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The Cowboy's Surprise Nanny*
Hero Too Unlikable for Me
After his wife’s death, Ian can use a little help with his 6-year-old son. In an exchange of favors, the mayor helps Ian get a spot for his son in the strawberry festival while Ian agrees to take in the mayor’s niece as the new nanny. Katie made some inappropriate career choices and is needing a little time to get her head straight and figure out her next plan.
The little boy in the story, Andy, is just adorable. He’s a sweet little boy who’s recently lost his mother. He has multiple food allergies that are severe enough to threaten his health. He and Katie bond the very first night, as he is a little boy who’s much in need of loving attention.
I can’t say that I like the hero, Ian. He was just too cynical, unforgiving, and unkind for most of the book. Yes, he’s got issues because of the loss of his wife and having to raise his son alone but give him a few redeeming qualities than his looks. I just found him to be really unpleasant and couldn’t quite get beyond that. Probably because I didn’t like him, I didn’t feel any chemistry between him and Katie. In fact, I was almost hoping she would find another guy in town who would treat her better.
Too, I’m not wild about the cover. Cowboys should be muscular, not emaciated. It’s one thing to see the six pack of the rectus abdominus but quite another to see the serratus anterior muscles. Ick.
I found it interesting that the concept of recipe plagiarism was strong in this book. This is Katie’s supposed bad career move. Having worked with recipes in a couple of different capacities in my life, I’ve seen firsthand that several well-known celebrity chefs take recipes from sources like community cookbooks and tweak them just a little, name them something different, and call it their recipe. I also understand that a recipe in itself cannot be copyrighted unless there’s significant original prose; a list of ingredients and method is not considered such. So it seems a little odd to me that this was the big career-ender for Katie.
