I actually liked this book a lot but my only complaint is that Ross did not soften his feelings early enough in the book. But still, I thought the writing was good and my heart broke for her and all she had to go through. This story is very gritty and tough in a few parts.

While I didn't really like the hero calling the heroine names, the book overall kept with the times. Very well written and a beautiful love story.
Ma Langston. What a woman. Kind, generous and loving. IMHO, The world would be a much better place if there were a few more women like her.

Safety --  Hero of book one dies in book two

Fabulous book! Lots of hardships for the H&h and definitely had some choke up/ teary moments for me. The book is about a wagon trail heading to Texas and is set back in early America after the Civil War has ended. The hero, Ross and the heroine, Lydia, are in parallel situations. An almost dead Lydia is found by some young boys laying in the woods after she had just given birth to a baby boy (which I think was strangled by its umbilical cord). She wants to die because of the cruel life she is living and is glad the baby isn't being brought into it. She is saved by a wonderful family. Meanwhile Ma, the mother of Lydia's saving family, a day later is called away to deliver Ross and his upper class wife, Victoria's, baby. Victoria dies in childbirth, but Ross's son, Lee, lives. Ross is devastated by his wife's passing and when Lydia is presented to Ross as a wet nurse to save Lee, Ross hates and resents her and says vicious things. He thinks she is a prostitute, since she doesn't have a husband, and wants her nowhere near Lee or himself. Lydia is described beautifully and I just loved her. She was an innocent temptest (not sure if this is a word, might have made it up) with all the right alluring parts and Ross hated her because she distracted him from his perfect wife's memory. Ross had a sordid past as well and the dead Victoria made him respectable by marrying him and bringing him into her upper class world. I also loved Lydia because she stood her ground against Ross's insults and bad tempers, loved his son, and didn't try to take over Victoria's position in Ross's heart. She did it naturally and became loved by everyone.

Lots of meat to this story and many crisscrosses. There were so many rich secondary characters and even though Ross was a hurtful, horrible jerk through half the book I respected him for his honorable and loyal ways. Good side stories and BAD villains too. Very fulfilling read!

ugh im so conflicted on this book bc i actually liked the premise, but there were things that really didn’t work for me.

i really liked how the book started, that horrible still-birth was such an attention-grabber from the first page, and i immediately was invested in the heroine’s story. the langston’s were the best - i loved ma!!!!!!!! how she took her in, set her up with the hero, and basically served as a stand-in mother for lydia. i also liked the setting of a wagon train, i thought it was unique for a western, and served as a backdrop for some interesting scenes.

i wanted to like the hero ? he was definitely tortured, and i enjoyed the tension between the two - until he literally rapes her !!!!!!!!!!!!! like !!!!!!!!!!! especially given her traumatic past - i understand this is an older book and non-consent/body betrayal was a big theme at the time, but the scene made me cringe in the worst way- and what was even worse is how the characters never really addressed it. like i could have dealt if he at least seemed repentant but we got none of that. also, he remains kind of awful to her throughout the story, and never stops thinking of her as a whore !!!! (honestly, i kind of wanted her to end up with winston)

also the ending was so contrived, i hated how the whole thing with the step-brother was handled - like the whole extortion plot could have been so easily handled if she just mentioned something to ross. i actually got annoyed with how readily she submitted to the step-brother, considering how her husband was a literal big bad outlaw.

i only complain this much when i actually like the book !!!!!! so a disappointed 3 stars

SPOILERFEST!!!


Ok, the story itself wasn't that bad... I liked it until around 70%, the author brought a character back from the deads. I was super annoyed with all the breasts description here and there. Nipples, Breasts, Nipples, Breasts, Nipples, Breasts...Ugh enough already!!!
Lydia was an ok heroine. I liked how she defended herself against Ross abuse. I just hated how she lied at the end when dead character came back.
Ross was awful, plain horrible... Mean and Horny, the worst!


That being said, I hate when an author decides to kill off a character!! Right after finishing this book, I was considering reading the next in the series because Sunset Embrace didn't have an Epilogue and was wondering how Lydia and Ross were doing... WRONG MOVE EVER!!!
When checking the next book reviews, I found out the author killed Ross, some 20 years after this story takes place. This is simply not done. I didn't particulary care for him but I wanted to see some redemption and Lydia being happy. Why having readers root for a couple and in the following couple, kill off a main character. F*ck you Sandra Brow seriously, she absolutely ruined it!!

0 stars!!

Lydia's story of love conquering all was definitely a soap opera from the 80s. I'm not really sure how she fell in love with Ross. He was an arrogant, judgmental jerk who was an absolutely hypocrite. Seriously, he'd rather see his newborn son die than be breast fed by a woman he considered scum, when she was the only option he had? I hated the rape scene and almost stopped then, but in a sense that was historically accurate as generally the thought of marital rape was only recently considered a criminal act.

Lydia's claim of being in love happened much earlier in the story than what was credible left Lydia looking really shallow. It seems as though she really was in lust with his body and grateful that he didn't beat her. The only other reason was because it was expedient for her to love Ross as where Ross went the baby went. I think her "love" spoke more to Stockholm Syndrome than anything else.

Die Geschichte spielt im 19. Jahrhundert auf einem Wagentreck in Texas. Zwei Jungen finden die junge Lydia halbtot mit einem toten Baby unter einem Baum liegen und bringen sie zu ihrem Wagen. Dort wird sie liebevoll von der Familie Langston umsorgt. Doch leider stößt sie auf Ablehnung bei den anderen Menschen in dem Treck. Auch Ross Coleman, der gerade seine Frau verloren und einen kleinen Sohn bekommen hat ist nicht gut auf sie zu sprechen. Als die junge Lydia allerdings ihm zur Hilfe kommt, seinen Sohn stillt und ihm somit das Leben rettet dreht sich die Geschichte langsam.

Auf dem Weg nach Texas quält sich ein Wagentreck durch die staubige Prärie. Auf einem der Wagen reist Lydia mit, eine geheimnisvolle Rothaarige, die vor Kurzem ihr Neugeborenes verloren hat. Auch Ross Coleman betrauert einen schrecklichen Verlust. Seine Frau ist im Kindbett gestorben. Doch der neugeborene Sohn braucht eine Mutter, und so geht er mit Lydia eine Vernunftehe ein. Eine Ehe – aus der Notwendigkeit geboren, zum Scheitern verurteilt? In der glühenden Präriesonne geraten Lydia und Ross in einen Sturm der Gefühle, der die bösen Schatten ihrer Vergangenheit ebenso ans Licht bringt wie ihre bedingungslose Leidenschaft.

One of my favorites...have read it so many times over the years. The way Ross fights his attraction for Lydia, a girl he thinks is nothing but a white trash hussy, is both sad and infuriating at first. He has a secret, she has a secret and neither one of them can trust the other enough to join forces and fight together until finally...
Well, you know what happens...it is a romance after all!

4.5 ☆

A pesar de haber tenido mis "disgustos" con este libro, no puedo darle menos puntuación porque entonces no sería sincera.
Me gustan las historias que crea Sandra Brown y la manera en como las dirige, aunque los finales me resulten algo abruptos.
En este caso Ross me ha gustado mucho, y eso que le he dejado pasar algunas cosas que a lo mejor en otras novelas hubiera castigado mucho más.
Lydia me ha parecido un personaje femenino estupendo, valiente, que plantaba cara cuando había que hacerlo y contestar a Ross cuando se merecía una buena réplica.
No puedo quejarme de mi experiencia con esta autora porque la verdad es que está siendo muy satisfactoria.

Típico culebrón ochentero(lo digo por el año de publicación y no por la época en la que transcurre la trama), donde los malos son muy malos y la prota muy buena y a veces pasada de boba, y no me pudo entretener más, no podía soltarlo, me lo bebí. Me hizo rabiar a montones, hay una parte que es hard topic para mi y eso me hizo bajarle estrellas el primer encuentro sexual de la pareja es una violación que la autora trato de romantizar; sorry pero no my cuppa 3,5⭐

I just couldn't finish reading this. I usually enjoy this author, but this particular read just wasn't for me.