Member Reviews

I don’t think that you can ever go wrong with a Hallmark book! Jocelyn and Mack were so sweet together and I was rooting for them the whole time! If you are looking for a lighthearted, sweet romance than this is definitely for you!

Was this review helpful?

I want to thank Netgalley and the author for gifting me the ebook. Perfect Hallmark romance for people who love those kinds of stories. Highly recommend

Was this review helpful?

Feeling good is so important now! Jennie Marts does that for her readers and more with Rescuing Harmony Ranch. The characters are unique as they preserve the past, struggle through the present, and bring hope to the future. Max is my favorite two-legged character with his four-legged sidekick, Savage. Harmony Ranch is just the perfect place of friends and family that everyone would love to call HOME!

Was this review helpful?

Rescuing Harmony Ranch by Jennie Marts
Source: NetGalley and Hallmark
Rating: 3/5 stars

The Bottom Line: I normally have no trouble blazing through a Hallmark read, but I must admit to a bit of a struggle with this one. I think my greatest issue with this read is the okay-ness of practically every aspect of this read. Everyone and everything is okay, but nothing and no one (except the dog!) is either spectacular or meant to stand apart from the vast crowd in this genre. I liked Jocelyn and Mack well enough, their grannies are both quite delightful, and the setting is certainly beautiful, but I feel like I’ve read this same story many times over and that led me to determine everything is just okay. To be completely fair, there is nothing wrong with okay and I certainly can’t say I disliked this book. I enjoyed the story well enough but can’t say I would be running for book two if this were the beginning of a series. In truth, I feel most readers will like this book especially if he/she goes into the read knowing it isn’t going to be anything groundbreaking or mind-blowing, but a decent middle of the road read with a lovely HEA.

Was this review helpful?

I'm a sucker to Hallmark books and this was very good. It made me smile and root for the characters.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

Was this review helpful?

This is a super fun read. I really enjoyed this one!

Many thanks to the author, the publisher, and Netgalley for my ARC. All opinions are my own.

Was this review helpful?

I really enjoyed this book. It's about love. lose, and second chances. Jocelyn comes home to help her Grandma after a car accident. There she runs into Mack her best friend and first boyfriend. She is still strongly attracted to him, but she is not staying long. Can she resist him?

Was this review helpful?

What would you do if you bumped into the one who got away years later? Jocelyn is a New York City career girl who heads home to her small Colorado hometown to help save the family ranch. There’s just one hiccup in that plan. Her high school boyfriend is now the caretaker of the ranch. Yes, it sounds like a Hallmark movie plot and that’s why I loved it! Hopefully, this becomes a movie! I loved the surprise ending that saved the ranch! This book has great banter, and I loved the level of emotions. Not too much. Just enough.

The bonus recipe in the back has my mouth watering! Wow! 

This is the first novel I’ve read by Jennie Marts, but it won’t be the last.

Was this review helpful?

This second chance romance brought tears to my eyes near the end.

Jocelyn was a teen when her mother took her from Colorado to New York. Jocelyn had initially planned to go back but after her high school sweetheart married someone else, Jocelyn poured herself into her college and marketing career. Years later Jocelyn returns home to help her injured grandmother. Jocelyn always loved Harmony Ranch, the living history museum that it is her grandmother’s ranch, and Jocelyn is distressed to learn it is in financial trouble.

Mack is the caretaker and blacksmith at the ranch. He has a history full of abandonment and betrayal, including his perception of his parting with Jocelyn. Now he is divorced but not sure he can risk his heart to Jocelyn.

Jocelyn and Mack are pushed together by their grandmothers, and they find it necessary to work closely together as they take over the planning of the upcoming festival which is the hope of raising money to save the ranch. The pair have a history of miscommunication and initial reluctance to be open with one another. However, their never forgotten feelings soon become clear even if Jocelyn’s limited visit back to Colorado, while she works toward a promotion at work, is still an obstacle.

I enjoyed the tense start to the couple’s relationship and how it grows but still has misunderstandings. The cute, stubborn basset hound, Savage, adds a fun furry friend element. The ending may be predictable but it was fun getting there through the festival and the lovely sounding living history aspect of the ranch.

The writing flows easily and the romance is sweet and clean. It is totally enjoyable. I recommend this to fans of clean, second chance romance.

Source: NetGalley 2020.

Was this review helpful?

Rescuing Harmony Ranch. By Jennie Marts. 2021. Hallmark Publishing (ARC eBook).

Jocelyn and Mack were teenage friends and rivals who had crushes on each other, but they each have gone their own way. But after a phone call from her grandma asking for her help, Jocelyn returns to Harmony Creek, Colorado, and her grandma’s Harmony Ranch. Now she runs into Mack again, who works as a blacksmith at the ranch, which operates as a living history museum and in in financial trouble. As the two join forces to fund-raise money they get to know each other again.

I wanted to like it more, but it just didn’t have the appeal I’ve found in Marts’ Cowboys of Creedence and Creedence Horse Rescue series. This is a Hallmark published book, so through that lens, Rescuing Harmony Ranch meets the tried and true romance benchmarks, but I never felt the chemistry.

Was this review helpful?

Rescuing Harmony Ranch is a stand alone, second chance romance by Jennie Marts.

Jocelyn Stone’s mother took her away from Harmony Ranch, her grandmother, and the boy she loved when she was seventeen years old. Ten years later, she’s never been back. She works for a marketing firm in New York and has been working hard towards a promotion she has her heart set on. But when her grandmother calls and says she needs her, Jocelyn doesn’t hesitate for a second to drop everything to go home. Even if it means having to face the only man she ever loved after all these years.

“She was the first girl he’d ever fallen in love with, the first girl he’d truly given his heart to. And it still belonged to her. Even after all these years.”

Mack Talbot is both the caretaker of Harmony Ranch and the resident blacksmith. Harmony Ranch is a living history museum and ranch. It’s a real working farm with horses and cows but also a historic site where visitors see how life was in the 1900’s. Mack can’t believe that Jocelyn is back. But, it seems her grandmother has been keeping something from both he and Jocelyn. The ranch is in financial difficulty. A huge loan is due in just two weeks. If the payment isn’t made, they will lose the ranch. It’s up to Mack and Jocelyn to find a way to save their home.

“Jocelyn was here, at Harmony Ranch, back in his arms…right where she was supposed to be.”

As Mack and Jocelyn work together, it’s obvious their feelings are still strong. But they both had broken hearts when Jocelyn left ten years ago. Her life and career are in New York now. Mack’s is here on the ranch. How could they ever find a way to make this work?

“He could tell himself to keep his heart in check until the cows came home, but it was too late. He was already gone.”

This was such a sweet book. I feel like I should mention that it’s a clean romance but really, I didn’t miss the steam at all. This was full of wonderful characters, adorable dogs and plenty of smiles. These two gave everything they had to saving the ranch and at the same time, they might just have saved each other.

Was this review helpful?

Jocelyn has rushed back to Colorado after hearing that her grandmother was in a car accident. Things are worse than she thought when she finds out that the living history museum and ranch that her grandmother owns is about to be lost to the bank. Jocelyn teams up with the boy who broke her heart in high school to try to save the ranch.

This was an adorable feel-good romance. I really liked Jocelyn and Mack's relationship. I was totally rooting for them the whole time. I loved the whole town and how everyone helped each other. This was the classic Hallmark storyline, but it's a classic for a reason. This was so adorable!

Was this review helpful?

Sweet story about two kids who fall in love at the age of 10, first as BFFs and then planning to get married after high school.. Both Mack and Jocelyn were abandoned by their fathers and Mack was also abandoned by his mother, so they both have abandonment "issues". They both ended up being raised by their grandparents and being next door neighbors. But the summer before their senior year, Jocelyn's mother had a fight with her mother and took Jocelyn to NYC. They both vowed to stay in touch, but unbeknownst to them, Jocelyn's mother took their letters and destroyed them unseen, devastating them both. Hurt, especially after hearing that Mack got married, Jocelyn did not come back to Harmony Ranch for 10 years, until her grandmother needs her to help save the Ranch. Back together again, they are both first wary of the other, not knowing the truth, but are also still drawn together like magnets. Can they repair their relationship, save the ranch and start making better choices than they have in the past?

Well written story, endearing characters including some feisty seniors and really cute dogs. However, no explanation is ever given ( at least in my ARC) where Peaches was finding all these "missing" things. Are there "Borrowers" living in the house?

I read an ARC that I received from NetGalley.com. This is my unbiased and voluntary review.
1 like

Was this review helpful?

I really enjoyed this sweet and heartfelt story. The characters were charming and witty. I look forward to reading more by this author in the future.

Was this review helpful?

I love me some second chance romance. This was sweet read. I enjoyed this read. It was a 3.5 stars gor me

Was this review helpful?

Reading a Hallmark book can guarantee the following:
1. A happy-ever-after ending sealed with a kiss
2. I will feel so good after reading it
3. I will want to dump my current life, move to a small town and save a failing business thereby making me a hero and I will find my place in this world.

This time around, Rescuing Harmony Ranch had me wanting to move to the mountains of Colorado and get involved with a local festival! My husband declined. At least I had Jocelyn and Mack to show me what I am missing out on.

As I always do with any of my Hallmark publishing books, I always wonder which Hallmark actor/actress would fit the best for the parts. Even though many would work, my final 2 ended up being TREVOR DONOVAN AND JESSY SCHRAM!

I loved her in Birthday Wish, and loved him so much in Snowcoming and USS Christmas, I couldn't picture a better pair (even though sometimes the description may not 100% match for Mack). Now with their faces firmly in my mind, let's jump into my review.

What I Loved

What's not to love about this tale? This is your standard wholesome romance/finding yourself/saving the small town tropes that Hallmark does so well. Do you love Hallmark movies all year long? Then yes, you will love this one as well.

Mack Talbot is the blacksmith you'll want to fall in love with. Equal parts sensitive with his basset hound I want to snuggle and stubborn, just like my own husband, Mack is a standout Hallmark hero. When he is in the same room as Jocelyn, I could feel their chemistry burning off the pages as I turned them. I could feel the walls up between them from past hurts and the stubbornness to not address them. The emotions were alive and I felt like I was at Harmony Ranch seeing it happen with my own eyes.

In addition, Mack and Jocelyn's grandmothers, who just happened to be best friends, loved to meddle in their relationship. What was nice to read was when the characters could see through the meddling, but would humor the grandmothers with their silly requests to get Mack and Joss together. I've read other books where the main character would fall for it, and it was all too silly. Here? It just works.

What I Did Not Enjoy

Why did the book have to end? Why couldn't I stay at Harmony Ranch and see how everything continues? When will this become a Hallmark movie, because I would watch this one over and over again!

Was this review helpful?

Jocelyn and Mack shared young love in their high school years but Jocelyn moved off and they both lost touch. Jocelyn comes back to help her grandmother and finds Mack there at the family plantation. Sparks fly and they won’t let love get away from them this time. Great historical type read.
Complementary copy given for honest review and opinion from NetGalley.

Was this review helpful?

In Jennie Marts's Rescuing Harmony Ranch, this contemporary romance is so swoon-worthy and romantic. When Jocelyn Stone received a call that her aunt got hurt in an accident, she left NYC and headed to her hometown of Harmony Creek, Colorado. After a ten-year absence, she returned home to heartache and bittersweet memories when she ran into her old love, Mack Talbot, a bearded blacksmith who worked on the historic living ranch. With Jocelyn's grandmother sidelined with an ankle injury, she told them about the plight on the ranch: it needs money to be saved to pay the debt. So Jocelyn and Mack team up to figure out how to save it: she's a modern world tech savvy and he's old-fashioned and not too familiar with social media. While she worked hard for a much-earned promotion as a marketing exec, she dealt with the heartache and made new memories with Mack to come up with some fundraising ways to come up with the money. And after they came up short after the festival ends, they needed to come up with a new plan as the same time Jocelyn has to take care of business and follow her heart. In the end, she had a hard decision to make when it was more than her old family ranch that needs to be saving with a happy ending.

Was this review helpful?

I loved everything about in this engaging story. Jocelyn’s love and care for her grandmother was admirable and even self-sacrificing, Jocelyn and Mack’s “second chance romance” was very sweet. The setting of the ranch in Colorado made me want to repeat a trip to that beautiful state. The festival and concert to save the ranch added extra interest to the story, and I although I knew this book was most likely to have a happy ending, I enjoyed reading every page of the way there. it would be fun to see this one as a Hallmark movie, but it would be hard fir a movie to capture all the charm of this story. When you want a “feel good romance” to read, choose this one!

I received a copy of this book from the publisher. All opinions are my own.

Was this review helpful?

Loved this book so much! Jocelyn and Mack’s relationship is so sweet and relatable that you root for them from page one. I loved everything about the setting of this book, from the descriptions of the small town to the details of the living history museum. It felt like a place I knew in real life even though it’s fiction! The meddling grandmothers were an adorable pair, too!

Was this review helpful?