DiAne N. Gates - Roped
Thirteen-year-old Crissy Crosby chases a dream
to live up to her parents’ rodeo legacy. But the rodeo championship is two
months away and problems beyond her ability to solve stack and teeter like a
game of Tumbling-Towers. Meanwhile rival Jodie Lea and her father, Ed Fairgate,
contrive to swipe the silver buckles from Crissy’s grasp any way they can.
Prejudice, anger, and dark secrets simmer in a
pot of family feuds destined to boil over in a tragic nightmare at the rodeo.
Will Crissy develop courage and faith to overcome the consequences of her
temper? Will her dreams of buckles and titles become reality? Or will the
character-building adversities of her life quash her dreams forever?
My Review: If
you love cowboys, rodeos, and heroes this is the book for you. Actually it’s
about a heroine, and little Crissy Crosby is quite the girl. She’s out to win
the silver buckle, and it seems like the world is against her led by the
Fairgate family and Crissy’s long time competitor and pain in the neck, Jodie
Lea.
Try as she might it seems everything goes wrong
for Crissy and her family including the weather, but her biggest enemy is her
temper. At school, she befriends a Chinese immigrant, Chun, and Jodie is out
for him, too.
Jodie Lea and her father try everything to keep
Crissy and Chun out of the rodeo and when their attempts fail things get even
more dangerous. As they deal with temperamental horses and Brahma bulls with
minds of their own, a more menacing plot unfolds. Everyone is in danger
including Jodie Lea herself. When the rodeo is over, Crissy learns from her
grandfather her most important goal is forgiveness.
I thoroughly enjoyed this enchanting YA. I was
fighting for Crissy all the way and cheered her on while she competed. The
excitement and thrill of the rodeo develops beautifully in this story. The
well-formed and thought out characters made them believable. Well done, Ms.
Gates.
Meet the author: Texas writer,
DiAne Gates, illustrates and writes fiction for children, YA, and serious
non-fiction for the folks. Her passion is calling the Church’s attention to how
far we’ve catapulted from God’s order as evidenced by her blogMoving the
Ancient Boundaries, http://dianegates.wordpress.com
Under contract with Prism Book Group for her YA
novel Roped, DiAne reported and worked as a photographer for the
East Texas Youth Rodeo Association. She had the opportunity to be in the rodeo
arena, feel the sting of Texasturf in her face and across her camera lens,
which gave birth to this western rodeo adventure and it’s sequel Twisted.
DiAne leads two edit groups for North Texas
Christian Writers, LifeSavers for adults, and PageMasters for teens. She is a
GriefShare facilitator, an international support ministry for those who’ve lost
loved ones.
Wife, mother, and grandmother, her passion to
share those hard life lessons God has taught her will hopefully leap from
the page into your heart.
