"Tall, Dark, and Texan" Review

Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages - Publisher: Jove (October 28, 2008 ) - Language: English - ISBN-10: 0515145432 - ISBN-13: 978-0515145434

      From the book cover:

He can’t hide from love forever.

Teagen McMurray would ride to hell and back to protect his land. He’d certainly never felt that way about a woman. At least not until Jessie Barton showed up with her three little girls, desperate for a place to stay. Suddenly he finds himself proposing marriage, telling himself it is only to protect her and her children… 

Jessie had no place to go except Whispering Mountain – and to Teagen, the one person who couldn’t deny her, thanks to the correspondence he shared with her dead husband. But what will happen once the man she’s loved through his letters discovers her tangle of lies?

My Viewpoint: The McMurray brothers and sister lost their parents at a very young age. Teagen, the oldest, was 12 years old... as a result, the three boys had to fight hard to keep the ranch, in addition to raising their baby sister. Years later, Teagen is an adult, his two younger brothers have married. Teagen has grown into a man of few words. Deep down, he's a good man, but not one that is used to expressing his feelings. He  had many responsibilities as a young man, raising the family, however, he doesn't seem to resent his past;  it helped make him into the man he is now. He developed a love of reading books and his only friend, a bookstore owner from Chicago that he ordered books from, and wrote letters to.


Jessie Barton has just lost her husband. 
Her mother-in-law is threatening to take away her three little girls. 
Jessie's only solution is to run away to Texas, to Teagen, and the ranch hoping for protection, and a place to live.


I enjoyed reading this book. Some may think the storyline was to slow, but I thought it was nice. Teagen and Jessie, didn't jump into bed and have a hot, steamy romance, like so many so called romance novel characters do. It was not love at first sight. They grew to respect each other, and to save the children from the wicked mother-in-law there was a quicky marriage. I also liked that Teagen did not change overnight, he did not turn into this loving man at the sight of Jessie and her three daughters. Both shared a love of books and discussing them, along with discussing the goings and comings in their daily life, in this way they got to know each other.


Not only was this a love story, but there was a bit of action thrown in and made the book more exciting. I thought that Teagen and Jessie's relationship was very sweet. This was a chick-lit book and I gave it 4**** because I liked it.
I own this book, it was on my TBR pile, and also was my choice for the February book for the "Fun To Read Challenge."