A Bride for Keeps Paperback - 2013

From the rear cover

"Melissa Jagears is a stand-out talent! Her fresh new voice is strong, stylish, and makes A Bride for Keeps a page-turner for anyone who fancies a stirring love story."
-Rosslyn Elliot, author of Fairer Than Morning and Sweeter Than Birdsong

"A Bride for Keeps treats readers to an engaging, prairie romance...delivering a heartwarming, satisfying read."
-Maggie Brendan, CBA bestselling author of The Heart of the West and The Blue Willow Brides series

"Melissa Jagears has penned a tender tale of a mail-order bride who takes both the groom--and herself--by surprise when love comes softly...quietly... to heal their broken hearts."
-Julie Lessman, author of Love at any Cost

"A Bride for Keeps is just beautiful. It put me in mind of Janette Oke's sweet prairie romances but with a bit more edge, which I found compelling...I loved it."
-Mary Connealy, author of Fired Up


Everett Cline will never humiliate himself by seeking a mail-order bride. Not again. He's already been jilted by three mail-order brides and figures a wife just isn't in his future. However, a well-meaning neighbor hasn't given up on seeing him settled, so she goes behind his back to bring yet another woman to town for him.

Julia Lockwood has never been anything more than a pretty pawn for her father or a business acquisition for her former fiance. A mail-order marriage in faraway Kansas is a last resort, but she'll do anything to leave her life in Massachusetts and the heartbreak she's experienced there.

Although Everett doesn't see how a beautiful, cultured woman like Julia could be happy sharing his simple life, he could really use a helpmate on his homestead. Determined to prove she's more than just a pretty face, Julia agrees to a marriage in name only. Faced with the harsh realities of life on the prairie and hesitant to explore the tentative feelings growing between them, can Everett and Julia ever let each other in long enough to fall in love?

"Beautiful, descriptive writing makes for excellent storytelling in Jagears' debut... With a well-crafted plot, Jagears deftly expresses the characters' struggle to overcome feelings of self-doubt on their journey toward God and each other." --RT Book Reviews

Media reviews

Citations

• Romantic Times, 10/01/2013, Page 76