Round-up Review: Heaven, Texas, I'll Be Home for Christmas & other anthologies

Since I’ve still got quite a few backlogged reviews to post, I’m bundling the following contemporary romance novels into a round-up review, just to save some time. The books

Title: Heaven, Texas
Author: Susan Elizabeth Philips
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Publisher: Piatkus Books
Year Published : 2007

Stand alone or series: Book #2 in the Chicago Starrs series

Why I read it: The author is new to me, and the back cover description of the story sounded interesting.

On the Back cover:

Former sports star Bobby Denton has agreed to lend his fame and his name to a movie. But when he doesn’t show up the film company sends straight-laced Gracie Snow to bring him to the set with surprising results.

Despite his dazzling good looks and killer charm, Bobby has reservations about being a movie star- and no plans to cooperate with anyone from the studio, let alone shy little Gracie. But though she comes across as a wallflower, Bobby soon discovers Gracie is really a steel magnolia and the more time he spends in her company the more he finds himself drawn to this plain Jane with a heart of gold…

In my books …
If you enjoy humour in your romance, then this book is definitely up your alley. From page one, when the hero Bobby Tom (or BT, as he’s referred to in the book) mistook Gracie for a stripper, a birthday treat he presumed was arranged by his friends, and tried to ‘teach’ her how to do her job, the author makes you laugh out loud with the hilarious situations both lead characters get into, the bantering between the two and of course, the undeniable chemistry between them.

Great Western Romances: Diablo, The Scotsman and Never Love a Lawman

It’s the New Year, and time for me to catch up on that backlog of book reviews, over the next couple of weeks (I hope!).  One post that has been sitting in my draft folder for the longest time, is that follow-up to the Great Western Drive spearheaded by Kristie, Sybil and Wendy some months back.

Well, I had the chance to read through several Western romances from different eras in the last couple of months: Diablo (1990s), The Scotsman Wore Spurs (1997) by Patricia Potter, and Never Love A Lawman by Jo Goodman (2009). Without further ado, here’s how they stack up in my books …

I have Kristie to thank for pointing me in the direction of Diablo. I’ve read other books by Patricia Potter but never touched any of her Western romances until the Great Western Drive. And since the UBS I visited carried The Scotsman Wore Spurs, I took that out on rental too.

A brief summary on Diablo … Kane o’Brien, a.k.a Diablo, was sentenced to death when a US marshal who wanted information on a secretive, and notorious outlaw hideout called Sanctuary, approached him with a deal.  Find out where it is, and he and his friend would be pardoned. However, nothing prepared him for temptation in the form of Nicole Thompson when he rode in to Sanctuary.