Kit McBride Gets a Wife

June 20, 2022
With this squeaky-clean western, Barry (End of the Night Girl, written as Amy T. Matthews) takes readers to 1886 Buck’s Creek, Mont., where Junebug McBride is fed up with her four older brothers expecting her to do all the “women’s work” at their trading post. Her solution? Find a wife for at least one of them by secretly placing a newspaper ad for a mail order bride. Meanwhile, blowsy St. Louis widow Willabelle Lascalles hires Irish maid Maddy Mooney, who decided to try her luck in America after being seduced and discarded by the lord of the manor where she worked—but Willabelle can’t pay her. When Willabelle sees Junebug’s ad, she thinks it could be just the thing to solve her money issues. Once in Buck’s Creek, however, the flighty Willabelle changes her mind, abandoning Maddy to fend for herself. A series of misunderstandings has Kit mistaking Maddy for Willabelle, and he falls in love with her under this misapprehension. When the truth comes out, their romance may be doomed. Feisty Maddy and strong, silent Kit are easy to root for, and brash Junebug steels every scene she’s in. Barry’s snappy prose and standout scene setting make Buck’s Creek a destination readers will want to return to. Agent: Sarah Younger, Nancy Yost Literary.

Starred review from July 1, 2022

It is 1886 in the wilderness of Bucks' Creek, Montana, and 14-year-old Junebug has had enough of cooking, cleaning, and caring for four messy older brothers. She arrives at the perfect solution: a want ad for a wife for her most agreeable brother, Kit. No one is more surprised than Junebug when the ad actually produces a lady and her maid, fresh off a rickety wagon from St. Louis, looking for Kit McBride, her betrothed. Shocked by the arrival of a beautiful woman, Kit never wanted a wife--or a meddling little sister with a big vocabulary and no cooking skills--but fate and one determined little sister have proven to outfox him. Junebug is both loquacious and endearing, and the McBride clan is full of unmarried strapping mountain men just begging to be snared. VERDICT This first installment in a planned series from Barry (Bound for Glory, writing as Tess LeSue) will leave fans ready for a return trip to Buck's Creek.--Judy Garner

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