Half the folks in America love reading the gunslinging tales of Granite Westwind. But nobody knows the real story behind the legend: Granite Westwind is a woman. True McCormick grew up wild and free among the Texas Rangers and Harvey girls of the untamed West. Now she’s a famous published author, writing Wild West adventures under the name "Granite Westwind." But when her publisher wants to send Granite Westwind on tour, she has two choices. She can 'fess up to her true identity, or hire someone to play the part of the lightning-fast gunslinger. She finds her man in a Galveston jailhouse. Seth Atherton is a hardware store clerk with foolhardy dreams of gunsmoke and justice. But True is determined to turn this handsome young greenhorn into a larger-than-life hero. Filling the boots of a legend isn’t easy. Especially when the bullets begin to fly—and True begins to fall in love with the hero she created.
Ed H Whorton was born in New Mexico but has lived in Texas most of his life. He has recently renewed his interest in history and historical fiction. His mother was an avid reader of books and poetry and encouraged her son to do likewise. His father was in the Army Communications Corp during World War II and was awarded the Bronze Star. Ed served in the United States Navy during the Viet Nam war both on shore and shipboard. He is married, has two daughters and three grand children. He has one sister who lives in California and no brothers. For the last few years he has been looking at family history and discovered that a Great Great Grandfather was an itinerant preacher know as The Fighting Parson riding the circuit in Texas during the early years of that state. Ed also has written religious commentary and a childrens book which are yet to be published. He currently resides in Houston, Texas with his wife who is a registered nurse and education coordinator for a local hospital.
Detectives Moss Stone and Anya Roberts investigate the sudden death of a liquor agent and newspaper columnist at a wine festival by poison. There were a daunting number of suspects in Oscar Detrick's death, including his women chasing business partner.Stone and Roberts enter the world of wine festivals to determine the motive in poisoning Detrick and even if he was the intended victim. And was the missing the bag of garbage holding the clues they needed?
Watch out, Wilder, Texas! Sweetie's back in town! Sweetheart Mae Holiday is the oldest of the six Holiday sisters—the one who carries the burden of continuing the family's ranching tradition. Except Sweetie doesn't want to be a rancher. She wants to be the next Dolly Parton. And she's going to achieve her dream come hell or high water...or the inability to sing her songs in front of a crowd. When her daddy suffers a heart attack, she heads home to Wilder. Before she even reaches the edge of town, she's pulled over by a sexy-but-grumpy sheriff who makes it clear she's not welcome. Since before she headed off to Nashville she broke his cousin's heart, she understands why Sheriff Decker Carson has a bone to pick. But no one tells Sweetie what she can and can't do. When she finds out her mama and daddy are losing the ranch, Sweetie decides to put her country music dreams on hold and stay to help save her beloved home—even if she has to take on a stubborn Texas lawman whose sizzling kisses make her start to wonder if she’s been following the wrong dream all along. Decker Carson has had a thing for Sweetie since first seeing her strut around the Holiday Ranch with her golden ponytail swinging and her eyes sparkling like a dew-drenched meadow. But he flat refuses to let his feelings show. Everyone in Wilder knows Sweetie has always been Jace’s girl. Jace is not only Decker’s cousin, but also the one who helped him get through the loss of both his parents. Decker is not about to break the no-kissing-cousin’s-girlfriends rule—even if Sweetie and Jace have been broken up for years. Unfortunately, when a scintillating rumor spreads through town and every cowboy in the county starts showing up on the Holiday’s front porch with flowers and marriage proposals, it’s Decker’s job as sheriff to untangle the mess. Which means spending a lot more time with the one woman he can’t resist . . . and the one girl he wants to make his own.
Lord, help the mister who comes between Texas sisters . . . The Holiday Secret Sisterhood has a strict rule: never poach on another sister’s boyfriend, past or present. Hallie Holiday has no intentions of ever breaking that rule. After watching her big sisters become love-struck fools, men don’t even make the top five of Hallie’s wish list . . . until one night when Jace Carson slips onto the barstool next to her with his sexy lopsided smile and devilish smoky-gray eyes. Suddenly, spending the night in the muscled arms of a hot hometown hero becomes more than a wish. It becomes a steamy reality. Before Hallie can finish shoving that night into her bad-bad-sister vault and throwing away the key, Jace waltzes back into town. Soon Hallie will realize there’s no way to keep a secret from a sister . . . or from your own heart. Jace Carson plans to never step foot in Wilder, Texas, again. After an injury ends his professional football career, he has no desire to witness the townsfolk’s disappointment. Or watch his cousin live happily ever after with the woman Jace had planned to marry. But desire is a funny thing. It can change at the drop of a hat. Or the drop of a pair of lace panties. Getting involved with his ex-girlfriend’s little sister is just plain stupid, especially when Hallie is a tough cowgirl who pulls no punches—literally or figuratively. But there’s something about the way she looks at him that makes him feel like less of a failure. Like he could lasso the big ol’ harvest moon . . . and make a feisty Texas girl’s dreams come true.
The first systematic inquiry into the Texas Rangers did not begin until 1935 with Walter Prescott Webb’s publication The Texas Rangers. Since then numerous works have appeared on the Rangers, but no volume has been published before that covers the various historians of the Rangers and their approaches to the topic. Editors Bruce A. Glasrud and Harold J. Weiss Jr. gather essays that profile individual historians of the Texas Rangers, explore themes and issues in Ranger history, and comprise archival research, biographies, and autobiographies. Several approaches in Texas historiography have influenced the writings on the Texas Rangers and serve to organize the chapters in the volume. Traditionalists (Chuck Parsons, Stephen L. Moore, and Bob Alexander) stress the revered happenings in the nineteenth century that brought about the Lone Star state and its empire-building Ranger force. To these historical writers the Texas Rangers were part of a golden age. Revisionists (Robert M. Utley, Louis R. Sadler, and Charles H. Harris) pull back from this adulation, emphasize the importance of overlooked ethnic and racial groups, and point out misbehavior on the part of Rangers. They also want to separate fact from fiction. Some Ranger historians (Frederick Wilkins and Mike Cox) straddle both traditional and revisionist approaches in their works. The final group, Cultural Constructionalists (Gary Clayton Anderson, Américo Paredes, and Monica Muñoz Martinez), continue the work of Revisionists and focus on an interconnected past that includes theoretical approaches and the study of memory and regional identities. Several themes emerge throughout the book. One is how the Rangers changed from unorganized mounted militia, dragoons in the modern sense, to organized cavalry forces with six-shooter firepower who served as a military arm of the state and nation. A second is how the dichotomous views of the Rangers—as either patriot warriors or bloody avengers—left their imprint on Anglo and Hispanic society. This divergent examination especially derived from incidents in the US-Mexican War, the period from 1910 to 1920, and the lower Rio Grande valley in the 1960s. And yet another theme is how the Rangers first resisted and fought against, yet ultimately absorbed, all creeds and colors into their ranks over two hundred years as they evolved into police officers: Anglo, Black, Hispanic, Indian, and women Rangers.
Fireworks are about to light up the Texas skies! Liberty Lou Holiday is the overachieving Holiday sister. Whatever goals she sets, she meets: star athlete, homecoming queen, CEO of a successful event planning business. Which is why her entire family is pinning their hopes on Liberty to save the Holiday Ranch from foreclosure. How hard can it be given that the owner of the company doing the foreclosing once had a major crush on Liberty? She’ll have him wrapped around her little pinkie in two shakes of a lamb’s tail. Or so she thinks until she meets the villain sent to take her family’s home. Liberty is not expecting a sexy ex-rodeo cowboy with soulful brown eyes and a charming smile that can sweep a Texas gal off her boots. Nor is she expecting his smooth-talkin’ ways and devilish dares to have those boots wrapped around his hot body in the time it takes to say “Come here, darlin’.” Jesse James Cates might look like a laidback rodeo cowboy, but his tough childhood has made him a savvy businessman who doesn’t take no for an answer. He’s quite content making loads of money and traveling the world as a carefree bachelor . . . until one hot spring night when he runs into Liberty Holiday. The moment he sets eyes on the ebony-haired beauty, he realizes what his life has been missing. Unfortunately, it’s hard to woo a woman into your bed when your half-brother and business partner is foreclosing on her family’s ranch. Now, Jesse has a choice. Tell the truth and lose Libby forever or tell a little white lie and hold onto his feisty firecracker. What harm can come from a little white lie?
Enjoy four classic Long, Tall Texans stories from New York Times bestselling author Diana Palmer! Christopher Wealthy Christopher Deverell has everything he could ever want. But the jaded millionaire has never opened his heart to let a woman in—that is, until he’s confronted by determined journalist Della Larson. Luke Elusive bachelor Luke Craig meets his match in young Belinda Jessup. There’s something about the beauty that rubs him the wrong way, but at the same time, sparks as hot as a Texas summer fly between them! Guy Rugged Texan Guy Fenton refuses to be tamed by any woman, let alone a prickly publicist who gets on his last nerve. But beautiful brunette Candy Marshall might just bring the sexy rancher to his knees… Hank Hank Shoeman has retreated to a secluded Colorado cabin, eager to be away from the outside world and the hurt that comes with it. But what he gets when he meets lovely Poppy O’Brien is so much more than he ever bargained for… New York Times Bestselling Author 4 Heartfelt Stories: Christopher, Luke, Guy and Hank (previously published as Redbird)
Things are heatin’ up in the Lone Star State . . . When a dastardly villain takes the Holidays' family ranch, no one in Wilder, Texas, suspects that sweet-as-apple-pie Belle Holiday is responsible for the villain's vendetta. Belle is the soft-spoken sister, the one who looks to her assertive twin, Liberty, to make all her decisions. Except now Liberty is getting married and has left Belle without a leader . . . and stuck dealing with the man she’s done wrong. Belle had no plans to hurt the teenage boy who arrived at her front door with a wilted bouquet of wildflowers and his heart in his pretty blue eyes. But there’s no way to explain that to the brooding man who’s now set on making her family’s home his own—even if he doesn’t know one end of a steer from the other. Except it turns out that beneath the grumpy greenhorn is still the kind-hearted boy who will help Belle discover her own strength and make her burn brighter than the hot summer sun. Corbin Whitlock has been harboring a grudge against Belle Holiday and her twin sister since high school and the night they pulled "the switch" on him. Now Corbin won't rest until he's made all the Holidays pay. Taking their ranch seems like fitting revenge—not to mention, he’s always wanted a place to call home. But since Corbin knows nothing about ranching, he has to rely on Belle and her family to teach him. And riding lessons from a sexy country gal who knows how to sit a saddle can make a man forget all about horses and start dreaming about another type of riding. Once in the arms of sweet Belle, vengeance will turn to something else—something that makes Corbin realize home isn’t a place on a map. It’s a place in the heart.
Cowboy, Cowboy, wherefore art thou Cowboy? A fake marriage between the daughter and son of two archenemies. What could possibly go wrong? Cloe Holiday is practical enough to realize she isn't as pretty and talented as her five sisters and she's content standing in their shadows and cheering them on. Her dreams are small--help children overcome the speech impediments she had to deal with as a child, get an engagement ring from her longtime boyfriend, and have her wedding in the big red barn on her family's Texas ranch. But even small dreams can blow up in your face. Instead of a ring, she gets the boot. And now her family is about to lose everything. Not just their ranch, but also their home and the beloved barn . . . unless Cloe is willing to enter into a wild scheme with the son of her father's archenemy. Rome Remington has always tried to be the responsible, obedient son. After his mama ran off, he helped his father make the Remington Ranch one of the most profitable ranches in Texas. But now he has an opportunity to buy the neighboring ranch and the idea of getting out from under his controlling father's thumb is too good to resist. There's only one problem. The ranch is owned by the Holidays’ ornery grandma who refuses to sell to just anyone—the man must be willing to pay off the family debt and convince one of her granddaughters to marry him. After his first disastrous marriage, Rome swore he'd never get married again . . . but what if this marriage is merely a business transaction? Now all he has to do is convince a Holiday sister. And what better sister than the practical Plain Jane? But as it turns out, there’s nothing plain about Cloe Holiday. Her inner strength, kind heart, and breathtaking kisses will soon have Rome scaling any garden wall to get to his cowgirl Juliet.
