Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Thunder and Rain by Charles Martin

He's a retired Texas Ranger.  Unfortunately he was a lawman long enough to cause his divorce.  But he hasn't lost his "something's wrong" antenna.

Hachette Book Groups sent me an ARC of this book for review (thank you).  It is being published today, so look for a copy at your local bookstore.

Tyler Steele is old fashioned.  He believes in right and wrong and being married forever and in his son and his ranch and his horses.  In his relentless pursuit of evil and righting wrongs, he somehow lost his wife.  Now he lives with his son on the ranch and visits his wife in the hospital where she's recovering from a drug addiction.  He's in the process of getting divorce papers signed when he heads home and finds a young woman and her child with a "dead" car.  Seems all it needs is gas, so he he adds some to her tank and she continues her journey.

He notices the woman at the next town and doesn't like what he sees.  She's willing to do anything to get more money and get back on the road.  He has to save her from herself.  He also gets to meet the reason she's running and that almost turns deadly.

Tyler rescues Sam and Hope and takes them home with him.  The more he learns about them, the more his heart gets involved.  But he still believes in honoring and loving his wife, even if she has had problems.  This emotional conflict is intense when he analyzes why his marriage failed; I wanted to slap him and tell he was wrong.  The problem was that he wasn't wrong; he was an honorable man.  The author does a real good job of making you care about the characters he builds.

This is a hard hitting story that might very well make you analyze some of the decisions in your life.  Tyler has his own demons to conquer.  You definitely won't be bored.

I liked this story so well, I'm putting this ARC in my personal library.  I know I'll want to read it again.  I'm also going to check out Mr. Martin's previous books.  He has a talent for telling a good story so I'm going to see what other stories I can find.

Happy reading.

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