In Love's Territory: A Western Historical Romance

This book is definitely a great romance story with adventure. It was hard to put this book down. I just wanted to keep reading to find out what was going to happen next. It is definitely worth reading!!

I tend to read more thriller stories but bought this book becasue family members recommended it. I was very pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed it. The book has romance, comedy, and passion. I liked this book so much I bought the second book and read both in two days. Definitely will watch for more books by Lucy.

Given the timeframe of the book, it's opening page dated it at 1856, and that it bills itself as a "historical" romance, I thought this book failed to deliver on what was a volatile period of American history. The book opens in Boston where a family of a father, two sons, and a daughter pack up and move to southern Wisconsin upon a relative's death. There the family settles in and the book's primary character, Katie Taylor transforms from teenager to young woman complete with finding a fiance and a whole lot of romantic twists. But the book could have been so much more.

First, there was no mention of the sectional crisis that was unfolding in America at this time. Southern Wisconsin was the birthplace of the modern Republican party just two years earlier, but none of that is even mentioned in the book. Instead, we have characters that do not seem to be fully developed. Other than Katie, Edward, and Sam, we never really get to know much about the others. Thomas, the father, had lost both spouse and brother, but he more or less just floats through the various scenes. Likewise with Becky, Katie's attendant. She claims to have feelings for Katie's brother Jake, but we never see that storyline develop. Katie learns that Becky is illiterate, and vows to teach her to read and write, but other than one or two passages, we are left not knowing how that turned out. Mark and Jake, Katie's brothers, have even less of a role in the story. Jake was with Katie prior to the attack on her, and was admonished by Thomas for being absent, but we never get to know either of these boys at all.

Even the main male characters, Edward and Sam, are only weakly developed. Why did Edward feel that everything that he touched became his immediate possession? Why was he such a jerk? The author writes Edward's tirades and tantrums well, but there had to have been some force behind the way he was. Similarly, Sam is described as a capable farm manager, but the author never really wrote much about farm management. It was almost like she didn't understand the tasks involved, so she skipped over them. We also learn that Sam developed a prize winning cheese, that eventually became quite popular with the locals, but no effort went into describing cheese making. It's like writing a book about a baseball player who never really plays a game in the book. Finally, the fact that Sam was half white and half Indian makes for a dark, mysterious character, but in 1856 Wisconsin, twenty some years after the Blackhawk War, race relations probably would not have supported the town's general acceptance of the presence of such a person. Then as now, Americans don't like when there are people different than themselves around. Sam instead moves seemlessly through the town knowing everyone and accepted by everyone.

Finally, Wisconsin in general and the town of Mineral Point in particular, have their own interesting tales to tell. The mining is touched on, but the process of mining is ignored. The only insight we get into the miner's characters is that they are dirty and gross, living in caves and lusting after young women. Mining was central to the economy of much of south and southwest Wisconsin, and there are powerful stories to tell of mines opening and failing and the people who made it all happen. Edward Carter (or at least his father) was supposedly part of this history, but so little of the book describes mining. On a broader spectrum, Wisconsin is a land of hot summers and periodic violent storms. The weather in this book is almost always sunny and warm, if not just downright pleasant. There is always a beautiful sunset, and one scene is described as overcast, but not even a thunderstorm? Tornadoes are frequent summer visitors to this part of Wisconsin.

Mining, race relations, a civil war that was only five years away all could have added so much more color to this book. What story that was written was at times captivating and well written, but the author missed so much potential that it ultimately really hurts the book. The story itself was rather predictable, the only suspense being was how low Edward might stoop to make a fool of himself. But in the end we all knew Katie and Sam would find each other, we all knew they would live happily ever after. Happy endings are great and can be the end result, but making the ending happy by overcoming obstacles like a storm or a political crisis makes for a better book. The author says she reads reviews on her books in hopes of becoming a better writer. I hope she takes some of my criticisms here to heart, and plans for a more descriptive narrative in her future books.

Although it was a fast read, the writing was good and there were no loose ends or unanswered questions. I like thorough books with a real ending, not an ending left for me to decide. It was a clean read, which is good to know in case you don't like the erotic stuff. The characters were believable and the description of life at the time seemed accurate. I will be purchasing the next book.

After reading the first half, the second half was much better. Not a lot but some better. This is the story of Katherine and her family who move out west from Boston. Her uncle died and left the farm to Kate's father. This was so poorly written, there were times I just couldn't complete a sentence. I thought I would stop and give up. But I prayed for it to get better and it did. But I still can not recommend this story.

I liked the characters and story line but was disappointed with the sexual content. The author should have let the reader know that the book had explicit material and is not meant for younger readers.

I've read hundreds of Christian romance books and this one rates near the bottom.
Kate's character was flat and the only thing she did in the book was read and feel bored. As the main character she had no redeeming qualities which made it hard to care about her in the story. As far as a romance goes, the romance died the moment the kissing scene mentioned "sucking on his tongue"! So gross! I had no desire read that! Other scenes included "cupping breast". I felt like a was reading about a bunch of hormone-driven teenagers and it was very unfulfilling. For a christian romance, I think God was mentioned one time and there was no character development in that area and the main character certainly could have grown in faith. It wasn't until the epilogue that it seemed that the characters were behaving how I would've liked during the whole book but the epilogue is a little late for that. The book had potential- it could have delved into both Sam and Kate losing parents and binding them together and growing through their loses. There were so ways the characters could have been deeper and more meaningful but this book fell short.

I totally agree with the review by SavedByGrace. Too much carnality to be considered healthy Christian reading. Language later in the book was offensive and I don't have any Christian friends that "accidentally" use the Lord's name in vain. The main character's sexuality seemed a bit too much for a virginal girl in the 19th century. And some things are unrealistic like when a man that was beaten so badly that he was left for dead was moving himself up on the headboard and feeding himself within hours after the attack. And what man beaten so severely and has a broken rib or two or three would be holding a woman firmly against his chest the next day even if she was his dream come true? I only have two chapters and the epilogue to go but have decided not to finish the book. The writing is good and the plot is good but these flaws have made me decide not to bother finishing the book. Again, please don't label this as a Christian book but just as a Western Romance.

Everything from the front cover to the category this book was under is a deception. For that, I gave it a 1 when it might have reached a 2.

The good: The author has talent, but it was wasted on the second half of this novel. The first half was okay - it was a 3 star novel until halfway into the story, where the swearing and inappropriate behavior began. It felt like a deliberate move on the part of the author to deceive the reader. Up to that point, the characters, while shallow, were at least behaving themselves - except the guy everyone knew was the villain.

For those that are wondering about my mention of the book cover, technically, it has nothing to do with the era this story was written about. Rolling hay in one-ton bales is a relatively new thing. With that said, I would have overlooked the cover, if the insides were better.

When we search out Christian fiction, we do not expect cussing or graphic sexuality (she sucked his tongue; he felt a stirring in his --- ) I search with the Christian filter to avoid this stuff. If the author remover the Christian tag, I believe the ratings would be higher.

I was very disappointed that this book was marketed as a Christian Romance. There were swear words in it that Christians don't use and don't want to read. Also, there was inappropriate sexual content. The problem was, also, that the inappropriate items were not apparent at the beginning of the book, thus I was into the story before it was apparent this is not the kind of book I read. Too bad. because it was a good story and well written. Please, don't market your book as Christian.

I found this title searching for books under Christian Fiction for my kindle app. Aside from a prayer in dire circumstances and taking of the Lords name in profanity at least once, I am puzzled, as God was hardly a focus. It is a fairly innocent romance, with pretty one dimensional characters and some surprising events that at least kept me skimming to the end. If you are looking for something that required no thought at all, on an innocent harlequin romance level, this is it. One reviewer took exception to the treatment of the part Sioux character in the book, and I will say that his voice did sound like every other in the story: his racial make-up seems a convenient device to create a tension to an aspect of the plot, and otherwise has little effect on his character. For the price - free - it was worth it, in a Hallmark channel movie way...one that you DVR'd and fast forwarded through to get to the pay off at the end.