Montana Dreaming (Home On The Ranch) (Harlequin Superromance, No. 1085)

Rating:
Summary: Winner of the WordWeaving Award for Excellence
Review: The death of her father, his remaining medical expenses and low cattle prices lead to a heart rendering decision for Jessie Weaver. Despite her intense connection to the land of her forbearers, Jessie must sell out and move. Rather than accepting the easy millions offered by developers, however, Jessie sells to a wealthy man interested in conservation. He promises to realize her dream, however, if she will stay and manage the land. But Jessie cannot remain on land that is no longer her own.

When Guthrie learns of Jessie's plans, he leaves behind the mountains of Montana seeking answers and healing in Alaska. Alas, he might have left Jessie, but he cannot quit her, and after five months, he gives into the compulsion to return to Montana. He hopes things have changed between them, but the bitter anger and pain still simmers, blocking softer feelings. Indeed, the cataclysmic events of the past year have robbed Jessie of any vulnerability or gentle feeling, leaving behind a woman as strong and rugged as the Montana mountains. But Guthrie loves the mountains as he loves Jessie, and he is equally resilient.

Nadia Nichols' voice combines the beauty of a poet with the strength of a visionary to create a unique balance between the mundane and the surreal. Jessie Weaver is a difficult heroine to warm to with her prickly attitude and stalwart determination. But occasional shifting points of view reveal an extraordinary woman as others reveal her strength, her courage and her moral fortitude. Jessie believes in the Montana land she loves so dearly, sacrificing millions to preserve a dream of wide-open spaces. Contrasting Jessie's dreams, Guthrie is a realist, practical to the core and pained by their constant friction. A typical male who cannot express his true feelings, Guthrie tends to make messes of things rather than fixing them. Yet it takes the strength of such characters to inhabit Nichol's world of unforgiving natural and manmade danger. An extraordinary novel that explores the most difficult of emotional landscapes and the most beautiful of natural spaces, MONTANA DREAMING earns the WordWeaving Award for Excellence.