Wendy the Super Librarian‘s review of Rancher To The Rescue by Jennifer Faye
Contemporary Romance published by Harlequin Romance 01 Jul 13
I love reading debut authors, especially in category romance. Hey, you never know – you could be reading the first book by the next Nora Roberts, Sandra Brown, or Jayne Ann Krentz. So I really want to love every debut book that lands in my lap. But when I don’t? Yeah, it’s not only depressing but makes me feel like a Big Meanie. While Faye is a competent writer, and I had no problem getting through the pages, it is ultimately the unbelievable heroine and thinly drawn villain that sinks this story for me.
Cash Sullivan hates weddings, which is why he’s waiting out in the parking lot for his invited grandmother and didn’t actually escort her into the church as her plus-one. He’s merely passing time until he can get back to his ranch, when what should he see? The bride, lurking around the outside of the church, looking for an escape route. Which is how she ends up in his truck with a pack of nosy reporters hot on her tail.
Meghan Finnegan is a local celebrity, with her own cooking show on a regional TV station. The show is poised to go national, and she’s all set to marry her own Prince Charming, a local boy turned computer software gazillionaire. However, it turns out the groom has other ideas. Meghan told him a couple weeks ago she’s pregnant, and while he told her he doesn’t want children, he seemed to take the news OK. That is until she arrives at the church and he tells her the whole thing is off. Now she’s running scared, dumped at the altar, and her ex-fiance is spinning lies to the local press.
This is one of those stories that I was rewriting in my head as I went along. The problem here is Meghan. Her reactions and the way she behaves are just completely unbelievable. Instead of confronting her problems head-on, she runs and hides. You’re a minor celebrity, your fiance dumps you, literally, at the altar, and you’re pregnant. You know what makes more sense? How about commandeering the entire press brigade at your wedding, holding a press conference, telling them that your groom said hateful things, dumped you at the altar, and is abandoning the unborn child you told him about weeks before? Yeah, who do you think wins in the court of public opinion here? Instead Meghan tells nobody a damn thing (including her family) and scurries off with a man she doesn’t know, hides out at his ranch, and plays housekeeper for him while she wallows in self-pity.
Yeah, it’s about as much fun to read about as you would think.
Cash seems like an OK guy. He’s a former rodeo cowboy who had a crap childhood, that baggage has a nice edge to it. He also has a nice relationship with his grandmother, who lives in a small house on his land – and that dynamic is well drawn. What he sees in Meghan outside of a Rescue Fantasy is anyone’s guess. He seems to think she’s strong, smart, and determined. Yeah, look Cash – you can think that all you want and tell the reader that all you want – doesn’t make it true.
In the end it’s too much for me to swallow. Meghan doesn’t tackle her problems logically, and the ex-fiance’s motives are a complete mystery outside of the ol’ He’s An Asshole excuse. Why wait and dump her at the altar? Why not before the wedding day and just spread rumors that Meghan is a faithless whore? I mean, that at least makes some sense. But we never really find out since Harold stays blissfully one-dimensional and pretty much off-page after the runaway-bride opening.
Enjoyment of this story rests entirely on the reader’s ability to buy into the set-up. I never do, mostly because the way Meghan confronts her problems (which would be to, oh….not confront them at all) and that doesn’t work for me. I also, admittedly, have a wee bit of a pet peeve for women who leave one relationship and immediately jump right into a new one. Yeah, Harold is an asshole, but Meghan sets the land speed record for lusting after Cash. I mean, hello?! You were about to get married to another man! Like just mere days ago! About to get married to another man! Who just gets over that with a snap of the fingers? I’ll tell you who. A heroine I don’t want to spend time with. That’s who.
Grade: D+
Summary:
Damsel in a wedding dress!
Jilted at the altar, celebrity chef Meghan Finnegan flees the scene–and the baying press–only to run straight into the muscled torso of Cash Sullivan.
The former rodeo champion knows what it’s like to have your life crumble in the spotlight, so he offers Meghan a place to lie low at his ranch.
Fresh air, no paparazzi and the brooding rancher’s lazy smile are making Meghan not want to leave her sanctuary. But she and her unborn baby can’t stay here forever…can they?
