Romancing the Cowboy, Part 3: Three Novels by Debra Clopton

Debra Clopton is her own book-writing industry. She has eight series in the romance genre, four historical romance novels, and three contemporary romances – for a current total of some 57 books. Six of the series (and some 35 books) are cowboy-themed, and the historical novels are historical western/cowboy themed. 

Here are three of the books, two from the Ransom Creek series and the first from the Texas Matchmaker series.

In Her Cowboy Hero, Lori Calhoun has left a promising marketing career in Houston to return the family ranch in the Texas Hill Country. Her father has died in a freak horse accident, and Lori decides she will operate the horse and cattle operation. Trip Jensen, the son of the longtime ranch manager and who grew up from childhood with Lori, now owns a share in the ranch ans works as foreman. Years before, being told by his father that he had nothing to offer the ranch owner’s daughter, he had walked away, hurting both Lori and himself deeply.

The horses are all about rodeo events, and Lori and Trip face the theft of several prize horses at a rodeo. Cattle stock has been rustled as well. Someone is trying to take advantage of a young woman’s management inexperience. 

But Lori and Trip have other problems – personal problems. They’re both still attracted to each other, and the story hinges on whether their relationship can be reborn. It’s a sweet story with plenty of ranch and rodeo atmosphere.

In Charmed by the Cowboy, the Presley brothers operate a ranch with their father. There are several brothers (obvious candidates for the series). Cooper Presley has had a worse-than-bad experience with his former wife, who decided she wasn’t cut out for ranch and small-town life. Beth Lee is a photographer who has moved into her uncle’s place near the Pressley ranch. She’s been making money filming miniature goats in dresses (and you can imagine what a cowboy like Cooper Pressley thinks of that).

Despite a mutual determination to stay out of relationships, Beth and Cooper are clearly attracted to each other. But Beth has problems, and especially problems with the stalker boyfriend she broke up with and left behind in the city. She begins to experience vandalism of her house, and worse may be coming. Then Cooper’s former wife shows up and attempts to win the award for most obnoxious. Can a growing relationship between Cooper and Beth survive all this?

Dream with Me, Cowboy is the first in Clopton’s Texas Matchmakers, set in what appears to be the dying town of Mule Hollow, Texas. Lacy Brown and her best friend ride into two in a bright pink antique Cadillac (fins and all), answering an ad for “Wives Needed.” Lacy isn’t there to find a cowboy husband; she’s there to open up a beauty salon and help the town realize its potential. 

Clint Matlock owns a cattle ranch, and he’s fighting off cattle rustlers at every turn. Clint’s father is dead; his mother left his father when Clint was a boy, running away with a circus owner. Clint felt the betrayal as deeply as his father; he’s now 35 and not particularly interested in any kind of relationship. Until he runs into Lacy (literally) in front of the diner. It’s a comic romp of a story, and Lacy Brown is one of the most original characters I’ve run across in a novel.

Debra Clopton

Clopton knows of what she writes. A sixth-generation Texas, she lives with her husband on a ranch “deep in the heart of Texas.” She’s sold some 2.7 million books. In addition to Cowboys of Ransom Creek and Texas Matchmaker series, her other series are Texas Brides & Bachelors, Sunset Bay Romance, Turner Creek Ranch, Windswept Bay, New Horizon Ranch, and Four of Hearts Ranch. If you like romance with cowboys, you should take a serious look at Clopton’s books.

Related: 

Romancing the Cowboy, Part 1.

Romancing the Cowboy, Part 2.

Photograph by Allef Vinicius via Unsplash. Used with permission.