Spotlight & Giveaway: Relentless in Texas by Kari Lynn Dell

Posted June 10th, 2020 by in Blog, Contemporary Romance / 25 comments

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Kari Lynn Dell to HJ!
Spotlight&Giveaway

Hi Kari Lynn and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Relentless in Texas!

 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

Ah, the dreaded question. “Tell us about your book.” Have you got an hour or two?

The problem with writing a pair of complicated characters who’ve really lived their lives and experienced some serious stuff is that their story isn’t one story, it’s layers of intertwined stories that are nearly impossible to reduce to a few pithy sentences…but I will attempt to keep it under five pages.
At first glance, Relentless in Texas is a classic comeback story, complete with heart pounding rodeo action, intense rivalries, and incredibly high stakes. The scarred, sexy as sin cowboy who threw away his first chance at rodeo glory, and the woman who’s been burned by his kind—left for greener, blonder pastures when the dream comes true.

But scratch the surface and you’ll find a man who has poured his competitive energy into building the Sanchez trucking empire. A workaholic who is grappling with becoming the recently custodial single parent to a teenager trying to find his place in a new town, a new school, and the world in general. Navajo by appearance with a Hispanic last name, a white upbringing and little connection to his Native roots, Gil has been there his whole life, but that doesn’t mean he has any idea how to help.

When Gil is suddenly handed a near miraculous second chance at rodeo glory, he has to ask–not only can he compete after all these years, but should he?

Can the ultimate control freak turn over the reins to Sanchez Trucking to hit the rodeo trail? He has a son depending on him now, and one wreck could send him crashing back into the hell of chronic pain and opiate dependence. And will the triumphant highs and bitter lows of rodeo—his first and most powerful addiction—undermine more than a dozen years of hard-fought sobriety?

Turning his back on the dream would be the safe, smart thing to do. Unfortunately, Gil has never been worth a damn at playing it safe. If so, he never would have let Carmelita White Fox lure him out of that bar in Montana last fall, mesmerized from the instant he saw her body move in sensuous rhythm with the rope she was twirling. She wouldn’t still be firmly embedded in his dreams months later.
And when she suddenly appeared in Earnest, Texas he definitely would not have offered her a job practically on the spot.

Women don’t get more complicated than Carma. She is a trick roper and former trick and stunt rider, a movie double, and between gigs, the world’s greatest office temp. After most of a lifetime of falling in and out of the same dysfunctional relationship, she is determined to break the pattern and discover not only who she is, but what?

She’s been called a prophet…and a kook. The next in a centuries old Blackfeet line of born healers, and a Pretendian with too much white blood to hold to the strict traditions of her calling. Is she a super empath, as modern psychology would have her believe? Or can she actually feel others’ emotions and use her strange gift to relieve their pain? Does she have visions, or hallucinations?

And if the gift is real, what is she supposed to do with it when there appears to be no place for her either among traditional healers or the modern medical world?

Like Gil, she is in no condition to stumble into a relationship. Fate doesn’t care about timing, though, and Gil only knows that she can see straight through the walls he’s built to keep everyone else at a safe distance—and instead of making him want to run, he finds himself wanting to lean into the warmth of being truly known. But can this sarcastic, battle-worn cynic convince himself that he deserves real love?
And can Carma put her chronically abused heart on the line one more time and trust that this cowboy won’t ride away?
 

Please share your Favorite quote from the book:

Her gaze tracked across the sky before coming back to meet his. “We’ll see what the stars have in mind.”
“I don’t believe in Fate.”
Her laugh was a low, husky rasp that played across every hypersensitive nerve in his body. “Well, then, you should’ve steered clear of a woman named Carma.”

 

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

  • Carmelita’s father is based on a lifetime family friend who was one of the premier movie wranglers in the business—aka, the guy who brings the horses. And yes, you have seen him and his herd because he worked as an extra in movies like Last of the Mohicans, Dances With Wolves, and too many others to name. They tell me he taught Kevin Costner to ride, and there’s a great interview with Chris Hemsworth about how Dutch out-dickered him for the horse he rode in the movie 12 Strong. For the record, Reinman was worth every penny of the asking price.
  • I borrowed the name Carmelita from my mother’s cousin because from the time I was a little girl I thought it was so beautiful. At some point I should probably mention that to her.
  • So much of what I needed to learn in order to get this book as right as possible I learned from #NativeTwitter. It isn’t always pretty and it can be very uncomfortable, but it will give you a whole new perspective on the Native populations of this country and Canada. Plus Natives have a very underappreciated sense of humor.

 

What do you want people to take away from reading this book?

Oh, so many things. But if I must choose one, it would be that there is no such thing as a typical Native American, any more than there is a typical Asian or a typical Latino. We are hundreds of far flung tribes, and clans within tribes, that have distinctive religions, beliefs, and histories. And like any other culture, we also have a diaspora—both a geographical scattering and the intermingling of blood with other ethnicities that leaves us struggling to define what really makes a person Native. Is it genetic? Immersion in the culture? A percentage of Native blood randomly assigned by the U.S. government (aka, blood quantum) to make us easier to fit into their categories?

It’s an issue both Gil and Carma wrestle with, and one I think will strike a chord with many readers. In every culture—from all of Judaism to the LGBTQ community to your local book club–there are those who feel they have the right to sit in judgment of who is or is not, as a Blackfeet friend says, Nativing right. I hope readers leave this book with a strong sense that true happiness and self esteem come from learning to define yourself and your place in the world, rather than letting others do it for you.

 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

 

Giveaway: A paperback copy of Relentless in Texas by Kari Lynn Dell

 

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: As I said, every culture of every kind has its Authenticity Police. I would love to hear from the readers here about their experiences, large and small, and how they’ve been impacted.

 
a Rafflecopter giveaway

 
 

Book Info:

There’s a reason they call this cowboy relentless

Gil Sanchez was once rodeo’s biggest and baddest hotshot. Now he’s thirteen years sober and finally free of the pain that ended his skyrocketing career. Given one last, near-miraculous shot to claw his way back to rodeo glory, he can’t let fantasies of happily-ever-after dull his razor edge…but Carmelita White Fox is every dream he’s never let himself have.

And from the moment he saw the spark of challenge in her eyes, he hasn’t been able to look away.

Carma may come from a Blackfeet family noted for its healing abilities, but even she knows better than to try to fix this scarred, cynical, and incredibly sexy cowboy. Yet she’s the only one who can reach past Gil’s jaded armor, and the fiercely loyal heart buried beneath the biting cynicism is impossible to resist. Gil needs Carma just as much as she needs him, but as the pressure builds and the spotlight intensifies, they’ll have to fight like hell to save the one thing neither can live without.

Book Links: Amazon | B&N | iTunes | Kobo | Google |
 
 

Meet the Author:

KARI LYNN DELL brings a lifetime of personal experience to writing western romance. She is a third generation rancher and rodeo competitor existing in a perpetual state of horse-induced poverty on the Blackfeet Nation of northern Montana, along with her husband, son and Max the Cowdog.

Author Website: http://www.karilynndell.com/
 
 
 

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25 Responses to “Spotlight & Giveaway: Relentless in Texas by Kari Lynn Dell”

  1. Mary Preston

    Sometimes it’s the language. An author tries to use what they think is local dialect, but it’s often so, so wrong.

  3. anxious58

    I think this city has more problems with gangs than the police themselves. I’m not young so I’m not out at night which seems to be when the problems happen oh and there is a lot of pull overs which drugs large quantity are found. Not to say the police are perfect here far from it but nothing as bad as what happen to the man in Minneapolis. We did have the protesters here and there were some problems major and minor but have settled down.

  4. Lori Byrd

    I live in a big city with lots of violence. I can see why the police are wary.

  5. janinecatmom

    I moved into this town 20 years ago and have seen a complete change. Crime has gotten out of control. We need more police officers. The only time I go anywhere alone is early in the morning because it seems calmer then. I stay away from the mall area all together.

  6. Pamela Conway

    I don’t think this has been an issue so much with me & I try not to judge others.

  7. dbranigan

    I’m sorry but, I am not sure of your question and how to answer it. Best wishes to the author on the novel.

  8. [email protected]

    We don’t have a lot of violence where we live .A lot of drug bust but we have great police and deputies..I have a nephew that’s a deputy and he is good to everyone and tries to help.He will vouch for you with the judge.

  10. Lilah Chavez

    Ok, so what I think ur asking is like … I do have apache ancestry but I don’t think I have the right to say or have the right to cash in on the reparations bc I did not grow up within the culture nor did I followed any traditions

  11. Mary C.

    I am Asian, born in the USA. Even now, I get comments about how well I speak English, followed by “Where were you born?” When I reply with the state, they say no, ask “Where were you born?” again in a louder voice.

  13. peggy clayton

    I moved to Iowa from the bay area in Ca and in Ca there is a lot of crime etc,, but here in Iowa where we live there are some crime but a lot of drug problems. When I first moved back here my hubbys daughter asked us if she could have her 21st b-day party at our house as we lived in a rural area. Well we said yes and she was going to serve shots i said everyone had to be 21 and we would provide all of the food. Well I was in the bedroom with my stepson watching tv and all of a sudden i hear so much comotion and it was the cops. They were not nice at all very rude and they took me and hubby into custody as 2 of the kids were underage and they said it was our party. I am battling a disease and at that time even they could see i was very crippled in many ways they couldn’t care less they took me and threw me against the car and then pulled my arms back while my hubby is yelling that i am just from Ca and a teacher that i had nothing to do with it and for them to see that i was disabled and not pull my arms back they laughed. All the way to the station they were laughing so hard at me as i was crying and they were making fun of me. My husband had the same problem they were threatening him and everything. Well he had to stay overnight and they let me go even with no charges but i had to go to court a month later. Everything was dropped and not on my record but i still wanted a lawyer as i didn’t trust anyone. The police wouldn’t release the body camera footage till the trial was over which was 10 min and cost us so much. The judge apologized for them taking me in and that of course i could still teach and my record was clean. I couldn’t believe that happened and we still talk about what they did to us. It was so tramatic and never ever did i want anything to do with the Dbq, police dept.

  15. erinf1

    eh, I live in the US, there’s authenticity police for eeeeeeverything 🙂 thanks for sharing!

  21. Amy R

    In my area we have city police, county police, state police and we have a large University that has it’s own police.

  23. Glenda M

    Not sure if this is the answer you are looking for but it’s been my experience that even people of the same race, socio-economic status, education, etc have different experiences that they identify as part of what makes up well, their identity. Most of them haven’t felt the need to be authenticity police except with totally racist types.

  24. Anna Nguyen

    i live in san diego and people are for the most part pretty open and friendly. of course there are always some that are not so kind. i think it helps that there are so many different cultures living here and it lets you discover more of what is outside your culture and learn to be more open.

  25. tonyamlucas

    Lived your blog, I’ll be the 1st to say you’re books do have layers and layers of complicated stories. How you wrote and keep them straight baffles me.
    I think we have Authenticity police “people” everywhere judging. It’s sad. We are all one and should respect each other no matter what.