What a Cowgirl Wants by Joanne Kennedy
What a cowgirl wants and what a cowgirl needs are two very different things.
What a cowgirl wants is what she gets in my books: One Fine Cowboy.
She wants a lot of other things, too: a fine-tooled pair of cowboy boots, a champion barrel horse, a pair of jeans that fits just right, and a home on the range to call her own.
The boots are an essential tool when you’re in the saddle, and a badge of honor out of it. Every cowgirl should have at least two pairs—a rough-and-ready set for everyday wear, and pretty ones for scootin’ at the Outlaw on Saturday nights.
While not all of us can run the barrels like Lindsay Sears, we all wish we could—and a great barrel horse will carry you around the cloverleaf whether you’re a champ in the making or just hanging on to the horn.
And those jeans? They have to fit right, and they need to be long enough to “stack” over your boots. My favorites right now are Wrangler Q-Babies. I just wish they made them in more colors to go with my dress-up scootin’ boots!
As for my current “home on the range” there are no deer and antelope playing in the yard, though a pair of pronghorns took to strolling around he sidewalks this summer. (I think they were lost.) But “seldom is heard a discouraging word”—and that’s a lot more important than flora and fauna.
Throw in a handsome cowboy and you’ve got everything a cowgirl wants—but no genuine cowgirl needs a man to make her complete. Or boots. Or a horse.
All she really needs is attitude—because “cowgirl” is a state of mind.
You might not get the chance to ride the range in real life, but you can still celebrate the cowgirl spirit. Cowgirls take pride in their work, keep their promises, and live each day with courage. They’re independent, fair-minded, and can take care of themselves, thank you very much. All a cowgirl really needs is a life of her own and the courage to live it.
Charlie Banks, my heroine in One Fine Cowboy, definitely has her own dreams and goals—a Plan with a capital “P.” She’s going to finish school, get her degree in psychology, and move on to some kind of meaningful work. She definitely doesn’t have a place in her life for a man. Not until she’s executed The Plan.
But when her thesis advisor sends her to Wyoming to study interspecies communication at a “horse whispering” clinic run by trainer Nate Shawcross, Charlie’s less than thrilled. As an animal rights advocate, she’s not about to “bust a bronc.” Only loyalty to her advisor keeps her at lonely Latigo Ranch—that, and the broken axle on her car. It’s going to take the local mechanic at least a week to get the part she needs to hit the gas and go.
But it’s not long before Charlie finds herself falling in love—not with the cowboy, but with the damaged, difficult stallion he’s staked his ranch on. And when Nate’s injured in an encounter with a stack of hay bales and a renegade two-by-four, he’s forced to trust her with the horse, and with his own future.
Before long, Charlie finds herself warming to the work—and to the cowboy. Nate’s not much of a talker, but he definitely teaches her a thing or two about non-verbal communication.
If my cowboys are designed to be the kind of man readers want for their own, my heroines are the kind of woman we all want to be: strong and independent, with goals and dreams of their own. How do you celebrate the “cowgirl spirit” in your life?
ONE FINE COWBOY BY JOANNE KENNEDY
IN STORES – SEPTEMBER 2010
He’s got a way with horses…and with women...
Nate Shawcross is perfectly content to spend his days training wild horses. So when a beautiful greenhorn unexpectedly shows up for a seminar from the famous “Horse Whisperer” of Wyoming, all Nate wants to do is send her packing…
The last thing she expects is a lesson in romance…
Graduate student Charlie Banks came to the ranch to learn about horse communication, but when she meets the ruggedly handsome cowboy, she starts to fantasize about another connection entirely…
Nate needs to stay focused if he’s going to save his ranch from foreclosure, but he can’t help being distracted by the brainy and breathtakingly sexy Charlie. Could it be that after all this time Nate has finally found the one woman who can tame his wild heart?
About the Author
Joanne Kennedy has worked in bookstores all her life in positions from bookseller to buyer. A member of Romance Writers of America and Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, she won first place in the Colorado Gold Writing Contest and second in the Heart of the Rockies contest. Joanne lives in Cheyenne, Wyoming. For more information, please visit
http://joannekennedybooks.com.
