Men are optional. That's the credo Emma Chandler's suffragette aunts preached and why she started a successful women's colony in Harper's Station, Texas. But when an unknown assailant tries repeatedly to drive them out, Emma admits they might need a man after all. A man who can fight - and she knows just the one.

RITA Award finalist Karen Witemeyer pens heartwarming historical romances that lift the spirit and the soul. Short-Straw Bride finds Meredith Hayes struggling to let go of her childhood crush on Travis Archer - the strapping young lad who saved her as a little girl. With a sensible proposal from the eligible Roy Mitchell on the table, it’s time for her to move on. But when Meredith overhears a plot to drive Travis and his brothers off their coveted land, she has no choice but to intervene.

Many consider Evangeline Hamilton cursed. Orphaned at a young age and possessing a pair of mismatched eyes - one bright blue, the other dark brown - Eva's world constantly rejects her. But Eva has two people she can rely on - Seth and Zach, two former orphans she now counts as brothers. Seeking justice against the man who destroyed his family, Logan Fowler arrives in 1880s Pecan Gap, Texas, to confront Zach Hamilton, the hardened criminal responsible for his father's death. Only instead of finding a solitary ruthless gambler, he discovers a man not much older than himself with an unusual family.

Beauty has been nothing but a curse to Penelope Snow. When she becomes a personal maid for a famous actress whose troupe is leaving Chicago to tour the West, she hides her figure beneath shapeless dresses and keeps her head down. But she still manages to attract the wrong attention, leaving her prospects in tatters—and her jealous mistress plotting her demise.

Following the stunning success of her high-spirited debut, Karen Witemeyer delivers this compelling blend of humor and romance. When Adelaid Proctor finds herself stranded in 1883 Texas, she’s hired by a British-born sheep rancher as governess for a daughter still grief-stricken over her mom’s death. As Adelaid gently draws the girl out of her shell of silence, the governess and sheep rancher, at first, resist their mutual attraction.

Greta Nilsson's trip west to save her ailing little sister, Astrid, could not have gone more wrong. First, bandits hold up her stagecoach, stealing all her money. Then, upon arriving in Fairplay, Colorado, she learns the man she was betrothed to as a mail-order bride has died. Homeless, penniless, and jobless, Greta and her sister are worse off than when they started.

This collection includes three charming and festive holiday novellas spiced with humor, frontier action, and sweet romance.

A rising star in Christian fiction, Karen Witemeyer brilliantly blends humor and romance in this compelling debut novel. Texas liveryman Jericho “J.T.” Tucker wants nothing to do with the town’s new dressmaker, Hannah Richardson. He’s all too familiar with her kind - shallow, more devoted to fashion than true beauty. Except for her well-tailored clothing, however, she’s not at all what he expected.

Stone Hammond is the best tracker in Texas. He never comes home empty handed. So when a wealthy railroad investor hires him to find his abducted granddaughter, Stone eagerly accepts. Charlotte Atherton, former headmistress of Sullivan's Academy for Exceptional Youths, will do anything to keep her charges safe, especially the little girl entrusted to her care after her mother's death.

When Nicole Renard returns home to Galveston from an eastern finishing school, she's stunned to find her father in ill health. Though she loves him, he's only ever focused on what she's not. Not male. Not married. Not able to run their family business, Renard Shipping. Vowing to secure a suitable marriage partner, Nicole sets out with the Renard family's greatest treasure: a dagger personally gifted to Nicole's father by the pirate Jean Lafitte.

Josephine Nordegren is one of three sisters who grew up nearly wild in southwestern Colorado. She has the archery skills of Robin Hood and the curiosity of the Little Mermaid, fascinated by but locked away from the forbidden outside world - a world she's been raised to believe killed her parents. When David Warden, a rancher, brings in a herd much too close to the girls' secret home, her older sister especially is frightened, but Jo is too interested to stay away.

Left with little back in Missouri, Kevin Hunt takes his younger siblings on a journey to Wyoming when he receives news that he's inheriting part of a ranch. The catch is that the ranch is also being given to a half brother he never knew existed. Turns out, Kevin's supposedly dead father led a secret and scandalous life. But danger seems to track Kevin along the way, and he wonders if his half brother, Wyatt, is behind the attacks. Finally arriving at the ranch, everyone is at each other's throats, and the only one willing to stand in between is Winona Hawkins, a nearby schoolmarm.

New York Times best-selling author Francine Rivers returns to the California frontier in this sweeping, romantic tale of a displaced New England suffragette, a former Union soldier disinherited by his Southern family, and the town they join forces to save.

Swept away when her wagon train attempts a difficult river crossing, Ruthy MacNeil isn't all that upset at being separated from the family who raised her. All they've ever done is work her to the bone. She prayed for a chance to get away, and then came the raging flood. Alive but disoriented, she's rescued by Luke Stone...so unfortunately, there are more chances to die in her immediate future. Luke is heading home to reclaim the ranch stolen from his family.

Lucy Marsh's worldly resources are running out, but she's fiercely determined to care for her younger brother and sister. When she discovers that their father's recent death was no accident, Lucy is eager to leave town. She accepts a proxy marriage she believes will provide safe refuge. But trouble follows her to Texas where her new husband is surprised to suddenly have a wife and children to care for.

Men are optional. That's the credo Emma Chandler's suffragette aunts preached and why she started a successful women's colony in Harper's Station, Texas. But when an unknown assailant tries repeatedly to drive them out, Emma admits they might need a man after all. A man who can fight - and she knows just the one.

A rising star in Christian fiction, Karen Witemeyer brilliantly blends humor and romance in this compelling debut novel. Texas liveryman Jericho “J.T.” Tucker wants nothing to do with the town’s new dressmaker, Hannah Richardson. He’s all too familiar with her kind - shallow, more devoted to fashion than true beauty. Except for her well-tailored clothing, however, she’s not at all what he expected.

Many consider Evangeline Hamilton cursed. Orphaned at a young age and possessing a pair of mismatched eyes - one bright blue, the other dark brown - Eva's world constantly rejects her. But Eva has two people she can rely on - Seth and Zach, two former orphans she now counts as brothers. Seeking justice against the man who destroyed his family, Logan Fowler arrives in 1880s Pecan Gap, Texas, to confront Zach Hamilton, the hardened criminal responsible for his father's death. Only instead of finding a solitary ruthless gambler, he discovers a man not much older than himself with an unusual family.

RITA Award finalist Karen Witemeyer pens heartwarming historical romances that lift the spirit and the soul. Short-Straw Bride finds Meredith Hayes struggling to let go of her childhood crush on Travis Archer - the strapping young lad who saved her as a little girl. With a sensible proposal from the eligible Roy Mitchell on the table, it’s time for her to move on. But when Meredith overhears a plot to drive Travis and his brothers off their coveted land, she has no choice but to intervene.

Josephine Nordegren is one of three sisters who grew up nearly wild in southwestern Colorado. She has the archery skills of Robin Hood and the curiosity of the Little Mermaid, fascinated by but locked away from the forbidden outside world - a world she's been raised to believe killed her parents. When David Warden, a rancher, brings in a herd much too close to the girls' secret home, her older sister especially is frightened, but Jo is too interested to stay away.

Stone Hammond is the best tracker in Texas. He never comes home empty handed. So when a wealthy railroad investor hires him to find his abducted granddaughter, Stone eagerly accepts. Charlotte Atherton, former headmistress of Sullivan's Academy for Exceptional Youths, will do anything to keep her charges safe, especially the little girl entrusted to her care after her mother's death.

Kylie Wilde fought in the Civil War dressed as a boy and now she's homesteading as a man. But she makes one lousy man! When land agent Aaron Masterson comes to inspect her claim, he immediately realizes she's a woman. She begs him not to tell, but can he in good conscience defraud the U.S. government, even if she really did serve in the war? Aaron is interested in the little spitfire from the moment her long hair falls from her cap, but when he tells her of his plan to stake his own claim, farther west and up in the mountains, she draws away.

Reluctant love and shared faith blossom during the daily chores and arguments of tobacco farmer Drew O'Connor and Lady Constance Morrow. Constance is everything Drew despises in a wife - she cannot cook and she prefers mathematical equations to cleaning. Worst of all, she has red hair! But when the two are forced into a marriage of convenience, Drew soon realizes how blessed he truly is.

With their sharp engineering minds, Laura Stiles and her two sisters have been able to deal with their mother’s unfortunate choice in husband until they discovered his plans to marry each of them off to his lecherous friends. Now they must run away—far and fast—to find better matches to legally claim their portion of their father's lumber dynasty and seize control from their stepfather. During their escape, Laura befriends a mission group heading to serve the poor in California. She quickly volunteers herself and her sisters to join their efforts.

Greta Nilsson's trip west to save her ailing little sister, Astrid, could not have gone more wrong. First, bandits hold up her stagecoach, stealing all her money. Then, upon arriving in Fairplay, Colorado, she learns the man she was betrothed to as a mail-order bride has died. Homeless, penniless, and jobless, Greta and her sister are worse off than when they started.

Ingrid Chastain readily agreed to accompany her father to deliver vaccines to a mining town in the Montana Territory. She never could have anticipated a terrible accident would leave her alone and badly injured in the wilderness. When rescue comes in the form of a mysterious mountain man who tends her injuries, she's hesitant to put her trust in this quiet man who seems to have his own wounds.

Swept away when her wagon train attempts a difficult river crossing, Ruthy MacNeil isn't all that upset at being separated from the family who raised her. All they've ever done is work her to the bone. She prayed for a chance to get away, and then came the raging flood. Alive but disoriented, she's rescued by Luke Stone...so unfortunately, there are more chances to die in her immediate future. Luke is heading home to reclaim the ranch stolen from his family.

Once known among New York's elite as the American Adonis, Everett Griffin now lives as a recluse in the wilds of Texas. The treachery of a former admirer left his face and his spirit riddled with scars, so he hides himself away, his only companions a trio of trusted servants and an oversized dog. Locals whisper of the beastly man who lives in the gloomy manor outside of town and his tendency to attack anyone who dares approach. Everett relishes his fearsome reputation and uses it as a shield to guard his privacy.

RITA Award nominee Karen Witemeyer is acclaimed for her winning blend of history, humor, and romance. In this heartstirring tale, repentant exconvict Levi Grant comes to Spencer, Texas, in 1887 - hoping to put his past behind him and start out fresh as the town’s new blacksmith. To promote civility, Eden Spencer runs her own lending library, where she discovers Levi’s love of literature. But just as romance begins to bloom, Eden learns of Levi’s prodigal past.

Bailey Wilde is one of the best new ranchers in the West. She's been living disguised as a man for a while, but when Gage Coulter comes to drive her off her homestead, he quickly realizes he's dealing with a woman - a very tough, very intriguing woman at that. Gage is an honest man, but he didn't make his fortune being weak. He won't break the law, but he'll push as hard as he can within it.