Lone Star Book Blog Tour: Courting Miss Emma by Linda Broday (review & giveaway)

“This wild land of Texas isn’t for the faint of heart.”

Courting Miss Emma by Linda Broday is the much-anticipated book two in The Hangman’s Daughters series. Book one, Winning Maura’s Heart, set the stage for two sisters in the shadow of their distant father and his infamous profession as a hangman. Maura and Emma are mercilessly taunted and/or ostracized and are eventually run out of San Antonio, Texas, in 1868 because of they carry the Taggart name. They take many unwanted orphans with them to a seemingly abandoned mission just outside of San Antonio and set up an orphanage and safe haven for anyone in need. While US Marshal Calhoun captures Maura’s heart, younger sister Emma is resigned to spinsterhood and takes care of the orphans, with the help of their Uncle Max and three French nuns who were already living at the mission.

Linda Broday starts this series off strong in typical Broday fashion, with book two now focusing on compassionate, courageous, and fiercely protective Miss Emma. Linda Broday has quite the storytelling and characterization gift because all her stories are exceptional, with every character, even minor ones, jumping right off the page. In The Hangman’s Daughters series, Uncle Max is a personal favorite in both books, and Jubal Poteet is now a favorite in book two, but every character is so well developed, you would swear they are real and that you are right there in the story with them. How does Linda do that with every single book?

Less than a year after fleeing San Antonio, trouble once again hounds the sisters and their safe refuge that they call Heaven’s Door. Courting Miss Emma starts off with an interesting bang when stone-faced Stone Landry purchases some neighboring land and warns Emma to keep her orphans far away from his land and his three camels that he rescued when he mustered out of the Army. While their initial exchange is quite heated, Emma and Stone just can’t stop thinking about each other.

Life is never dull at Heaven’s Door, but when a greedy man decides he wants all the land in the area because of the prime location, danger and trouble come a calling, forcing everyone to band together to protect the children, themselves, and their properties.

Love is clearly a main theme here, and it is no secret (because the title tells us so) that it is now Emma’s turn to find some Texas-sized romance, with handsome and rugged Stone Landry fitting the bill quite nicely.

With Courting Miss Emma, get ready for some explosive action throughout, sweet romance, flying bullets and cannonballs, a new member of the Taggart family on the scene, and plenty of love to soothe bruise pasts and brighten promising futures.

Enter the giveaway below on or before November 17, 2023, for a chance to win some great prizes.

I received a free copy of this book from Lone Star Book Blog Tours in exchange for my honest review.