This book started well. Our hero, Reid, is a rock climber who, along with his best friend, Luke, turned his passion for this extreme sport into a successful tv show. With shades of [the movie] Cliffhanger, tragedy then struck when Luke plunged to his death in an apparent suicidal act. I really enjoyed this part, and was expecting more of this from the rest of the book. This is what I signed up for! But…

After that great opening chapter the book also took a dive into strictly rural romance territory - a rambling rural romance that soon had me bored and skimming.

Our heroine, Nat, returns to CoalCliff Stud, a farm which is run as a camp where Nat spent her youth. As teenagers she and Reid had a relationship of sorts, and this is more of the focus of the book -- the second chance at love trope. Nat also has a sad backstory too, of course, with her husband suffering from PTSD and taking it out on her before turning a gun on himself.

When I say rambling, at the 25% mark, Nat and her daughter, Tilly, were still settling in to their farm cottage and being shown around the place. There’s choosing of bedrooms and dogs to meet and horses to feed and clothes to unpack and… Skim.

I think the book might have worked better for me if there was more suspense/mystery plot. Seriously, there’s only the slightest sprinkling and unfortunately it’s not really mysterious or suspenseful. Rather, it’s all a little obvious. As I’ve said, it’s eclipsed by the horse riding and ute mustering. There's also annoying repetitive inner thoughts of Nat as to why she couldn’t possibly become involved with Reid again (which is pretty much one of the weaker conflicts I’ve read in romances, and I’ve read some weak ones!).

I’m trying to think whether or not you’d love this if you love rural romance… Maybe, although I still think that part needed something else too. Another review mentioned that the characters talked and thought a lot about their past and what happened and it would have been a better book if Leighton had just thrown in some flashback scenes actually showing what happened instead. I couldn’t agree more.

The pop culture/sci fi names for the farm animals was cute. (Although, I must point out it’s Bosley in Charlie’s Angels, not Boswell. Yes, I might have watched it once or twice or a million times when I was younger.)

Anyway, bit of a shame this book was such a disappointment. Maybe 1 1/2 to 2 out of 5?

This is the first in a romantic suspense series centred around the Coalcliff Stud, a property on the edge of Victoria’s alpine region which runs horseriding camps for kids, trail rides and some adventure activities. Matriarch Barb runs the show and specializes in taking in lost souls.

Years ago, Natalia was one of Barb’s lost souls. Coalcliff was a safe haven for her growing up, until she got mixed up with Barb’s grandson Reid, who at just 18 was four years younger than she. Unable to deal with the intensity of their relationship, Nat took off and ended up married to someone else… a marriage that ended in blood and tragedy and left her needing a safe haven once again, this time with her nine-year-old daughter Tilly in tow.

Reid’s lived his own share of disaster. A world-class climber with his own TV show, he’s lost his nerve after his best friend Luke died right in front of his eyes. He’s going home to Coalcliff to try and put the shattered pieces of his life back together… but the last person he expected to find there was Nat.

There is SO MUCH backstory for these two, and honestly… I think in trying to avoid info-dumping the backstory, Leighton has gone a bit too light on. Information is doled out in dribs and drabs, which is okay if it’s part of what leads into the suspense plot, but just confusing when it comes to the details of Nat and Reid’s prior relationship and why it failed. I was left with way too many questions. I checked twice on the series information for this, wondering if it really was a first in series, or maybe tied back in to an earlier series by the author, because there were all these hints about Previous Important Events, but we never got a full explanation of them. There were a few weird continuity things too - Barb is 63 but her grandson is 28? Something a bit hinky about the maths there.

Those things aside, the romance plot was actually really good. There was some gorgeous pining between two very damaged souls, Tilly was a delightful plot moppet, and there are lots of wholesome country activities going on with horses and dogs (though I have to give a trigger warning for animal death, so be aware). The suspense plot was intriguing and took a surprising twist at the end… though I admit I’d have liked to see the ultimate villain featured a little earlier. The reveal had me wondering yet again if this led on from another series where he appeared, because he did pop up a little bit out of the blue.

I did enjoy this, but I think it needed to be about 20% longer. Maybe it was cut down to meet a publisher’s required word count, I don’t know, but it reads that way, and what got cut was backstory that was actually essential to really understand and empathise with Nat and Reid’s situation. I loved Coalcliff Stud, and several characters were introduced who I suspect are going to get their own books later on, which would be good to see. Overall a good read. Four stars.

I relaxed into this book almost from the first page. The characters were so well developed they felt like real people to me. Their dialogue and mannerisms were natural and realistic and as a result the plot was believable.
Both Natalia and Reid, the stars of this show, have returned to Coalcliff ten years after leaving. Nat is seeking a new beginning with her daughter after the death of her abusive husband while Reid hopes to regain his strength and overcome his fear of climbing, which arose after the death of his best friend and partner Luke. Both are emotional wrecks in their own ways and when strange things start to happen the tension ramps up.
The setting near the old Victorian gold mining town of Walhalla is perfect for the story, which has a real Australian bush feel to it. There’s a sense of community that matches the setting.
I really enjoyed this book both for the plot and for the characters. I felt invested in the outcome of their story from the start and pleasantly satisfied at the end.