Having left the military, Dakota Jones is at a crossroads in his life. With his elder brother and youngest sister happily settled in Sullivan’s Crossing, he shows up hoping to clear his head before moving on to his next adventure. But, like every visitor to the Crossing, he’s immediately drawn to the down-to-earth people and the seemingly simple way of life.

Dakota is unprepared for how quickly things get complicated. As a newcomer, he is on everyone’s radar—especially the single women in town. While he enjoys the attention at first, he’s really only attracted to the one woman who isn’t interested. And spending quality time with his siblings is eye-opening. As he gets to know them, he also gets to know himself and what he truly wants.

My thoughts:
The Family Gathering is the 3rd book in the Sullivan's crossing series. It can be read as a standalone but I'd read the first two books just so you don't miss anything. I love how the series are connected and that we get to see previous characters in other books. Great book!

I am a Robyn Carr fan. When I pick up one of her books I know that I am going to find a good romance story with wonderful, realistic characters. The Family Gathering is exactly that and more. I found a book with an amazingly unique and fun family, a storyline that I lost myself in, and a series that I am looking forward to more from.

The Family Gathering is a book with a lot going on. The main story is Dakota’s return to Sullivan’s Crossing and his trying to find his new normal. He has to adjust to having family around, having friends, and living a civilian life. In addition to Dakota’s story, the reader gets to catch up with his siblings and where they are in their lives. There were a few times that I felt like I was lost in the secondary stories and there was too much going on.

While there are tough subjects touched on within this story such as divorce, stalking, adoption, and mental illness this is a romance story. If you love a good story as much as I do pick up this book and meet the wonderful people of Sullivan Crossing.

What can I say about this author that I haven't said in the past? The Family Gathering is one of my favorites by Robynn Carr. I have re-read it twice now because I can't get enough of this story.

I loved this one! I feel like I say the same thing every time I read a book in this series because it's the same setting and the same characters. The family all came together for a wedding, and I loved the reunion. I loved the romance and the characters. It's a very feel-good story.

Review featured at www.books-n-kisses.com

Dakota is back from the military and this is her story. First let me say that you need to read the first two in the series to read this one.

Robyn Carr is one of my favorites. She can spin a story like few others. From chapter one you are drawn into her world and never want to leave it.

This book is a romance but it is also a woman’s lit wrapped up into one. It touches on everything that happens in everyday life. Love, divorce, family and so much more.

Worth the read. But then Robyn Carr always is.

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

This is an excellent book and you will really be missing out if you don't read it. This book will make you laugh and cry at the same time.

Dakota has recently left the Army and has decided to visit his brother and sister in Sullivan's Crossing, Sid is the local bar Tender that is weary of trusting any man again. Dakota immediately attracts the attention of the local woman, but Dakota is only interested in one woman the one that doesn't want him. But Dakota is only traveling through, Or is he. Does Sullivan's Crossing pull him in like it does everyone else.

I highly recommend this title. Thanks you harlequin and Netgalley for allowing me to read for an honest review.

The Family Gathering is the final book of the Sullivan's Crossing trilogy. I dont feel that it stood alone well. If you are a fan of small town settings and family/character based series, the three book arc is very entertaining, I went with 4 stars because I have read the entire series and I was satisfied with this conclusion. The reason that I say it it doesnt stand alone well, is there are so many story threads to be followed to their ends that the book can get quite convoluted. Dont get me wrong, the characters are rich and layered - just plentiful! Robyn Carr is a favorite for me because of the small town worlds she creates - beautifully detailed, rich in acceptance, and peopled by quirky, engaging characters, the town itself almost becomes a character in my eyes.

The Family Gathering is book 3 in the Sullivan’s Crossing series, where I loved book 1, but had some reservations about book 2 (quirky wanderer gave me pause). I’m feeling the love again for this installment.

Dakota needs time to decompress after serving his country, so he visits his sister and brother in Sullivan’s Crossing. Besides building a relationship with his siblings and their families, Dakota starts to build a life in town (he sees it as temporary but come on now).

I very much enjoyed Carr’s customary secondary plot lines that reference past books but don’t depend on them. I also liked that she focused so much on family — because Dakota’s family totally had some issues to resolve! And of course the romance…. well, it’s obvious Sid would be a tough nut to crack. Question is, is Dakota the guy to do it…

As for my favorite part of most books: I won’t tell the hows and whys and wherefores, but after some work, Dakota and his family experience some pretty nice happily ever afters.
https://randombookmuses.com/2018/06/03/review-the-family-gathering-by-robyn-carr/

RATINGS: 4 STARS
​​(I received an ARC from the EDELWEISS)
(Review Not on Blog)
Listened to on Audio

I love Robyn Carr series and writing! I love the small-towns with realistic story lines and endearing characters. Even though each book focuses on a hero and heroine's journey, most of the characters
make appearances in other books. It gives us more of their stories. In the third instalment of Sullivan's Crossing we meet Cal and Sierra's brother, Dakota. He has come to Timberlake, Colorado to put down roots after his military career. As he figures out what he wants to do next he meet bartender, Syd and a few other women. All, but Syd, are ready to settle down with the handsome new comer even if he doesn't want to. I think Carr dealt with this quite well - the scariness felt very real.

All this novel we have Sierra and Connie grappling with parenthood...or rather if they should become parents and if they should adopt instead. All of this while still planning a wedding...and dealing with the fourth Jones sibling, Sedona. Sedona's need for perfection may be more of a disorder than her personality. When she disappears, Dakota decides it is his turn to step up. We also find out more about the Jones's family history. I really enjoyed this book, that I finished it quicker than I wanted, and I really like Therese Plummer's narration.

This is one of those romances that walks the line between women's fiction and romance. I think the primary thread is the developing relationship but there is so much more to it than just that. Dakota has been mentioned numerous times in the previous books I've read but this is the first time I've spent any amount of time with him. While he was a good soldier (though didn't always get along with superiors) he is a much more complex character. He's still carrying a lot of baggage from his chaotic childhood as well as from other tragedies. While Sid had a more stable childhood her life has had more than its fair share of tragedies culminating in a devastating betrayal. Neither has any real interest in committing to a serious relationship of any kind.

I loved the way the relationship developed. While Sid initially refused Dakota's offer of coffee or dinner and he doesn't give up it isn't in a creepy or over bearing way. He never forces his attention on her but instead puts himself out there and makes himself available for Sid to get to know. He's also very clear on what he wants and his expectations. There is a decent amount of discussion on consent but it never crosses the line into preachy and instead really made me like Dakota. Early in the book there is an incident where Dakota is a victim of a rather aggressive woman and there is a really interesting discussion on handling that.

I also enjoyed seeing the couples from previous books have roles in this one. Catching up with main and minor characters from previous books really added to the community feel that Carr has created in this series.

This is a thoroughly enjoyable entry into a thoroughly enjoyable series. There's enough heart to keep it from being silly but enough humor to keep it from being melodramatic or overwrought. You could jump right in here with no problems but the other books in this series are definitely a don't miss!

The Family Gathering is the third book in the Sullivan's Crossing series. It focuses on Dakota, bringing out his story and relationship with his siblings. As complicated as his life has been, we are given glimpses into the past of the siblings' which helps us understand their personalities. The romance that develops slowly between Dakota and Sid, seems to change both of them slowly, forcing Sid to start trusting again.

The story consists of a number of mini plots, focussing on each of the siblings and their lives at that moment. This takes away the focus from the main plot and reduces the impact of the whole story. Though the characters are developed, some of their personality traits come off as annoying, like how Dakota is initially rather cocky and arrogant and then miraculously he changes. Though the story is a decent read in the romance genre, there seems to be too much happening with no specific plot line being given more importance. Somewhere along the way, we find that Dakota is on a path of self-discovery and understanding, developing a better relationship with his siblings and making the effort to understand them and just be there for them.

I found the book to be alright, not exceptional, but a light read that helps to pass the time.

THE FAMILY GATHERING is the third book in the Sullivan’s Crossing series. I was so excited to find out Robyn Carr had a new series about to begin and Sullivan’s Crossing has been so much fun to read. Robyn is my favorite author and I devour everything she writes. I’ve never read a Robyn Carr book I didn’t love. THE FAMILY GATHERING is a heart warming addition to what is becoming a wonderful series.



THE FAMILY GATHERING takes place in Colorado and the way Robyn Carr describes the scenery had me feeling like I was sitting right there in the woods by the campground and enjoying a warm fire. I could almost taste the s’mores. The plot is multi layered and will have you not being able to put this wonderful story down until the very last page. THE FAMILY GATHERING touches on divorce, adoption, stalking, betrayal, marriage, starting over, and mental illness. The story is about returning Army Ranger Dakota Jones and his search for his place in this world, and him finding the life he didn’t think he wanted–until he found the woman who he couldn’t live without.



I truly got lost while reading THE FAMILY GATHERING and found myself in Colorado with Sid and Dakota and all the wonderful secondary characters who I know are going to become my friends as the series continues. Keep the tissues close by because as secrets are revealed, I was an emotional wreck. I’m so excited to read the next story in this series and learn more about my new friends. Robyn Carr always pulls me right in and hooks me from the very first page. She is an auto buy author for me and her characters always feel so real. They aren’t perfect and while they all have flaws they are also very lovable. I can not wait to continue this series!

Returning back to Sullivan's Crossing, this time it's Dakota Jones, brother of Cal and Sierra. Dakota is now discharged from the military where he'd escaped his crazy upbringing. He's looking for a place to settle and joins his brother and sister in Timberlake for what he thinks will be just a short time. Enter Sid, who's recovering from a devasting divorce and working as bartender at her brother's place, These two flawed characters hit it off, overcome a stalker or two and meld even more into the community, and eventually find their own love story.

This wasn't as fluid a story as the two previous ones, it did seem a bit choppy in parts, almost as if it'd been written in different places. But the end result was satisfactory.

I love reading about families and their dynamics. I definitely did not want this story to end. Robyn Carr put together a thoughtful book about the characters from her previous books. She creates such strong characters and I appreciate the evolution through out the story. I wanted more when I finished. Thank you Netgalley and Mira for the e-copy Arc of this lovely read.

Dakota and Sid have each been through a lot in their past and it was nice to see their characters grow. For some reason, I was less interested in the side story of Tom and Lola. I guess I just can't relate to them and I felt like it didn't add much to the storyline so I could have done without it. Sierra and Connie's storyline was good also but I also felt it lacked something. I'm assuming Carr is wrapping up this series so she was trying to tie up all the loose ends? Not my favorite of hers but I still enjoyed it.

I had some pretty high expectations going into this one. I had read and reviewed the second book in the series, Any Day Now and really enjoyed it. I ended up reading and reviewing her next standalone The Summer That Made Us, and unfortunately, many of the problems I had with that book were also present in this one! So this review is hard to write! While I really wanted to love it, I ended up only mildly liking it.

Once again, there are so many characters each with their own individual story line that you end up reading about the same situations over and over again as they meet and interact with one another. And again, despite each character being very well developed with an engaging story line, there are just so many of them competing for page time that I'm not really connected to any of them. I felt like I was watching a soap opera where everyone was faced with such dramatic and over the top issues that it begins to feel tedious and tiring. There is so much going on for such a surprisingly short book. Rather than raise awareness and understanding towards a few complex topics, the story feels crammed with multiple hard-hitting subjects that even by themselves are difficult to write about well. However, when every character is made to struggle, it began to feel overwhelming, and sometimes even overkill, especially if you were to chose to marathon all three books.

Putting those few concerns aside, devoted readers of Robyn Carr will eat this book up. I can appreciate this heartwarming community, but I'm just not so sure how realistic it is for me anymore. And while there isn't a lot of romance going on, it was a little steamier than what I remembered from the previous book. Somehow I ended up receiving a physical and digital ARC. In the digital copy, each chapter ended with thought-provoking quotations that were not in the print copy. I enjoyed reading them as they added some depth to the conversation presented in the chapter, so I'm interested to see whether they made the final cut in publication.

I still need to read the first book, What We Find, so I'm really interested in whether I will ultimately have the same issues. I'm going to try and get it read in the next few months and will definitely report back what I discover.

I have read, and enjoyed, books in Robyn Carr's Virgin River series so I thought I would give her Sullivan's Crossing series a try. I'm not sure if it was the fact that this was the third book in the series or what but I just did not connect with this story or the characters. While I was charmed by the small town and it's people in the Virgin River books, I found myself somewhat annoyed and disinterested in the lives of the people is Sullivan's Crossing. The same spark just wasn't there. I would still try other books by Robyn Carr but maybe I won't try to jump into a series several books in again.

THE FAMILY GATHERING by Robyn Carr is the third book in the Sullivan's Crossing series and another sure-fire hit which can easily be read as a standalone novel.

Dakota Jones is used to wandering and the army suited him fine these past seventeen years but now that he has left the army, he decides to look in on his siblings and suddenly finds himself with a need to stick around. And this small town is eager to embrace him, especially the single females in the area ...well most of them anyway. But avoiding commitment has become second nature to Dakota, especially with his upbringing, a relationship is the last thing he wants. But when a certain barwoman sparks his interest in every way, Dakota cannot help but want more. But Sidney is fighting her own demons from the past and knows only too well how much love can break your heart. Add in plenty of drama among his new friends and family, and some determined characters who won't take no for an answer, and THE FAMILY GATHERING by Robyn Carr has everything you need in a compelling family novel with plenty of action.

With fascinating and heartwarming characters and a stunning setting, THE FAMILY GATHERING by Robyn Carr is the perfect book to cosy up with one evening and a must-read for fans of contemporary romance.

Having read and enjoyed Any Day Now, the second book in Robyn Carr’s Sullivan’s Crossing series, I told myself I would go back and read the first book, What We Found. I wanted more of the characters and the setting, I wanted to dig deeper into the world. Sadly, I have yet to read What We Found, but when I was given the chance to dive into the third book, The Family Gathering, I was happy to return to the world.

Personally, I would recommend reading at least the prior book before diving into this one. The romance story in this one is certainly a standalone element, having a solid starting and ending point, but there are many other elements intertwined throughout and these relate back to the prior books. In many ways, this is more family saga than romance – although the romance is enjoyable – and due to that a bit of understanding is needed to really appreciate all that occurs throughout this one.

I will be honest and say I was a little bit unsure as to how I would feel about this one at first. Despite loving Any Day Now, I wasn’t crazy about my other Robyn Carr read, The Summer That Made Us. When it took me a while to get into The Family Gathering, I feared we were going to have a repeat performance – a story I could appreciate, but not one I would love. Fortunately, in the end, I was won over by this one.

It takes a few chapters, but once you fall into the story it becomes difficult to put down. You fall in love with the characters, and the deeper you get into the story the more threads that come to light. There were some elements that felt a bit predictable, but as a whole I really enjoyed the way all the elements played out with this one.

As with my prior Robyn Carr reads, I found the main thing that won me over was how realistic the characters were. Many books go for completely outlandish characters and events to keep readers entertained, yet Robyn Carr reflects real life wonderfully. The events are easy to envision and the characters are believable, ensuring you’re sucked deeper into the story and unwilling to take a step back as you’re desperate to see how everything ends.

Dealing with many issues throughout, The Family Gathering quickly won me over and has left me even more in love with the Sullivan’s Crossing crew.

This year I have tried to read a little more fluffy contempo romances. I’ve sometimes felt that I get pigeon holed into reviewing just historical fiction—don’t get me wrong, historical fiction is my jam but sometimes I need a break and could go for something a little more modern and different just to keep things interesting.

Romances never seem to get old for me and I think a lot of women would agree. It doesn’t matter how cliche or repetitive the romance might seem–theres just something about love and having everything turn out in the end that just makes me happy and gives me hope that romance is still alive n the digital age!

Enter books like The Family Gathering. Sure I feel like I’ve read similar stories before but I enjoy love in all it’s shapes and forms and I never get tired of seeing how individual romances unfold.

Having left the military, Dakota Jones is at a crossroads in his life. With his elder brother and youngest sister happily settled in Sullivan’s Crossing, he shows up hoping to clear his head before moving on to his next adventure. But, like every visitor to the Crossing, he’s immediately drawn to the down-to-earth people and the seemingly simple way of life.

Dakota is unprepared for how quickly things get complicated. As a newcomer, he is on everyone’s radar—especially the single women in town. While he enjoys the attention at first, he’s really only attracted to the one woman who isn’t interested. And spending quality time with his siblings is eye-opening. As he gets to know them, he also gets to know himself and what he truly wants.

When all the Jones siblings gather for a family wedding, the four adults are drawn together for the first time in a way they never were as children. As they struggle to accept each other, warts and all, the true nature and strength of their bond is tested. But all of them come to realize that your family are the people who see you for who you really are and love you anyway. And for Dakota, that truth allows him to find the home and family he’s always wanted (summary from Goodreads).

When I read this review pitch, I was intrigued by the ‘taming of the shrew’ troupe. Don’t we always want what we can’t have? Dakota sounded kind of like this cocky military guy who loves the female attention he’s getting in a small town but yet he can’t get the woman he really wants….doesn’t this sound like every woman’s fantasy? Well it sounded like mine so I was totally in.

I didn’t really notice that this book was part of a series, lately I’ve started reading a few series midway an had good luck with not feeling lost so I figured that would be the case with this one. I don’t know that I would recommend starting mid series with this one. There were clearly other plots and references to previous books and characters that I felt a little lost. This is a new author to me and according to some of the other reviews I had read, it sounds like it’s pretty typical for this author to carry on multiple story lines throughout multiple books and I would say that I recognized that right away with this one.

But I don’t think that took anything away from the story itself because I still liked it but I think that as a new reader, some of the finer nuances of the plot and the characters were lost on me.

I was surprised that this book was actually more about family than about romance. Yes romance is part of the book but really the emphasis is on family and the relationships between the siblings and their parents. the story itself was emotional but again having come in to this series late in the game, some of the emotional impact was less than what other readers might have felt.

I loved how Carr really drove home the small town feel of this book. Having grown up in a small town myself and then as an adult–traveled, gone to college, and lived other places and then moved back to said small town–I think she does a fantastic job at highlighting the difficulties about ‘coming home again’ and living in a small town and that impact on the characters.

It’s hard for me to rate this book because on one hand I enjoyed it and wanted to give it a 4 star review, but I also felt like I was missing so much of the plot which left me wanting to give it a 3 star review. I decided to split the difference and go with 3.5 stars. I think people who have read the other books in the series might rate it a 4 or 5 star review but without having the total understanding of the characters etc I didn’t feel as emotionally impacted or connected to the town and characters as I had hoped.

Challenge/Book Summary:

Book: The Family Gathering (Sullivan’s Crossing #3) by Robin Carr

Kindle Edition, 352 pages
Published April 17th 2018 by MIRA
ASIN B076ZPMD44
Review copy provided by: Publisher/Author in exchange for an honest review.
This book counts toward: NA

Hosted by: NA
Books for Challenge Completed: NA
Recommendation: 3.5 out of 5

Genre: contempo lit, contempo romance, romance

Memorable lines/quotes: