Leaving Whiskey Bend Book

In 1890 the rough Western town of Whiskey Bend, Colorado, is no place for single women. The final straw for widow Pearl Parsons and young schoolteacher Hallie Wolcott is the assault on their friend Mary. Desperately fleeing from the attacker, the three women drive away in an open wagon, seeking new lives and safety. When they re caught in a violent storm on the road, help comes in the form of a stranger, Eli Morgan, a former military general turned reluctant rancher. He welcomes the women into his home, and it isn t long before he and Hallie develop tender feelings for each other. But Eli has troubles of his own a family on the brink of falling apart and now someone is trying to kill him

Publishers Weekly

Garlock's newest (after On Tall Pine Lake) feels old, and not just because it's set in 1890. Schoolteacher Hallie Wolcott flees Whiskey Bend, Colo., with her friends Pearl and Mary after Mary is beaten by Chester, one of the town's many brutes. Pearl, the eldest, has been through this before, and she won't rest until they find a place that feels safe. Fortunately, a powerful storm leaves them washed up at tumbledown ranch owned by Eli Morgan. Eli's cantankerous and cruel mother wants no part of the women, but she begrudgingly changes her mind when an accident lands her in bed. Meanwhile, Chester's been tracking the ladies; will he find them at the ranch, the place where each woman feels she can finally find true happiness? The answer to this and other "cliffhangers" are apparent to the reader long before the resolutions are played out on the page. The prose is lifeless, the dialogue wooden and the whole thing reads like a poorly strung-together mishmash of western romance tropes. (Nov.)

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