If Wishes Were Horses...

by Judith Duncan

Book of dolls. A catalogued auction of rare and antique collectible dolls. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0373271425
• ISBN13: 9780373271429
• Release Date: April 2001
• Publisher: Silhouette Books
• Length: 249 Pages
• Weight: 0.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 4.2" x 6.6"

Customer Reviews

Another great tear jerker!

I loved "Beyond All Reason" and while not really a straight romance reader, I have sent the book as a gift to someone. This book is the same setting, different H/H and similar format. I really liked the book, although not as much as Beyond, but Judith Duncan always does a great job of pulling emotion out of me. I highly recommend the book and will be reading more of her.

I read her in spite of myself!

I have read many of Judith Duncan's books over the years; the first was "Tender Rhapsody" and I was completely hooked. Another keeper is "Beyond All Reason" and some of the characters from that story reappear in this one. Judith Duncan's Canadian prairie stories are wonderful. She has built for the reader a community of interesting characters who live out their lives in the ranch country of southern Alberta. You feel the wind, smell the snow on the way and can see the Rockies on the distant horizon. "If Wishes Were Horses" is a fairly simple tale of how the elder of two brothers has always loved his younger brother's wife. The younger brother dies, having wasted his potential, leaving behind a vulnerable yet feisty widow and two children. Elder brother rides to her rescue when life deals her one bad hand after the other and he carries her and her children off to his ranch in order to look after them. There is a "hidden baby" (well, two to be exact) in this story and this device touches on AI and surrogacy. I don't want to say any more - it would spoil things but it is fairly realistically and sensitively handled. However, I have to say why I read this author in spite of myself. I enjoy her setting - rather like I love Rachel Lee's Conard County, Wyoming. Duncan writes incredibly angst ridden stories that are full of high emotions. Unfortunately, though, and here is where I must criticise her, her wrenching emotions are always portrayed the same in her books. Here are some examples of what I feel is ridiculously over-drawn emotionalism: .... "Dazed and devoid of coherent thought in her head, she reached for the chair, her knees so wobbly they wanted to buckle ..... heart pounding and her pulse thundering in hear ears" (No they have not had sex; he merely looked at her.) .... "she bounced from one thing to another like a ricocheting tennis ball." .... "he turned and walked out of the room his heart thundering like an express train in his chest." ...."His gut knotted and he suddenly found it hard to breathe." My problem is that in order to convey emotion, the author constantly has her characters in tears, so choked up they cannot breath, their jaws locked, their hearts exploding, etc, etc. After a while it's just annoying and silly. I give this one 4 stars because the story line was great and I really liked the hero despite the fact he spends half of his time unable to breathe, choked up with his gut twisted and dizzy with emotions. Indeed, a physician would wonder why the H/H were not about to expire from the physical side-effects of their emotions by the end of the story. The author does tell a good tale, she writes with intensity but ever since I read her first novel some 18 years ago, I note that this tendancy for her characters to be so emotional as to be physical wrecks is getting worse. Please, Judith Duncan, take note. You don't need your wonderful heros to expire from heart, chest and lung problems. They are