Obtained via:  Publisher  
Reviewed by name and email address:  Gina  Ginalrmreviews@gmail.com

FOUR-1/2 HEARTS


Caught in the middle of the decades old Tucker / Sawyer divide veterinarian Jenna Tucker isn’t one to just give up and sulk. When she loses a plumb spot in the local vet practice due to no other reason than her being a Tucker she picks herself and sets about establishing her own equine center.  With her sisters Callie and Brandy married to the men of their dreams…who just happen to be Sawyers, Jenna is the only one still living at the family home. It wasn’t the happies of homes after their parents died.  Their grandfather, James Harlin, wasn’t the most loving of men.  More interested in his moonshine he gave them a roof over their head and that was that.  Now, with him gone and a new business on her horizon Jenna is determined to change her image and wild child ways.  To do that she’s stopped her one night stands with the “bad boys” and gone on date after date with your basic “nice” guys.  They do nothing for her.  That’s okay because she doesn’t, after all, really want a beau.  And the last person she wants to be falling for is one of the dreaded Sawyers.

Hunter DeMassi is a Sawyer by way of his mother’s people.  Like Jenna he is trying to leave his bad boy image behind.  His parents never let him forget that he wasn’t the favorite, that it was his brother who was their shining star.  Even running for and winning the election for Sheriff three times he still doesn’t measure up to what his parents want.  They still see him as the rodeo bum who just was never going to measure up.  And really, the last person he needs in his life is Jenna Tucker – a wild child, Tucker. 

But sometimes our hearts don’t quite listen to our heads, even when our heads tell us it’s lust, not love.

I’ve been enjoying Kimberly Raye’s Rebel Moonshine series starting with Texas Thunder followed by Red Hot Texas Nights.  While the first two books were entertaining with some totally fun characters, in book three, TEMPTING TEXAS Raye outdoes herself.  She tells a good story, but in this one the author’s innate sense of humor and flair for comedy while giving readers a toe curling romance comes through.  The transition from humor to romance is smooth and adds so much to the story. 

Raye also does a fabulous job taking the reader into the parallels between Jenna and Hunter’s lives and how they each, in their own way and at the same time, together come to terms with their pasts. 

I did have one small problem with the book and it could have been because it was an ARC.  Towards the end of the book there were a few chapters with a Kim Bowman.  They didn’t seem to have any relationship to the rest of the book and those few chapters, when they appeared, jarred me out of the story.  If it was meant as a lead in to book 4 it didn’t work for me.  Each time she showed up I wondered if maybe the publisher had somehow gotten two books mixed up with each other. 

Each book in the series is a stand alone and you do not have to have read one to enjoy the others.  TEMPTING TEXAS is, as I said, the best and you do not want to miss it.     




This is an objective review and not an endorsement of this book.

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