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Finishing my contemporary binge of the weekend was the final book in Max Monroe's Single Dad Collection, Grumpy Cowboy. When I had posted my story update on instagram for Single Dad Seeks Juliet, Shelby (the runner of Summer of Swoon) let me know that she loved this book in the series more than Hot Stuff. While I enjoyed it, it didn't quite live up to book one. I was nervous but excited for Grumpy Cowboy. Update: I applied this to the prompt of book Shelby read for the 3rd board of Summer of Swoon.
We shift from Southern California to Utah and a cattle ranch. Our single dad is Rhett, a former rodeo bronco rider and working to take over the family ranch. He has an adorable 5-year daughter Joey. He is with his cousin one night and stupidly decides to ride a bronco bareback. This leads to a pretty back injury on his leg and our grumpy cowboy gets grumpier. After fighting his doctors orders, his father collects on a favor and one of the orthopaedic doctors for the local basketball team is sent to help him rehab. There's some misdirection from her boss and they quickly butt heads.
This was such a sweet change of pace from the the first two books in the series. Rhett is the bull-headed cowboy trying to do everything himself, even at a detriment. I loved that Leah wasn't the stereotypical city girl. Does she like pretty dresses and heels, yes. Does she not want to get covered in cow and horse poop, yeah. Is she more than willing to put in the hard work to get the job done. 100%.I feel like a lot of the time city girls that show up on a ranch/farm are too overdone and take too long to adapt to their situation. This is not the case here. The only thing that Leah complained about out loud, was how grumpy Rhett was with her. And she told him to his face. Did she cringe on the inside when her shoes were covered in poop and fight the urge to visibly wipe it off on the, yeah. Who wouldn't?
Joey was really well done again, but she was a lot younger and didn't play quite as much of a role here. She was so cute though and reminded me a lot of the little girl I see at work everyday when she's not in school. Another thing I want to mention is how vivid their writing is. I didn't really mention it in my previous reviews, but their writing is so descriptive and I can really see and picture the landscape and events in my head. Maybe it was more vivid for me here since I've grown up farm/ranch adjacent for most of my life, but it was so well written.
This didn't quite hit me as much as Single Dad Seeks Juliet, but did have some funny moments. I feel like it was more situational than banter in this one, but I did still chuckle a few times. I also thought the 3rd act conflict was a little predictable. It also took a while longer than I expected for them to get physically intimate, even just kissing. I'm okay with the timing of the full steam, but I would've like a little bit of kissing earlier. Or even little touches or other ways to amp the the tension.
I don't know if they play to write any more in the series, but this is the last book as of now. I am super happy I finally got to read some of Max Monroe's books and hope that I enjoy their other books just as much. I can't wait to dig into their backlist and will definitely be adding them to my contemporary author list. Always excited to add a new author to my small contemporary list!
Bookishly Yours,
Stasi🍎
STATISTICS: Grumpy Cowboy, Max Monroe, 4-stars, 1 day, eBook, 346 pages, published in 2021
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