In Nashville the music is louder, the dreams are bigger, and love can bring a cowboy to his knees.Ethan Walker is Nashville royalty. Born to the King and Queen of Country Music, he’s spent his life trying to escape the spotlight of his parents’ fame, even walking away from his own promising singing career. He’s the kind of cowboy who prefers flannel to flashbulbs, hay fields to hit records, and … records, and the solitude of his horse farm to the nightlife along Music Row. The last thing he wants is attention, especially when it comes from country’s latest star…
Chelsea Harris’s meteoric rise up the charts and string of celebrity boyfriends mean that wherever she goes, the paparazzi follow. A duet with Nashville’s favorite son is exactly what her new charity album needs, but when she approaches Ethan, he turns her down flat. To win the camera-shy cowboy over, Chelsea will have to approach him on his terms. Trouble is, the more time she spends on his farm, the more Ethan wants to keep her there.
The Nashville Dreams series: Can’t Walk AwayCan’t Let Her GoCan’t Fight the Feeling
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Can’t Let Her Go is part bright lights, big city and part hearty realism. Either way you slice it, Ms. James delivers a down home good time. Sandy James sets out to prove a point with Ethan and Chelsea. Ethan grew up in the spotlight. Famous parents saw to that, but for him it was a lonely road. Chelsea has dreams of being a star. She’s on the verge of success, when she meets the man who will change her life and steal her heart. Can these two opposites learn how to make beautiful music together? Can’t Let Her Go is a tale of sacrifice, compromise and following your heart. Even at the risk of accomplishing your dreams. The sweetest sound I ever heard was the music of the heart, that shines through in ever word of this beautiful ballad of love.
I received a complimentary copy of this book from NetGalley and I am voluntarily reviewing it.
This is author is new to me but she blew me away. This was awesome. I totally was into this story from the first. The characters were so realistic and believable. I hated to put this book down. Each side of their story was so understandable. The way they opened up to each other was authentic. The miscommunication that they suffered from was SO REALISTIC; that as an outsider (reader), you just want to slap them. Seeing miscommunication like this in real life is heartwrenching and happens often.
This story deserves more than 5 stars!! I highly recommend this.
3.75 stars–CAN’T LET HER GO is the second instalment in Sandy James’ contemporary, adult NASHVILLE DREAMS romance series focusing on three friends who own and operate Words and Music-a bar in Nashville, Tennessee: Brad Maxwell, Ethan Walker and Russell Green. This is reluctant, former teen singing sensation Ethan Walker, and country singer Chelsea Harris’s story line. CAN’T LET HER GO can be read as a stand alone without any difficulty. Any important information from the previous story line is revealed where necessary.
Told from dual third person perspectives (Chelsea and Ethan) CAN’T LET HER GO follows the building relationship between former child star Ethan Walker, and country music celebrity Chelsea Harris. Ethan Walker is the progeny of country music’s hottest couple but when his father tried to outrun the paparazzi, our hero was left an orphan with a great disdain for everything music and celebrity represents. Enter rising country music star Chelsea Harris-the woman with whom Ethan would fall in love. Chelsea is hoping to release a charity album of duets featuring the children of former music stars, and Ethan Walker is her only hold-out. What ensues are the contemptuous relationship between Chelsea and Ethan, and the fall-out when their friendship and association becomes fodder for the tabloid press.
Ethan Walker is content to work on his ranch, and sit behind the bar serving drinks to his friends and customers but Chelsea Harris’ persistence as it pertains to a duet with our story line hero pushes all of Ethan’s buttons including the buttons that stir up too many memories of his parents and the past. His behaviour and reluctance to help is fuelled by the loss of his parents, and a loss of power over his life as a singing star but I have to questions his lack of maturity on too many occasions. Chelsea is determined to release a charity album in honor of her father, who passed away, an album meant to bring awareness and raise funds for cancer research.
The relationship between Chelsea and Ethan begins acrimoniously as Chelsea persists in her attempts to bring Ethan on board. Ethan is determined to remain out of the music business having had to deal with the fall-out of fame and paparazzi at a very young age. The $ex scenes are intimate but mostly implied.
We are reintroduced to Ethan’s business partners Russell Green, Brad Maxwell and Savannah Wolf (Can’t Walk Away #1), as well as introduction of Chelsea’s agent Addie, her mother Betsy , and Chuck Austin, a man who sets out to destroy the building relationship between Ethan and Chelsea.
The world building focuses on two things close to the author’s heart: horses and cancer research. We are up close and personal as Sandy James takes the reader into the world of raising horses, as well as the struggle with which many families have to deal-losing a loved one to cancer.
CAN’T LET HER GO is a story of friendship and family; of betrayal and loss; of letting go of the past and moving forward with life. The premise is engaging and thought-provoking; the romance is hindered by memories of the past; the characters are colorful and charismatic.
Usually with romances you can find a bit of yourself (or a bit that you wished was you) but this one was a little different. It’s all about dealing with the side effects of fame. Ethan experienced it thanks to his parents and decided it definitely wasn’t something he wanted. Chelsea sees it as just a by-product of her singing career. She’s worked hard to get where she is and understands that it is her fans that got her there … she just has to accept that it comes with paparazzi and people who think they have a right to comment on her private life. Obviously with two such differing opinions there is going to be trouble when Ethan and Chelsea fall in love.
While I have no experience to draw on to relate to either of them, James does a fantastic job of giving you well-developed characters so you understand where both of them are coming from. It is totally understandable why Ethan would do everything he can to stay out of the spotlight and ignore any press, but after seeing how the world is now, especially with the access of social media, people like Taylor Swift are the perfect example of why Chelsea feels the need to support the machine. When the trouble hits, I have to admit that I felt more for one of them than the other … both of them are stubborn and it doesn’t lead to an easy compromise but it seemed one of them tried even less than the other 🙂
With a totally awesome HEA moment and characters that I loved, Can’t Let Her Go is not to be missed.
*** I voluntarily read a Review Copy of this book. All opinions stated are solely my own and no one else’s. ***