Beyond the Desert Sands (Love on the Santa Fe)

Isabella Garcia has no wish to leave her aunt’s home in California for her parents’ home in the new state of New Mexico. Aaron Bailey has no wish to serve as her chaperone. For Isabella, the visit reminds her of when she was uprooted from California as a young child; for Aaron, Isabella is a spoiled brat with no notion of loyalty to her parents or an understanding of God’s love. In a pairing like this, you can already see the sparks flying.

Being a Christian romance, they are very chaste sparks. All the same, this is a book with real edge and grit, and not all of it is the New Mexican dust.

I loved the setting of early 1900s New Mexico and the half-Mexican protagonist. It’s clear Peterson has a deep love for the American west, and as someone who grew up in Colorado, I was very happy to see that. The one thing I didn’t like about this book was the disparity in characterization. All the growth seemed to be necessary on Isabella’s part, while Aaron was good to the point of being almost sanctimonious. It felt unbalanced, and Aaron felt far less interesting than he could have.