One Pink Rose

Amazon.com ReviewPart one of Julie Garwood's trilogy, The Clayborne Brides, takes on a timeworn scenario: Travis Clayborne, a no-nonsense cowboy escorts a mail-order bride across Montana as a favor to his mother. The bride, Emily Finnegan, is a pedantic Boston screwball who initiates their relationship by shooting at him. She misses, and things go downhill from there. As the pair proceeds toward Emily's rendezvous with matrimony, the sparks--romantic and otherwise--fly. There are the inevitable bumps along the way, and few surprises, so don't expect any. One Pink Rose is like silk: smooth, lightweight, and an indulgent pleasure. The other Clayborne brothers, first introduced as a gang of New York City street urchins in Garwood's bestselling For the Roses, meet their matches in One White Rose and One Red Rose.
From Library JournalBased on characters from Garwood's best-selling For the Roses (Pocket, 1995), this short romance takes headstrong, antimarriage Travis Clayborne, puts him in charge of safely transporting mail-order bride Emily Finnegan to her future husband, and lets proximity takes its course. Travis is determined to keep his promise to Mama Rose?and by the journey's end, he is glad he did. Despite a fast pace, occasional flashes of Garwood's trademark humor, a nice prolog, and the intriguing secondary character One-Eyed Jack, the story is hampered by incomplete character development and a silly heroine. Readers looking for something comparable to Garwood's more substantive works (e.g., Saving Grace, Pocket, 1993) may be disappointed. Nevertheless, this is the first of three novellas that will focus on the Clayborne brothers and their romantic adventures. Garwood lives in Kansas.
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