Faced with a decades-old mistake, can she find forgiveness?

After a fire devastates her hometown, Dr. Jess Bristol returns to save her mother’s clinic—and comes face-to-face with her high school sweetheart.

Over twenty years ago, Jess helped put Shane Stone in jail…and later learned he was innocent. Now they must work together to restore their town.

Though Shane has put his past behind him, can the adoptive single father forgive the woman he once loved?

Titles in the Kendrick Creek series include – Rebuilding Her Life –

 

 

 

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Title:  Rebuilding Her Life
Series:  Kendrick Creek #1
Author:  Ruth Logan Herne
Genre:  Inspirational Contemporary Romance
Publication Date:  April 1, 2021
Rating:  4.5 stars

Rebuilding Her Life begins the Kendrick Creek series with a heartwrenching and heartwarming romance that feels as real as if I was living it as I read Shane, Jess, Jole, Sam, and Mary’s story.  It was a simply amazing experience.  And this isn’t one couple’s story, it is the town of Kendrick Creek and its residents’ story as much as the main characters.  To a woman born in the country and transplanted to the city – this one felt like coming home.

A late-season forest fire has swept down the mountain and nearly devastated the small town of Kendrick Creek.  Some buildings, homes were completely destroyed – others jumped over and never touched – more have some damage but can be repaired.  It is into this tragedy in their hometown that Shane and Jess step into as they come home from different parts of the country to the town that shaped them and their futures.  Jess is an ER doctor in New York City, or she was before being let go recently.  Shane is rebuilding his life on the East coast, starting a successful construction company after his release from prison for a crime he didn’t commit but took the blame for.  It was a teenage Jess who was instrumental in Shane ending up in prison because what she saw (although not entirely accurate) was enough to convince a jury.  Jess is also on the other side of a serious medical situation.  Returning home was instinctive for them both – neither expected what would happen when they met again many years after the last time they saw each other.

Shane stole my heart from the beginning.  He’s a man of faith, a man of his word, and is now raising his nephew, Sam, and niece, Jole after their mother’s death.  It would be so easy for Shane to have become bitter but that’s not his way, his path.

It took me a little bit of time to really like Jess.  Her immediate attitude upon returning home needed a bit of adjustment… which did happen in a completely natural way.  But as Jess grew, got back to her roots, and lost some of that shield firmly in place, and became human I enjoyed her take-charge nature.  Although the main couple, Shane and Jess were a fascinating romance to watch unfold, it was Mary (Jess’s mother and town doctor) and the residents, and even Shane’s niece and nephew who really captured my heart along the way.  Rebuilding Her Life is so much more than a romance, it is a community coming together, helping each other after the unthinkable happens.

This story was an excellent way to begin the Kendrick Creek series, and I’m looking forward to continuing the series.

I own a Kindle edition of Rebuilding Her Life.

Available in paperback or for your favorite e-reader, mine is the Kindle.