Showing results by author "Susan Leigh Carlton" in All Categories

A Union of Broken Hearts A Post–Civil War Mail-Order Bride Romance by Susan Leigh Carlton. In 1870, the war may be over—but its wounds still bleed. Rebecca Caldwell is a Confederate widow in York County, South Carolina, struggling to hold on to the small farm her husband died defending. Buried far from home at Missionary Ridge, he left behind no grave—only memory, grief, and crushing Reconstruction taxes that threaten to take what little Rebecca and her young daughter have left. With survival closing in on her from every side, Rebecca makes an unthinkable choice: she answers a mail-...

Where Broken Things Belong: A Clean, Sweet Historical Romance Widowhood gave Margaret Rowan something she had never known before—freedom. After a marriage built on duty rather than affection, she is determined never to mistake safety for love again. In Red Rock, Wyoming, she has built a life of quiet independence, convinced that choosing nothing is better than risking heartbreak. Then Caleb Mercer returns. Years ago, Caleb offered Margaret a future she was unwilling to claim. He accepted her refusal without bitterness and built a life rooted in patience and purpose instead. Now ...

Previously published as "A Union of Broken Hearts" by Susan Leigh Carlton A Union of Broken Lives A Post–Civil War Mail-Order Bride Romance by Susan Leigh Carlton. In 1870, the war may be over—but its wounds still bleed. Rebecca Caldwell is a Confederate widow in York County, South Carolina, struggling to hold on to the small farm her husband died defending. Buried far from home at Missionary Ridge, he left behind no grave—only memory, grief, and crushing Reconstruction taxes that threaten to take what little Rebecca and her young daughter have left. With survival closing in on her ...

Almost Valentine A Sweet Historical Romantic Comedy Becky Hartwell has learned that the safest way to love is quietly—from a distance, with expectations carefully lowered and feelings neatly tucked away. Thomas Reed is kind in all the ways that matter and hopeless in the one that counts: saying what he feels. For weeks, they circle one another with lingering glances, half-finished conversations, and a growing certainty that something important is hovering just out of reach. As Valentine’s Day approaches, every almost-moment carries more weight, and the space between what is felt and ...

The Thornton car was washed down a creek during a flash flood near Independence, Missouri. Their only child, a seventeen year old daughter was still clinging to the top of the car when they last saw her. After an air, land, and water search for four days without a trace, the search was abandoned. Allie and Barry Thornton learn their missing daughter was transported back in time one hundred and fifty years to 1866. A research team at the most prestigious university in the country, offered them the opportunity to join her and her family. Do they dare take the risk? Can Barry survive what ...

When science fails her, only faith—and love—can save her. Dr. Claire Donovan has built her life on reason, precision, and control. But when a freak lightning strike during a total solar eclipse hurls her from 2025 Chicago to the wilds of 1870 Montana, everything she knows about the world—and herself—comes undone. Stranded in the rough-edged mining town of Silver Run, Claire's advanced medical skills make her both a miracle and a menace. After she saves a dying man using "impossible" techniques, whispers of witchcraft spread, led by the town's relentless marshal, Will Carver, who ...

A widow’s desperate journey west. A rancher’s guarded heart. A Christmas miracle that changes everything. When Clara Bennett arrives in Silver Creek, Montana Territory, she carries little more than hope. Widowed, nearly penniless, and seeking a fresh start, she accepts a position teaching in a one-room schoolhouse on the edge of the frontier. But she never expected Wyatt Carter—a brooding rancher hardened by a tragic Christmas Eve that left him bitter and unwilling to open his heart. Wyatt has turned his back on Christmas and love alike. With his ranch on the brink of loss and old ...

Raised in the shadow of a miracle, Anna Bennett has always known her life was shaped by a choice made long before she could understand it. The man she called Pa once stepped out of a white light and chose love, family, and a hard frontier life over the world he left behind. Anna grew up believing that belonging mattered more than answers. When the white light returns for her, it carries her forward in time—into a world louder, faster, and lonelier than anything she has known. Stranded in the future, Anna must navigate a place where faith is fragile, grief is hidden, and connection feels ...

Anna Bennett was only four years old when the Light brought Ethan into their valley—an impossible stranger who became her father and the living proof that miracles sometimes choose ordinary places. Raised in the quiet certainty of frontier life, Anna learned early that love is an act of faith, and belonging is something you choose. Years later, the Light returns for her. In an instant, Anna is torn from everything she knows and carried forward into a modern world that feels faster, brighter, and profoundly alone. She struggles to survive in a time where the rhythms of her heart no longer ...

A Letter to Santa A Novel of Faith, Miracles, and the Power of Believing When all hope seems lost, one child’s faith dares a town to believe again. Comanche Springs, Texas, 1887. After a tragic accident leaves fourteen-year-old Thomas Caldwell in a deep coma, doctors offer little comfort and even less hope. As days stretch into weeks, his family—and the entire town—begins to brace for the inevitable. Everyone, that is, except Thomas’s nine-year-old brother. While his mother keeps a weary bedside vigil and neighbors quietly prepare for loss, young Eli Caldwell refuses to give up. ...

A Time-Crossed Historical Romance When U.S. Navy pilot Kate is torn from the sky by an unexplained atmospheric phenomenon, she doesn’t crash—she falls through time, landing outside a remote U.S. Army cavalry fort in the 1870s. Stranded in an era that has no place for her training, her uniform, or her secrets, Kate knows one thing with absolute certainty: survival means adapting fast—and keeping the truth of who she is hidden. Captain Reed has spent his career mastering order in an unforgiving frontier, but nothing prepares him for the woman who arrives out of nowhere with impossible ...

A Novel of Love, Loss, and Second Chances When Kim Whitaker's car stalls on a remote Wyoming railroad crossing, she has only seconds before the freight train strikes. In a blinding flash of light, she braces for death—but wakes instead in 1875, alone on the empty prairie with nothing but the clothes on her back. Stranded 150 years in the past with no way home, Kim must navigate a world she only knew from history books. The modern conveniences she took for granted are gone. Her parents, her education, her entire future—erased in an instant. All she has left is her determination to ...

A Time-Travel Romance of Love and Second Chances in 1866 Montana Captain Ethan Walker should have died in a helicopter crash that shattered the sky and stole his crew. Instead, he wakes alone in the Bitterroot Mountains—with no wreckage, no rescue, and no explanation. When a mysterious white light fades, Ethan finds himself stranded in 1866 Montana, a world as unforgiving as it is breathtaking, where survival depends on grit, not technology. Laura Bennett has already buried one husband, killed during Red Cloud’s War, and learned the hard cost of trust. Living in isolation with her four-...

When Sarah Mitchell's world crumbles, she discovers that the greatest gift isn't being rescued—it's finding the courage to open her heart again. Six months after losing her husband in a tragic accident, Sarah is barely holding on. Working double shifts at a department store while raising two young children alone, she's down to her last twenty dollars with Christmas just days away. Desperate and out of options, she swallows her pride and applies for help from the local fire department's Toys for Tots program. Enter Ben Cole—a widowed firefighter who understands loss all too well. ...

After the Flames A Novel of Survival, Healing, and the Courage to Choose Love Madeline Hart has always been the one who shows up—the listener, the helper, the woman who puts everyone else first. As a nonprofit program coordinator, she’s built a life around service, never imagining how quickly it could all be taken from her. When Madeline is abducted by a human trafficking ring and held captive in an abandoned warehouse, survival becomes her only goal. Rescue comes in fire and smoke—carried from the flames by firefighter Lucas Reed, a man whose quiet strength and steady compassion ...

When a desperate wish sends them across time, a mother and daughter discover that sometimes the greatest magic is finding where you truly belong. Sarah Harper has reached her breaking point. Fleeing her abusive ex-husband with her five-year-old daughter Lacey and nowhere to go, she finds herself sleeping in her car in a Walmart parking lot on a cold November night. With no money, no hope, and a custody battle she's destined to lose, Sarah makes one last desperate wish at a mysterious wishing well—for a place where they can be safe, where she can be strong enough to give Lacey everything ...

When love isn't enough, sometimes you have to teach someone how to love you properly. Traci Waters thought she had found her happily ever after when she traveled back in time to 1875 Montana and married rancher Sam Waters. Five years later, she's discovered that building a marriage across centuries is harder than she ever imagined. Despite their deep love, Sam's constant questioning of her choices has worn Traci down. Every time he wonders if she misses her old life, every time he acts surprised by her intelligence, every time he treats her happiness like a fragile thing that might shatter,...

Baxter Sims built his empire with cold precision and ruthless determination. As Seattle's most formidable CEO, he has everything money can buy—except someone to share it with. Behind his icy exterior lies a man scarred by abandonment, who has locked his heart away along with memories of his painful past. Laci Carter lives in a different world, running a struggling bookstore while raising her four-year-old son, Jason. Her life is rich with love and laughter, if not financial security. When catering a high-society charity event brought her face-to-face with the infamous Baxter Sims, their ...

Thomas’s Rebellion is book three of the Eddie’s Journey Series. It is the story of Eddie’s younger brother whose thirst for education clashes with his father’s wants and needs. In 1880s Montana Territory, sixteen-year-old Thomas Grant dreams of studying geology at an eastern college, but his father William expects him to follow family tradition and take over their cattle ranch. When Thomas secretly applies for a scholarship to Dartmouth College, he sets in motion a conflict that challenges the foundations of his family. Thomas finds an unexpected ally in Eleanor "Ellie" Montgomery, ...

A Marriage of Convenience Becomes an Adventure of the Heart When Boston schoolteacher Laura Whitmore inherits a Montana ranch from her eccentric great-aunt, she discovers there's one shocking condition: she must marry within six months and live as a true wife for a year, or lose everything to a ruthless cattle baron. Desperate and out of options, she proposes a marriage of convenience to Jake Sullivan, the ranch's ruggedly handsome foreman who needs the security as much as she needs a husband. Jake Sullivan has spent three years running Whispering Pines Ranch while sending every penny to ...