This book was absolutely brilliant.  I just loved every minute of it. This book is so well written and tells the absolute truth of the struggles of running a ranch with all its difficulties.  It covers the strains put on family and co workers and the relationships between these. The struggles with the weather in Arazona,  the cost of keeping and supplementing the animals. And most of all the lack of profit margins due to the distances to the processing plants in rural areas. Also the lack of government support to correct these issues. I loved seeing how the ranch was ever trying to diversify to create enough income to keep it going. However with rural ranching there is always a small community who are willing help and support each other, with a few exceptions to the rule along the ways. These relationships with various new friends made this book for me. It was just so wonderful reading about things that people can achieve when they have friends to help one another.
So much praise to the author and publishing team for bringing us this very true life book for others to read and enjoy and also for some to learn from. 

The above review is already live on goodreads, Google books, Barnes&noble and amazon UK under ladyreading365 also live on my blog https://ladyreading365.wixsite.com/website/post/barbed-by-julie-morrison-soulstice-publishing-4-5-stars

Julie and Brett were seeking a tree change and swapped their city life for one on her parents property.
The author writes with honesty and insight into her marriage, the good and bad of farming including dealing with cowboys, broken equipment and horses. This is an entertaining and enlightening read to be enjoyed by a wide range of readers.
Like the author I too can relate to the feel of power and grace in the fluid motion that being on a horse gives the rider. The horse side of this book gave it a head start in my eyes and I enjoyed every part of it.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a free digital copy of the advance review copy in return for an honest review.

“Barbed” is the story of a woman entering into a “ranch” business in Arizona with her family. The description of the book intrigued me as I am a ranch owner myself. Morrison’s family has owned land and passed it down through generations, she and her husband decided to help her aging parents operate it. When the couple moved out to the ranch from the West Coast with a Range Rover -I knew it wouldn’t be good. The “Cowboys” who run the day to day cattle operations didn’t warm up to Morrison or her husband. I could relate to the author having to earn and build trust from the workers. I didn’t think she tried very hard to establish common ground with the “Cowboys” though. The author certainly got more than she bargained for and her once keen husband eventually gets a “real job” in the city. I would recommend this book to anyone who has longed to leave the shackles of city life and run cows instead. The author isn’t afraid to tell the hard parts of how running the ranch strained her marriage,finances and bones.

This was a sad book. It just seemed to keep having bad things happen only to end with the onset of COVID. I never really felt like I knew the author. I never got a sense of who she was or what she wanted. The characters encountered were described well but was really only I interested in the horses and ranch life.

Barbed, A Memoir, Julie Morrison

Review from Jeannie Zelos book reviews

Genre: Biographies & memoirs, Non fiction

I really, really wanted to love this because...well...horses! That's enough isn't it? However, it was not to be ;-(
'
The description really had me dying to get reading, I've a lifelong love of horses, and some of my happiest memories are when I was out riding, just me and my horse.
Sadly though I got to 25% and it just wasn't working for me. I didn't gel with Julies issues, just couldn't connect with the story. I know by now that if I feel this way about a book by quarter in, its not going to get better for me, so I DNF it.

Its a shame when a book doesn't work but not all books suit all readers, stories and who they appeal to are very subjective. Others will love this I'm sure, just not me.

Stars: Two, one that wasn't for me.

ARC supplied by Netgalley and publishers