I know that I have mentioned this in the past, but I enjoy reading cowboy/western romances. Something about a cowboy gives me shivers. I also like reading military romances. They can have an ex or current military, and I will read it. So when I read the blurb for A Cowboy Kind of Love, I knew I needed to read it.
Donna Grant is also one of my favorite romance authors. I have devoured all of her romances (regular and fantasy). So, when I saw that she had written another book in the Heart of Texas series, again, I knew I needed to read it.
Now, you would figure that I would have been head over heels for A Cowboy Kind of Love by what I wrote in the previous two paragraphs. Yeah, let’s talk about that.
I had a hard time getting into the book. I have no real reason why I had such a hard time with that, but I did. In turn, my not being able to get into the book translated into me not reading it. It took me a few days to get through it.
I didn’t care for the main characters. I was not too fond of Taryn for a good majority of the book and downright disliked her initially. As for Jace, he didn’t push my buttons as a leading man at first. But after the middle of the book, he pushed those buttons.
The storyline was engaging. Taryn and her family were kidnapped by the leader of a massive drug cartel. After watching her brother and father murdered in front of her, she offered to work for him to pay off their debt. Like I said, interesting.
The flow of the book was good, for the most part. There were times where it lagged (mainly in the middle). I also believe that deviating from the dual storylines messed with the flow too. It was fine when the book was switching from Taryn to Jace and back again. But throw in 3-4 other POV’s, and it did get distracting.
The romance angle of the book was a little “eh.” It didn’t scream Instalove, but it was close. I didn’t give it the Instalove tag because of the history between Jace and Taryn. They dated for two years, and he was about to propose when she disappeared.
The sex scenes, which generally are hot in any Donna Grant book, came across as tepid. Jace and Taryn didn’t do it for me. There was no build-up, no accidental touches, nothing. It was Taryn showing up at Jace’s house, saying her piece, and then they banged. Set on repeat for the rest of the book.
The suspense angle of the book was terrific. The author dragged it out until I was screaming. Talk about keeping me on edge. There was also a couple of twists that made me shriek when they were revealed. One is what happened to Taryn’s sister, and the other was Brick. Not saying much more, but I wasn’t expecting either one of those secondary storylines to turn out the way they did.
The end of A Cowboy Kind of Love was busy. There was so much going on that I did have a hard time following it. Once it settled down, I was dumbstruck (see above). The author did wrap up Taryn and Jace’s storyline, and she also teased at the next romance (a possible book 7??).