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Pistols and Petticoats
From bestselling authors Barbara Ankrum, Adrienne deWolfe and Sharon Ihle come three fresh novellas, featuring three firebrand ladies, each determined to make her mark while making her match. ETHAN'S BRIDE - 27,000 word sequel to CHASE THE FIRE (Wild Western Hearts, Book 4) Violet Bradford desperately wants a child. Believing herself barren, she answers Dr. Ethan Walker's advertisement for a mail-order bride in Colorado, knowing he only wants one a mother for his young daughter. Surely the joys of motherhood can compensate for a loveless marriage. But Ethan's broken heart won't stop tugging at hers. And Ethan soon realizes he must risk his heart again or risk losing it all. SHADY LADY - 26,000 word prequel to DEVIL IN TEXAS (Velvet Lies, Book 4) Fiery singing sensation, Sadie Michelson, thinks falling in love is bad for business—until William "Cass" Cassidy, a hotheaded gunslinger, sets his sights on wooing her. But when a Texas Ranger arrives in Dodge City to extradite Cass for a crime of passion, Sadie must use all her wits and wiles to lure the law from her man's trail. And that means risking everything—including Cass's love. BAREBACK BRIDE - 25,000 word sequel to THE BRIDE WORE SPURS (The Inconvenient Bride Series, Book 1) Expert horsewoman, Shannon Winterhawke runs away from home to join the Buffalo Bill Wild West extravaganza. Shannon is hired on the spot, but the show's head horseman, Seth Edwards, simply sees another flighty gal looking for a cowboy fling before settling down with some unsuspecting fool. But all bets are off as Shannon slowly sneaks into Seth's heart and lassoes him with his own rope.
297 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 28, 2014
44 people are currently reading
258 people want to read
About the author
Barbara Ankrum
40 books156 followersBarbara Ankrum grew up in Upstate New York, training to be a ballerina, but secretly dreaming of being an actress. Her first fangirl crush on Haley Mills led her to practice her British accent on unsuspecting store clerks, and she dreamed of co-starring in the remake of THE MOONSPINNERS. Because she was also a compulsive reader, she discovered that the film was based on a book by the fabulous Mary Stewart, which led to Barbara's lifelong obsession with romantic fiction.
Since Haley Mills was, sadly, not in the market for a co-star, Barbara pursued a degree in English Literature from the University of Tennessee. And when that degree, predictably, led to unemployment, she pulled up her socks and moved to Hollywood where she built a career as a successful commercial actress while raising two amazing (now grown) children with her sweet husband.
Writing romance came naturally from all that reading and the down time between auditions. Once she sold her first book, she said farewell to Hollywood-Land and never looked back. In between writing novels, she got her MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard and optioned a few screenplays. But her first love is, and always will be, romance.
Barbara's emotional, character driven, adventurous historicals (Wild Western Hearts series), her sexy, romantic suspense for Harlequin and her funny, heartwarming contemporaries for Tule Publishing, offer a little something for everyone. Twice nominated for Romance Writers of America's prestigious RITA Award, and her contemporary romance, Holiday Hearts, was made into a Hallmark Movies and Mysteries Christmas movie! Today, she lives in Texas with her husband and a scruffy, adorable rescue dog.
Please visit her on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Barbara.ankr...
Website: www.barbaraankrum.com
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/BarbaraAnkrum
Since Haley Mills was, sadly, not in the market for a co-star, Barbara pursued a degree in English Literature from the University of Tennessee. And when that degree, predictably, led to unemployment, she pulled up her socks and moved to Hollywood where she built a career as a successful commercial actress while raising two amazing (now grown) children with her sweet husband.
Writing romance came naturally from all that reading and the down time between auditions. Once she sold her first book, she said farewell to Hollywood-Land and never looked back. In between writing novels, she got her MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard and optioned a few screenplays. But her first love is, and always will be, romance.
Barbara's emotional, character driven, adventurous historicals (Wild Western Hearts series), her sexy, romantic suspense for Harlequin and her funny, heartwarming contemporaries for Tule Publishing, offer a little something for everyone. Twice nominated for Romance Writers of America's prestigious RITA Award, and her contemporary romance, Holiday Hearts, was made into a Hallmark Movies and Mysteries Christmas movie! Today, she lives in Texas with her husband and a scruffy, adorable rescue dog.
Please visit her on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Barbara.ankr...
Website: www.barbaraankrum.com
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/BarbaraAnkrum
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
July 28, 2018
So far, only read ETHAN'S BRIDE - super fun and adorable story! Had to finish once I got started!!
July 24, 2016
Originally published at Reading Reality
I want to make a joke about Pistols and Petticoats being “two, two, two books in one”, but the problem with the book is that it isn’t. Instead it is two books that attempt to be combined into one. Unfortunately the seam between the two books is rather visible, and leaves a nasty and distinguishing scar.
What we have feels like an attempt to yoke a scholarly study about the changing roles of women in detection and police work joined at the slightly non-working hip with a book about the changing roles of women in detective fiction and the lives and careers of women who have made successful and even groundbreaking forays into the mystery genre.
The desire, often stated in the book, is to show how the increased roles of women in novels and later other media often presaged the increasing roles for women in real-life police work. But the two parts don’t flow into one another, possibly because there isn’t much there, well, there.
Instead, in the historical narrative, police work for women was often proposed as, and in many cases restricted to, an extension of the reform zeal of the late 1800s and the belief that dealing with social problems and juvenile crime were a natural outgrowth of women’s roles in the home. Fictional female sleuths, on the other hand, were created first of all to entertain, but created in a way that was not supposed to upset the status quo. Which explains both Miss Marple and the reason that so many young female sleuths’ careers ended in marriage.
Women were supposed to remain in the domestic sphere, and that sphere was supposed to be the pinnacle of all their ambitions. Elderly spinsters like Miss Marple needed something to occupy their time, particularly in eras where so many women were left without spouses after a generation of young men died in warfare.
Pistols and Petticoats does not read like a successful amalgamation of the author’s two “plot” lines. The historical sections that detail women’s real and increasing contributions to police work and detection, read, unfortunately, like rather dry history. It’s interesting, but only becomes lively when the women themselves have interesting lives, like Alice Clement or Kate Warne.
The parts that thrill are where the author sinks her teeth into the history of female detectives and the history of the females who have written successful mysteries. The early years of female writers who made the genre what it is today, but whose works have not continued to find readers, was fascinating.
The information about where certain trends in mystery took their cues from contemporary life and women’s places in it also pulled me in. Not just the heroines of the Golden Age, like Christie and Marple, and Sayers with Harriet Vane, but also how those characters fit into their own society.
Escape Rating C+: All in all, the parts of the book that dealt with mystery fiction made for more compelling reading. They also reminded me of a book that I have not thought of in years, Murderess Ink: The Better Half of the Mystery. Murderess Ink, the followup to Murder Ink: The Mystery Reader's Companion, was a lighthearted study of the women who created and populated the mystery genre from the Golden Age until its late 1970s present. As much as I enjoyed the sections of Pistols and Petticoats that dealt with the genre, perhaps it is time for an update of Murder Ink and Murderess Ink.
I want to make a joke about Pistols and Petticoats being “two, two, two books in one”, but the problem with the book is that it isn’t. Instead it is two books that attempt to be combined into one. Unfortunately the seam between the two books is rather visible, and leaves a nasty and distinguishing scar.
What we have feels like an attempt to yoke a scholarly study about the changing roles of women in detection and police work joined at the slightly non-working hip with a book about the changing roles of women in detective fiction and the lives and careers of women who have made successful and even groundbreaking forays into the mystery genre.
The desire, often stated in the book, is to show how the increased roles of women in novels and later other media often presaged the increasing roles for women in real-life police work. But the two parts don’t flow into one another, possibly because there isn’t much there, well, there.
Instead, in the historical narrative, police work for women was often proposed as, and in many cases restricted to, an extension of the reform zeal of the late 1800s and the belief that dealing with social problems and juvenile crime were a natural outgrowth of women’s roles in the home. Fictional female sleuths, on the other hand, were created first of all to entertain, but created in a way that was not supposed to upset the status quo. Which explains both Miss Marple and the reason that so many young female sleuths’ careers ended in marriage.
Women were supposed to remain in the domestic sphere, and that sphere was supposed to be the pinnacle of all their ambitions. Elderly spinsters like Miss Marple needed something to occupy their time, particularly in eras where so many women were left without spouses after a generation of young men died in warfare.
Pistols and Petticoats does not read like a successful amalgamation of the author’s two “plot” lines. The historical sections that detail women’s real and increasing contributions to police work and detection, read, unfortunately, like rather dry history. It’s interesting, but only becomes lively when the women themselves have interesting lives, like Alice Clement or Kate Warne.
The parts that thrill are where the author sinks her teeth into the history of female detectives and the history of the females who have written successful mysteries. The early years of female writers who made the genre what it is today, but whose works have not continued to find readers, was fascinating.
The information about where certain trends in mystery took their cues from contemporary life and women’s places in it also pulled me in. Not just the heroines of the Golden Age, like Christie and Marple, and Sayers with Harriet Vane, but also how those characters fit into their own society.
Escape Rating C+: All in all, the parts of the book that dealt with mystery fiction made for more compelling reading. They also reminded me of a book that I have not thought of in years, Murderess Ink: The Better Half of the Mystery. Murderess Ink, the followup to Murder Ink: The Mystery Reader's Companion, was a lighthearted study of the women who created and populated the mystery genre from the Golden Age until its late 1970s present. As much as I enjoyed the sections of Pistols and Petticoats that dealt with the genre, perhaps it is time for an update of Murder Ink and Murderess Ink.
January 3, 2015
I loved the first story, Ethan's Bride. It was a short and sweet but I would have liked at least an epilogue to answer some open questions. The second story, Shady Lady, I couldn't even finish. The speech patterns were way over exaggerated and detracted from any story. The third story, Bareback Bride, was cute, but again I felt it was lacking something.
Read
January 20, 2015Two out of three okay
Ethan Bride- It was okay. I like the writing style. Will read other books by this author.
Shady Lady- I can't give a review, because I don't like books nor do I read "romance novels" where woman or anyone are forced into prostitution.
Bareback Bride- It was cute. I think I may have read a book by this author.
Ethan Bride- It was okay. I like the writing style. Will read other books by this author.
Shady Lady- I can't give a review, because I don't like books nor do I read "romance novels" where woman or anyone are forced into prostitution.
Bareback Bride- It was cute. I think I may have read a book by this author.
October 10, 2015
More hunks and beautiful women searching for love or not.
Great stories of handsome cowboys and beautiful women going about life in the the old west. Some characters will be eandering and some will make you think twice. All the stories were great reads and I will be looking for more books from these authors. I can't wait to read more by these ladies.
Great stories of handsome cowboys and beautiful women going about life in the the old west. Some characters will be eandering and some will make you think twice. All the stories were great reads and I will be looking for more books from these authors. I can't wait to read more by these ladies.
May 12, 2014
I don't normally read 'shorts' (or westerns) but I may have been converted. Each title was very different but all three had one thing in common -- terrific characters.
Want to read
December 9, 2014Free 12-09-14 http://www.amazon.com/Pistols-Pettico...
December 11, 2014
I only read the first novella, it was pretty good but needed to be longer! There were too many unanswered questions for me!
Want to read
March 21, 2015I really enjoyed the first story, Ethan's Bride, and would have given it 4.5 or 5 stars, but the other two didn't live up to the quality of the first.
April 26, 2016
VERY GOOD READ
I am so g lad I bought this trilogy. It had endings to two other books I read . If you want HAPPY ENDINGS try t his set .
I am so g lad I bought this trilogy. It had endings to two other books I read . If you want HAPPY ENDINGS try t his set .
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews