The Bowen Bride by Nicole Burnham

So I was at the library this morning picking up the 5th Cowboy Bebop dvd since we hadn't watched the last episode last time we checked it out (we're trying to watch them all in order this time around). They've rearranged things there since I was last there. I don't go there much since it's downtown and the parking sucks weekdays. Well, they've moved all the paperback fiction to the very back of the library, but I don't mind much since they put in new shelves and it looks like they have lots of room to grow. I did my usual browse and grab while poor DH looked on. I already had a stack of books at home from the library, but really, who can leave a library without picking up more books? So The Bowen Bride by Nicole Burnham was one I grabbed. I remember thinking it looked cute when it first came out, but didn't get it. Actually, it's a really sweet romance and I'm so glad I picked it up.

Katie Schmidt runs The Bowen Bride, a wedding dress shop in rural Bowen, Nebraska. It's well-known in the area because the local rumor is that no woman who buys a gown from The Bowen Bride ever gets divorced.

Katie plays into the rumor because it's good for business. However, when sexy single father Jared Porter enters the shop, looking for a wedding gown for his engaged—but far too young to be married—daughter, Katie decides a little rumor control might be in order.

Or will she and Jared give the residents of Bowen something to talk about?

I actually really liked this book. There are so many things that could have been done wrong, but they're not. Jared Porter is a single dad with a seventeen year old daughter who actually acts seventeen. His reasons for not wanting her to get married are valid and I liked how he handled everything. I also liked Katie and how she handled Jared and his daughter. Her reasons for leaving and coming back to Bowen, Nebraska rang true. *sigh* I could go on, but I won't. There really are so many elements of this short story that I really liked.

In all, I thought this was an incredibly sweet romance where I got the impression at the end that these two would definitely make things work. So if you want something short and sweet, The Bowen Bride is perfect.