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Kat's late mother's charity foundation is in financial trouble. She needs this fundraiser to succeed if she hopes to rescue the foundation and live up to her mother's legacy. She doesn't expect a pickup truck to crash through the hotel lobby. Rafe didn't expect to crash it, either. Now he's wrecked not only his truck and Kat's fundraiser, but also his knee and possibly his career as a professional bull rider. Rafe's solution is to retreat--to his family's ranch and his cocoon of guilt and grief over a friend's death. Kat's solution is to chase him--all the way to the ranch, demanding he help her raise the money she needs and salvage at least some of the things he's ruined lately. Neither of them is prepared to re-examine their views of God, to release their true selves under a wide Montana sky, or to fall in love.

Generally speaking, the romance genre bores me. "Will they ever see past their differences?" Sure they will. "Will her beauty inside and out be enough to heal his broken heart?" Naturally. "Will his deep, dark, dangerous past tear them apart forever?" Of course not. Fortunately, this book is not driven by cliched back-cover questions. It's driven by two people who are easy to care about. Kat is spirited and tenacious but constantly questioning her worth. Rafe is swaggering on the outside but trembling on the inside.

The book also holds quite a bit more setting and plot than the average romance novel. Readers are tossed into the rough-and-tumble world of professional bull riding, the tough and spacious world of cattle ranching. A skillful inter-weaving of Noble family backstory, a subplot love story between two endearing secondary characters, a slowly rising action plot involving money missing from Kat's foundation--I can't believe Ms. Warren crammed all this into less than 400 pages. Yet she did it, all without compromising the focus on Rafe and Kat. Every element manages to twine its way back to them.

How could this book have earned five stars? Mainly, some of the introspection could be weeded out. The romantic angst never made me shut the book, but the characters' feelings would have been more powerful if the author had relied more on their actions to show us, and less on their conflicted inner monologues spelling everything out. Also, twice while reading this book, I felt robbed of a scene I really wanted to read. First, the truck accident. This is Kat and Rafe's meeting scene, but it isn't shown. Rafe realizes he can't stop the truck; the next thing we know, Kat is reflecting on the crash. What did they say to each other when he fell out of the truck with a broken knee and she ran up to the truck irate over her broken fundraiser? I'll never know. The other scene that felt missing is nearly at the end of the book. Suffice it to say that it's a climactic moment for Rafe, and like the meeting of the protagonists, I wanted to see this in real time, not see it merely reflected on later.

On the whole, this book is an endearing, romantic delight. The author doesn't over-write but doesn't just toss words haphazardly onto the page, either. She also knows how to create a vulnerable but tough leading man. This was the first book I read by Ms. Warren, but not the last. I love Rafe; I love the Silver Buckle Ranch. When I finished this one, I loved knowing the series has two more books in which I could spend some more time in the big, glorious, modern West and better get to know the Noble family. ( )

Katherine Breckenridge and Rafe Noble; very different life styles, but much the same in life experiences. Both trying to figure out how they can make a difference; one by running a foundation and the other by riding bulls. Then there is Lolly and John and there story (is she related to Kat? and he is a western romance author). Liked this book very much! ( )