Article and Interview by Elise Cooper
Sweet Home Cowboy is the third installment of the compilation written by Maisey Yates, Caitlin Crews, Nicole Helm, and Jackie Ashenden. What readers get out of these four talented authors, who happen to be friends, are funny and riveting characters and a story that touches on sisterhood, womanhood, family, and friends.
The story begins with all four half-sisters, Teddy, Joey, Georgie, and Elliot, reunited in Jasper Creek, Oregon after their grandfather, Jack Hathaway had a heart attack. These four women were born out of wedlock when their father went on a spree to sow his oats with four different women in the same year. After the half-sisters finally meet, when they turned thirteen at a summer camp, they bond immediately. The Hathaway sisters might have grown up apart, but agree to move to Jasper Creek, Oregon, to revitalize their grandfather’s farm and set up a store. Although each sister has her own talents and issues what they do have in common is beautiful violet eyes and a desire to meet their cowboy matches: Beau, Holis, Con, and Colt.
This anthology is charming. The way the authors present each sister is magical. Readers will want to get to know each sister, their interests, their passions, and how they form a relationship with their individual cowboys.
Elise Cooper: There is a crossover of characters between each section written by a different author. Did all of you act it out?
Maisey Yates: We cannot explain what the mindset was. Nicole is the detailed person in the group who keeps track of everything. Once we talk about the characters, we run it by each other to make sure we got it correct, the other character’s personality. But I am pretty sure we did not have to change anything.
Nicole Helm: We read chapter by chapter to see if the story moves on so we would be able to catch if something was wrong.
Caitlin Crews: We decide on the characters, and we know how each other writes so the group scenes just flow.
EC: Since this is a book about half-sisters do you all consider yourselves sisterly?
MY: There is a connection between all of us. We met through writing but in different stages. From that has come friendship and being fans of each other’s work. It is magical and mystical. I will take the compliment of being half-sisters.
EC: Why name the girls with guy names?
CC: I like the idea that these poor mothers would all name their daughters on a theme.
EC: What role did the mothers play?
CC: They are the unseen characters in the book. Each daughter had a different relationship with their moms. All the mothers are different. Georgie’s mother kind of sucked. They were good mothers in the end.
MY: What I loved about the mothers is they did not make enemies of each other. This allowed each girl to have a relationship, which started when all were thirteen. Some of them over correct at times.
EC: What about Grandpa Jack?
CC: He was a gruff and grumpy grandfather with a heart of gold. He wanted to be protective of his granddaughters. I think he also was deeply ashamed how his son had one-night stands in a short period of time with all four women. He wanted to correct some of his son’s mistakes. The granddaughters gave him a life again. They would not let him have a solitary life.
EC: What about the half-sister relationships, a celebration of families?
CC: We wanted to show female relationships with all their complexities, but to not make them negative. Often society bombards girls with stories of women who are jealous or back-bite. We wanted to show their relationship is supportive and rewarding. Together they built their own home and family.
MY: Each daughter had a positive relationship that formed a connection. They were determined to make a family where they could. The girls did not wallow in what they did not have. Since there were relationships in all the stories during Sister Sundays it was a time to have sisters before misters. It was a great way to showcase their personalities. In all three of these anthologies, it was a harkening back to simpler times. It was intentionally done to strip away all the technological noises.
NH: This story shows how they were maturing. They were deciding to make their own choices. Teddy and Joey had co-dependent relationships with their moms. Teddy’s story was first so Sister’s Sunday was driven by me. It was a set time to be together and to have a certain time with each other that was enjoyable.
EC: There was both grief and humor in the stories?
NH: Grief is a part of everyone’s life. Most have lost someone they loved. It is the epitome of something we all must go through and have connected with. Grief is a natural place to go. We wanted to put humor in to put smiles on the readers’ faces.
EC: How would you describe Teddy?
NH: Sweet, warm, tenacious, and broken hearted. A little bit timid and sensitive. Very family minded.
EC: How would you describe Beau?
NH: On the surface he is a happy-go-lucky cowboy. He wants to avoid commitments and does not like change.
EC: What about the relationship?
NH: Neither planned on a relationship. They balance each other out.
EC: Maisey, what about your heroine Joey?
MY: She is a fixer, tomboy, self-sufficient, and ridiculously determined. Her mom taught her that if she wanted to learn something she must figure it out. She is kind of pushy but also charming. She has trouble expressing her emotions.
EC: How would you describe Holis?
MY: He is one of the most together heroes I have ever written. He is emotionally mature, a steady guy.
EC: What about the relationship?
MY: He did not see something good coming into his life, but when it did was open to it. She helped him to restore his life. He is not fully broken, but a little rusty. He is like the rocks on the shore, steady, while she is like the wave. He has her calm down and is aware that risks must be taken. She is wary because a relationship is all new to her. She wants to be in control of it, but unlike him she must ride the wave. She was the only sister that had doubt.
EC: Jackie, what about Georgie?
JA: She is prickly and grumpy, but it covered up a very big heart. She has a lot of caring in her. She has been rejected a lot. Through her baking, she shows her affection and nurturing ways. She wants to belong. She really values her sisters. She does not like people much.
EC: What about Con?
JA: He has a tough backstory. He was dumped on the side of the road by his mom. He is a bit of a flirty and cocky playboy. He is also a protector and caregiver. He likes to tease, very honest.
EC: What about the relationship?
JA: Growing up he was like a big brother to Georgie until he is not. Georgie feels threatened and does not want to lose the relationship with him. She likes to bring him down a keg or two. It takes her awhile to come around that she wants a relationship with him. He is patient, and she is skittish. In the beginning it was based on mutual respect and friendship, with a different type of love.
EC: Caitlin, what about Elliot?
CC: She has a sense of who she is and very confident. Creative, she is very much on her own wavelength, a free spirit. She knows her own mind and will share it with everyone. She embodies whatever truth she believes.
EC: What about Colt?
CC: He is mentioned in the first anthology. He is the oldest brother of the West family. Ornery and very caring. He is a single dad and wants his life in a certain way. I did not kill off his ex-,yet she is a problem. He is a very good father.
EC: How about their relationship?
CC: It is more of a journey for him than Elliot. It is hot.
EC: What about Kate?
CC: Elliot has a great relationship with Colt’s twelve-year-old daughter. It was fun to have her take on this step-motherly role with Kate because of the relationships of the sisters with their mothers. It is almost reverse roles between Kate and Colt. She is the one who had the heart-to-heart with him. She never had a mother figure. In Elliot she got to find this mother figure. Elliot kept telling her not to be embarrassed about her feelings, to be her own person.
EC: Do you have the hobbies of your characters? Nicole—chickens?
NH: I love farm animals even though I have never had any. I never dressed any animals up and thought it was funny. This woman in our neighborhood used to dress this goose up she had.
EC: Maisey—fixer upper?
MY: Philosophically yes. Emotionally yes. I aspire to be the DIY girl, but I am hampered by my coordination. Although I will say I am not mechanical or handy in anyway. If I could make it, I will try it. I blended my own tea and made my own tea bags.
EC: Jackie—baking?
JA: I like baking. I do like making bread and making cookies.
EC: Caitlin—art and poetry?
CC: That is not me, but my sister who is a ceramicist of some note. My husband is a drawer and has drawn the pictures in all the anthologies. Maisey and I do knit.
EC: What about your next book(s)?
MY: It is the first book in a new series, the Four Corners Ranch series titled Unbridled Cowboy. It is a mail order bride story, a contemporary historical western. It has a town contained in a ranch. It is out the end of May this year. My women’s fiction comes out the end of June this year. It is titled The Lost and Found Girl. It is more of a mystery thread with forbidden romances.
NH: The fifth book in the North Star series Dodging Bullets in Blue Valley is out the end of April this year. It is romantic suspense. The hero has twin infant children he did not know about.
JA: I have a new series about a small town coming out April of this year, titled Find Your Way Home. It is set in New Zealand, where I live. It is about three American women who end up in this tiny town. The first book is an enemy to lover type.
CC: My last cowboy book in my Cold River series is titled Summer Nights with a Cowboy. It is about a sheriff and a traveling nurse. The next book as M. M. Crane comes out in the fall titled Reckless Fortune, the second book in my new Alaskan series. I also have a third name I share with Nicole, Hazel Beck. It comes out in the fall and is about witches in a fictional Midwestern town.
EC: THANK YOU!!
