Learning to live with the hand you are dealt. Sure there is sometimes the element of choice in decisions that affect your entire life, but for so many, they are not given that option. A TALL DARK COWBOY CHRISTMAS by Maisie Yates is part of the Gold Valley series and brings us back to the Get Out Of Dodge ranch and characters we love. A TALL DARK COWBOY CHRISTMAS is also a deep look into the lives of two wonderful characters that have led their lives so far by managing.

Managing your life is a harrowing sometimes desperate and definitely tiring ordeal. But when that is the only thing for your survival that's what people do -- they manage. Some manage better than others. In A TALL DARK COWBOY CHRISTMAS, we meet two folks that have totally mastered the art of managing -- at least in the best version they could aspire to.

Grant Dodge married his teenage sweetheart. So cliché but this marriage was nothing like anything written in the fairytale books. I hate to say the marriage of Grant to Lindsay was doomed, but that was the unfortunate truth. Lindsay had survived bouts of cancer but the prognosis was dreary, and both of them knew that from the start. Their marriage somehow lasted eight years. Grant is now a widower and deals with the town's pity every day of his life. He has not found the strength or desire to move on, and so he basically hides in his home during the night and during the day works at the family ranch.

McKenna is at the end of her survival ropes so to speak. She arrives in Golden Valley in search for a man whom she truly believes is her father. The only proof she has is his name on her birth certificate. McKenna was abandoned by her mother when she was only two. Never adopted she remained in social services until she turned eighteen. McKenna never knew family, never knew love and certainly never felt as if she belonged to anyone.

And yet she is resourceful and an amazing survivor. Doesn't really seem like it when she is discovered holding up in one of the Get Out Of Dodge outer cabins by Grant. Cold and hungry and totally without any more choices McKenna decides to trust this tall dark cowboy. There is just something about Grant and in short time McKenna learns that this is a good man. Almost too good to believe. Certainly too good for her. But for a short time she has his attention McKenna is determined to enjoy their time together.

As to finding her father well that's another story. McKenna knows the odds of this man claiming her as his long-lost child are practically nil. But McKenna just can't give up hoping. When there is nothing else -- at least hope provides a glimmer of light to follow.

A TALL DARK COWBOY CHRISTMAS is filled with the joy of family and the knowledge that the absence of one is a very dark dismal void. So of course while reading this latest story by Maisie Yates you will find yourself rooting for a happy ending. As in all Maisie Yates books the characters are very real and honest -- no shortcuts here.