How to Handle a Cowboy

Starred review from April 1, 2014
Kennedy's authentic depiction of the contemporary West is both realistic and romantic. Sierra Dunn, with degrees in law enforcement and social work, would rather be making high-level decisions in Denver that would benefit hundreds of kids, but instead she is running a group home called Phoenix House in the small town of Wynott, Wyoming, where she is riding herd on five troubled 10-year-old foster boys. Ridge Cooper, a local rancher and former rodeo cowboy, ends up volunteering at Phoenix House, and visits to his ranch open up a whole new world for the boys. Danger looms in the form of a very scary man exhibiting an interest in Jeffrey, perhaps the most damaged of the children. Without being overly graphic, Kennedy deftly conveys the horrors that landed the boys in foster care and, most importantly, illuminates the emerging love that turns disparate survivors into a family. While the sex scenes are hot, Kennedy's forte is in making relationships genuine and heartfelt as she exposes vulnerabilities with tenderness and good humor. This is a terrific feel-good read with just the right amount of page-turning suspense.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)