LAST DAY WITH A COWBOY by Sara Richardson

Publisher: Forever
Date Published: December 28, 2021
ISBN#  978-1538717202
Contemporary Romance
Reviewed by Gina (myreviewbooks@aol.com)
Obtained via publisher
3 Hearts

When their father, Charlie, died, each of the Harding kids reacted in a different way. Wes felt like it was his fault and went on the road as a rodeo clown running from bulls which in a way was the story of his life – running.  Jane pretty much continued on at the family ranch.  And August, he moved to Napa, California and left anything related to ranching behind and became a wine maker. More than leaving ranching, he left the one person who would ever hold his heart—Leila Valentino. High school sweethearts everyone was sure Leila and August would marry. They were sure he’d get over his father’s death, come home and their life would go on. But it didn’t. August rarely returned home and never again spoke to the girl who held his heart. Until now. When his boss has sent him home to Silverado Lake to set the Valentino winery straight.

 

Valentino Bellas has been in the Valentino family for generations. It is Leila’s grandparents’ legacy, but it hasn’t been doing well. In desperation she signed a deal with Forrest, August’s boss, to get the winery back in the black. But she did it on her own and never told her grandparents. When August arrives to help things along old memories and emotions, good and bad, surface. To keep things hidden from her grandparents, Leila announces she and August are engaged and ready to marry. August agrees to the deception – after all, how hard can it be to pretend to be in love with the one you never stopped loving?

 

I’ve always been a fan of western romance. I grew up in the heyday of westerns on television and the attraction of a hot cowboy never stopped so of course I’ve been drawn to Sara Richardson’s Silverado Lake series. I sat down and read the first two books in this series, First Kiss With a Cowboy and One Night With a Cowboy in one day. I just couldn’t put them down.  Her latest in the series, LAST DANCE WITH A COWBOY took me a little longer. I was eager to read it not just because of a cowboy hero, but because at the start of the story he lives and works in Napa, just a few miles from where I live. The story just didn’t grab me.

 

First of all, it’s not much of a western. Yeah, Leila and August go for a horseback ride, but mostly it takes place at the Valentino winery. That part was fine—it is a contemporary romance, but most of the romance is them remembering how they were back in high school.  There was one scene with Forrest and August that I thought would have been great for a murder mystery, but that wouldn’t have been the kind of romance Richardson writes and why I read her.

 

After the intensity between Jane and Toby in FIRST KISS WITH A COWBOY and then Wes and Thea in ONE NIGHT WITH A COWBOY, I expected more from August and Leila, but it just wasn’t there. I liked the characters well enough, but it just wasn’t there for me. That’s something I’ve found with most series – usually book 2 or 3 falls down, it just doesn’t measure up. If a series goes on it usually picks up again so maybe there is a fourth book in there. 

 

What I did relate to is how we never really get over our first loves, especially our high school sweethearts. They set the standard for every man that comes after.  There is just something special about them and if we find them again in later life it is a second chance to do it right.

 

 

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