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Patience Smith is a loyal friend with a generous heart. Raised in an orphanage, she travels to Colorado with a group of women as mail-order brides, and now lives with three of them at the parsonage in Denver City.
Sheriff Jay Longer, still grieving the deaths of his wife and son, steers clear of both women and young boys. Broken dreams and despair have destroyed Jay's trust in God, leaving him lonely and hurting.
A case of mistaken identity puts Patience in danger and gives Jay Longer the unwanted responsibility of rescuing her. An accident allows Patience to escape her kidnapper, but leaves her alone, without resources, in the frozen winter of an unfamiliar landscape.
Seeking shelter, Patience stumbles onto a gold mine, a dead prospector, and an orphan boy. She decides to claim the mine and hopes the profits will support her and her friends. Sheriff Longer finds Patience in the mining town of Fiddle Creek. She spurns his efforts to rescue her, determined to make a success of her new mining venture.
I identified with Patience and admired her desire to be independent and help her friends. Taking responsibility for Wilson endeared her to me even more. The plot was a little thin, but the characters made up for it. I especially liked Copeland's portrayal of the orphan boy, Wilson, an intelligent and feisty young man who learns to love and respect Patience. One thing bothered me—the dead prospector was never buried. Patience covers the body with a blanket, but no mention was made of Longer, or anyone else, burying him. I even reread the first few chapters to see if I'd missed it. The omission was a small detail that took me out of the story.
Patience is Book 6 in the Brides of the West series, a continuing story of a group of mail-order brides.
Lori Copeland, a native of Springfield, Missouri, has published more than seventy romance novels. She has won numerous awards for her books, including the Romantic Times Reviewer's Choice Award, Walden's Books' Best Seller, the Holt Medallion Award, and the Career Achievement Award from Romantic Times magazine.
Reviewed by Marie DisBrow
for The Road to Romance
June 25, 2004
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