Thunder on the Plains
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4.5 • 17 Ratings
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
With more than 7 million books in print, RT Book Reviews Career Achievement Award–winning and USA Today Bestselling author Rosanne Bittner pens a historical Western romance filled with dangerous cowboys, capable heroines, and an epic love story that sweeps across the Old West.
IN A LAND OF OPPORTUNITY
Sunny Landers wants a big life—as big and free as the untamed land that stretches before her. Land she will help her father conquer to achieve his dream of a transcontinental railroad. She won't let a cold, creaky wagon, murderous bandits or stampeding buffalo stand in her way. She wants it all—including Colt Travis.
ALL THE ODDS WERE AGAINST THEM
Like the land of his birth, half–Cherokee Colt Travis is wild, hard, and dangerous. He is a drifter, a wilderness scout with no land and no prospects hired by the Landers family to guide their wagon train. He knows Sunny is out of his league and her father would never approve, but beneath the endless starlit sky, anything seems possible...
Praise for Bestselling Historical Western Romances by Rosanne Bittner:
"A hero to set feminine hearts aflutter...western romance readers will thoroughly enjoy this." —Library Journal
“Fans of such authors as Jodi Thomas and Georgina Gentry will enjoy Bittner’s thrilling tale of crime and love in the Old West.”—Booklist Online
“One of the most powerful voices in western romance.”—RT Book Reviews
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Veteran western romance author Bittner (Outlaw Hearts) pairs a fabulously wealthy heiress with an adventurous plains scout on a tense and twisting epic journey that will leave readers cheering. In the mid-19th century, 15-year-old Sunny Landers is being molded by her tycoon father to take over his business, and that means joining him on a trip from Omaha to the Rockies to survey the possibility of building a transcontinental railroad. She finds an untamed country that's easy to love and meets handsome Colt Travis, the orphaned son of a Texan missionary and his Cherokee wife. Though Colt shares her attraction, they both understand that they are too different for a successful union. While Sunny works to carry out her father's dream of a transcontinental railroad despite resistance from within her family and years of civil war, Colt must navigate his love of the land and his complex heritage as the world around him changes and duty conflicts with friendship. The carefully woven story stumbles only when the characters stop behaving sensibly in order to expand the plot.
Customer Reviews
construction and storyline reminiscent of the late 80’s early 90’s in feel.
Covering a twelve year span and incorporating actual historical events, Bittner reimagines a scenario in which a business tycoon’s daughter and a half-Cherokee scout defy danger and convention for love. Bo Landers, a Chicago businessman, has a dream: a railroad line that stretches from Chicago to the Pacific Coast. Not content to dance with failure, he decides that scouting the best route is the most prudent option, and sets about gathering a team.
Sunny Landers is her father’s daughter: intelligent, driven and above all, committed to his dream. In on the first scouting trip when she is just fifteen, she’s intrigued by the half-indian scout that her father has hired. Colt is half-Cherokee, familiar with life on the plains and comfortable with his ability to lead the party. He’s intrigued by the heiress, but her father is not willing to allow their relationship to develop. The Landers return to Chicago, and the negotiations and dance with the government begins.
Years later, Sunny is struggling to see her father’s dream come to fruition, and she and Colt come face to face. He’s content with his life, she’s most comfortable in Chicago, and the two can’t seem to find a middle ground, let alone acceptance from her family. But then, the heart wants what it does.
Lovely descriptions and wonderful insets of actual events that richen the story and bring a sense of the struggles that were faced in the railroad building combined neatly with the rather trite and familiar story of the hero and heroine. Two different worlds, outlooks and circumstances clash, adjust and then combine to bring the two together. While you know (it wouldn’t be a romance if you didn’t) they will finally be together, the journey is the fun, and in this case, the moments away from the relationship, particularly Colt’s personal history and life, are far more intriguing than their relationship machinations. Repeated phrases appear, often to the point of distraction, hammering home points that would have been better served with more show and less tell. Strangely enough, the descriptions, the actual use of history and the depictions of daily struggles of life during the railway construction are the moments that stood out as near perfect, keeping my interest in this story. A read that won’t be devoured in one day, the slow progression of the story allows you to take your time and enjoy, and readers of more contemporary historical romances will find the construction and storyline reminiscent of the late 80’s early 90’s in feel.
I received an eArc copy of the title from the publisher via NetGalley for purpose of honest review. I was not compensated for this review: all conclusions are my own responsibility.