The fifty-fourth book I read in 2014 was Cowboy Take Me Away by Jane Graves. This is the first book in her Rainbow Valley series, the second book just came out in May 2014. I finished this book on 6/19/14. I rated this book 4.5 stars out of a scale of 5. This book is about Shannon North and Luke Dawson. As teens they fell in love, but Luke was from the wrong side of the tracks and Shannon didn’t yet have the age and confidence to stand up to her mother. Luke decides that he’ll never be good enough for this town and takes off during the night after Shannon breaks his heart.

Fast forward to eleven years later, Shannon left her cushy CPA job in Houston to come home and run Rainbow Valley’s animal shelter. Between a pony that bites and spitting llamas and too many dogs and cats to count, she’s having trouble keeping her head above water at the shelter financially. Meanwhile in the past eleven years Luke has become a very well known bull rider. Through a twist of fate he ends up back in Rainbow Valley with a knee healing from surgery that he needs back at top condition for the championship bull ride competition in 3 months as well as an empty bank account after paying for the surgery out of pocket. When he sees the ad in the paper for a live in caretaker at the animal shelter, he decides to apply for the job.

As Luke becomes more involved in taking care of the animals at the shelter he realizes that they aren’t the only ones who need his care. Shannon cares so deeply for these animals that she’s on the edge of breaking and Luke realizes someone should be watching out for her as well. As their friendship once again develops into something more, Luke can’t seem to get past the town’s stigma that he’s just like his drunk no-good father. And once he reveals to Shannon how horrible his childhood actually was, is there even a chance she could love him then?

This was just such a great book. This book is just so perfectly heart-wrenching, between Luke’s childhood insecurities and all the animals at the shelter, you have to be a cold-hearted son of a gun to avoid tearing up multiple times during this story. I just absolutely loved it. I can’t wait to read the next book in the series.

Link to author website: http://www.janegraves.com/

Link to Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Cowboy-Take-Away-Rainbow-Valley/dp/1455515191/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1403270495&sr=8-2&keywords=cowboy+take+me+away

Link to Rainbow Valley, TX (not quite sure if it is a real place or if this is a Jane Graves website): http://www.rainbowvalleytexas.com/

Link to other blog reviews on Jane Graves books: https://rebeccabookreview.wordpress.com/tag/jane-graves/