Showing results by author "Susan Leigh Carlton" in All Categories

The Misplaced Bride A Mail-Order Bride Romance When Ella Whitlock boards the stage in Brevard, Missouri, she carries everything she owns in a single trunk—and a plan as carefully organized as her ledger columns. A matrimonial correspondence service has matched her with a respectable gentleman in Wyoming Territory, and Ella intends to fulfill the arrangement with the same precision she applies to everything: no romance, no uncertainty, no falling. She arrives in Wind River. The right territory. The wrong town. The wrong man. Hank Mercer is a rancher with a battered notebook he calls an ...

Where Broken Things Belong: A Clean, Sweet Historical Romance Widowhood gave Margaret Rowan something she had never known before—freedom. After a marriage built on duty rather than affection, she is determined never to mistake safety for love again. In Red Rock, Wyoming, she has built a life of quiet independence, convinced that choosing nothing is better than risking heartbreak. Then Caleb Mercer returns. Years ago, Caleb offered Margaret a future she was unwilling to claim. He accepted her refusal without bitterness and built a life rooted in patience and purpose instead. Now ...

A Union of Broken Hearts A Post–Civil War Mail-Order Bride Romance by Susan Leigh Carlton. In 1870, the war may be over—but its wounds still bleed. Rebecca Caldwell is a Confederate widow in York County, South Carolina, struggling to hold on to the small farm her husband died defending. Buried far from home at Missionary Ridge, he left behind no grave—only memory, grief, and crushing Reconstruction taxes that threaten to take what little Rebecca and her young daughter have left. With survival closing in on her from every side, Rebecca makes an unthinkable choice: she answers a mail-...

A Most Inconvenient Visit by Susan Leigh Carlton A Wind River Romantic Comedy Margaret Whitlock does not believe in foolish decisions. So when her sister Ella abandons the order and predictability of Brevard, Missouri for a life in the untamed uncertainty of Wind River, Margaret does the only sensible thing—she goes west to see for herself exactly what has gone wrong. She expects hardship. Improvisation. Poor judgment. She does not expect to find Ella content… nor the town itself so determined to involve her in its affairs. Worse still, Wind River arrives at a conclusion Margaret finds ...

“The Editor's Truth” A Historical Romance / Time-Travel Thriller When investigative reporter Hannah Rowan discovers her boyfriend's betrayal on the same night she's supposed to meet a promising dating match, she never makes it to the coffee shop. A catastrophic pileup on a Wyoming interstate sends her not to a hospital—but to 1872. She wakes on open ground outside Wind River, a frontier town that doesn't appear on any map she knows. Injured, disoriented, and stripped of everything that defined her—her phone, her career, her century—Hannah finds herself at the door of the town's ...

How did an iPhone sold in Missouri in 2014 wind up in a grave in Oregon that had been undisturbed for over ninety years? Angie and Jed met in Missouri over 1,800 miles from Oregon. How can she convince him she is telling the truth? Will he believe the strange story? Would anyone believe it? Can their love for each other survive the incredible tale she relates?

Previously published as "A Union of Broken Hearts" by Susan Leigh Carlton A Union of Broken Lives A Post–Civil War Mail-Order Bride Romance by Susan Leigh Carlton. In 1870, the war may be over—but its wounds still bleed. Rebecca Caldwell is a Confederate widow in York County, South Carolina, struggling to hold on to the small farm her husband died defending. Buried far from home at Missionary Ridge, he left behind no grave—only memory, grief, and crushing Reconstruction taxes that threaten to take what little Rebecca and her young daughter have left. With survival closing in on her ...

Almost Valentine A Sweet Historical Romantic Comedy Becky Hartwell has learned that the safest way to love is quietly—from a distance, with expectations carefully lowered and feelings neatly tucked away. Thomas Reed is kind in all the ways that matter and hopeless in the one that counts: saying what he feels. For weeks, they circle one another with lingering glances, half-finished conversations, and a growing certainty that something important is hovering just out of reach. As Valentine’s Day approaches, every almost-moment carries more weight, and the space between what is felt and ...

The Thornton car was washed down a creek during a flash flood near Independence, Missouri. Their only child, a seventeen year old daughter was still clinging to the top of the car when they last saw her. After an air, land, and water search for four days without a trace, the search was abandoned. Allie and Barry Thornton learn their missing daughter was transported back in time one hundred and fifty years to 1866. A research team at the most prestigious university in the country, offered them the opportunity to join her and her family. Do they dare take the risk? Can Barry survive what ...

When science fails her, only faith—and love—can save her. Dr. Claire Donovan has built her life on reason, precision, and control. But when a freak lightning strike during a total solar eclipse hurls her from 2025 Chicago to the wilds of 1870 Montana, everything she knows about the world—and herself—comes undone. Stranded in the rough-edged mining town of Silver Run, Claire's advanced medical skills make her both a miracle and a menace. After she saves a dying man using "impossible" techniques, whispers of witchcraft spread, led by the town's relentless marshal, Will Carver, who ...

After the Flames A Novel of Survival, Healing, and the Courage to Choose Love Madeline Hart has always been the one who shows up—the listener, the helper, the woman who puts everyone else first. As a nonprofit program coordinator, she’s built a life around service, never imagining how quickly it could all be taken from her. When Madeline is abducted by a human trafficking ring and held captive in an abandoned warehouse, survival becomes her only goal. Rescue comes in fire and smoke—carried from the flames by firefighter Lucas Reed, a man whose quiet strength and steady compassion ...

A Time-Crossed Historical Romance When U.S. Navy pilot Kate is torn from the sky by an unexplained atmospheric phenomenon, she doesn’t crash—she falls through time, landing outside a remote U.S. Army cavalry fort in the 1870s. Stranded in an era that has no place for her training, her uniform, or her secrets, Kate knows one thing with absolute certainty: survival means adapting fast—and keeping the truth of who she is hidden. Captain Reed has spent his career mastering order in an unforgiving frontier, but nothing prepares him for the woman who arrives out of nowhere with impossible ...

Anna Bennett was only four years old when the Light brought Ethan into their valley—an impossible stranger who became her father and the living proof that miracles sometimes choose ordinary places. Raised in the quiet certainty of frontier life, Anna learned early that love is an act of faith, and belonging is something you choose. Years later, the Light returns for her. In an instant, Anna is torn from everything she knows and carried forward into a modern world that feels faster, brighter, and profoundly alone. She struggles to survive in a time where the rhythms of her heart no longer ...

In the aftermath of the Civil War, young widow Rebecca Allen struggles to provide for her four-year-old son Eddie in their small South Carolina town. Desperate to escape the unwanted advances of wealthy landowner Jeremiah Blackwood and create a better life for her son, Rebecca answers a matrimonial advertisement from a Montana rancher seeking a wife. Upon arriving in Baker's Creek, Montana, Rebecca discovers she's been deceived by Frank Dawson, a violent drunk whose promises of prosperity were lies. Fleeing his cabin in the night with Eddie, Rebecca finds temporary refuge at the local ...

In the tumultuous landscape of post-Civil War America, "Love on the Oregon Trail" sweeps readers into the heart of Steubenville, Ohio, where dreams of new beginnings clash with haunting memories of the past. Hiram Lewis sells his farm, hoping to carve out a better life for his family out West. Along the journey, his daughter, Mandy, faces her own battles: lost love, unexpected encounters with a reckless suitor, and the aching weight of responsibility for her baby sister, Mary. As the Lewis family forges ahead, they find themselves entangled with the Gilleys, whose own struggles of love and ...

A Letter to Santa A Novel of Faith, Miracles, and the Power of Believing When all hope seems lost, one child’s faith dares a town to believe again. Comanche Springs, Texas, 1887. After a tragic accident leaves fourteen-year-old Thomas Caldwell in a deep coma, doctors offer little comfort and even less hope. As days stretch into weeks, his family—and the entire town—begins to brace for the inevitable. Everyone, that is, except Thomas’s nine-year-old brother. While his mother keeps a weary bedside vigil and neighbors quietly prepare for loss, young Eli Caldwell refuses to give up. ...

When love isn't enough, sometimes you have to teach someone how to love you properly. Traci Waters thought she had found her happily ever after when she traveled back in time to 1875 Montana and married rancher Sam Waters. Five years later, she's discovered that building a marriage across centuries is harder than she ever imagined. Despite their deep love, Sam's constant questioning of her choices has worn Traci down. Every time he wonders if she misses her old life, every time he acts surprised by her intelligence, every time he treats her happiness like a fragile thing that might shatter,...

I Wish I May A Time-Travel Romance Novel When love defies time itself, which world would you choose? Cardiac nurse Lainie Rosewood thought she had the perfect life planned—until her fiancé abandoned her at the altar for another woman. Devastated and humiliated in front of three hundred wedding guests, she flees to the church's rose garden where a desperate wish upon a shooting star changes everything. Awakening in 1872 Montana Territory, Lainie finds herself thrust into the role of frontier healer in the remote town of Sutter's Creek. Armed with modern medical knowledge she can't explain...

When Sarah Mitchell's world crumbles, she discovers that the greatest gift isn't being rescued—it's finding the courage to open her heart again. Six months after losing her husband in a tragic accident, Sarah is barely holding on. Working double shifts at a department store while raising two young children alone, she's down to her last twenty dollars with Christmas just days away. Desperate and out of options, she swallows her pride and applies for help from the local fire department's Toys for Tots program. Enter Ben Cole—a widowed firefighter who understands loss all too well. ...

When Edward "Eddie" Grant returns to Baker's Creek after four years at Harvard University, he finds himself caught between two worlds—his Eastern education and his Western upbringing. Just as he's struggling to find his place, a mysterious stranger arrives claiming a connection to Eddie's biological father, a Confederate soldier who died before Eddie was born. Colonel Marcus Harrington's tales of secret missions and hidden Confederate gold force Eddie to question everything he thought he knew about his birth father's legacy. When Harrington's true motives emerge, Eddie must protect his ...