Heartbreak Creek

May 16, 2011
Warner (Chasing the Sun) kicks off her Runaway Brides western series with this solid romance set just after the Civil War. With her family's Louisiana plantation to be auctioned off for back taxes, Edwina Ladoux answers an ad for a mail-order bride and journeys with her half-sister, Prudence, to the tiny town of Heartbreak Creek, Colo., to meet her new husband, widower Declan Brodie. Declan wants a "sturdy" woman to help run his ranch and raise his four children, and the thin Southern belle isn't what he expected. Edwina and Declan aren't sure their arrangement will work, but the two soon fall in love. However, things turn deadly when Lone Tree, an Arapaho with a grudge against Declan, decides to get his revenge via Edwina. Despite a bit of a deus ex machina, Warner delivers an engaging read full of likable characters and lovely descriptions of the rugged countryside.