A drifter since his teens, Jimmy Dorsett has no home and no hope. What he does have is a duffel bag, a lot of stories, and a junker car. Then one cold desert night he picks up a hitchhiker and ends up with something more: a letter from a dying man to the son he hasn’t seen in years.
On a quest to deliver the letter, Jimmy travels to Rattlesnake, a small town nestled in the foothills of the California Sierras. The centerpiece of the town is the Rattlesnake Inn, where the bartender is handsome former cowboy Shane Little. Sparks fly, and when Jimmy’s car gives up the ghost, Shane gets him a job as handyman at the inn.
Both within the community of Rattlesnake and in Shane’s arms, Jimmy finds an unaccustomed peace. But it can’t be a lasting thing. The open road continues to call, and surely Shane—a strong, proud man with a painful past and a difficult present—deserves better than a lying vagabond who can’t stay put for long.
Pages or Words: Approximately 80,000 words
Categories: Contemporary, M/M Romance, Romance, Western/Cowboy
Their waitress appeared beside the table. “Anything else?” she asked Jimmy.
He didn’t want to go just yet. But his belly was full, and any further conversation with Shane was probably going to frustrate him. Already Jimmy wanted to reach across the table and touch Shane’s hair, maybe run a finger across his scars. “Just the check. Thanks.”
“Mine too,” Shane said, but his thoughts were clearly elsewhere. As soon as she took their plates away, he leaned forward. “You don’t have to go, do you? I mean, you’re not, um, on the run from the law, are you?”
That made Jimmy laugh. “I’ve done some stupid shit, but never bad enough to make me a fugitive.”
“If I Google you, I won’t find you on the Ten Most Wanted list?”
“Afraid not.”
“So.” Shane traced his finger through a bit of spilled sugar on the tabletop, worrying at his lip and not meeting Jimmy’s gaze. He finally looked up again. “So you could stick around here for a while. If you had a place to stay and a job.”
God damn it! You don’t hope. You don’t want. That only leads to destruction. But Jimmy felt himself nod. “I could. For a short time.”
Author Interview:
Hi Kim!!
Thanks so much for hanging out with us here at Bayou Book Junkie today. We are happy to sit down and talk about what inspired this book, what you love about these characters, the meaning behind the name of the town and more!
Thanks for letting me stop by!
What inspired this story?
Road trips! Really, this story was the coming together of a couple of ideas. The first one came to me when we stopped for gas in a tiny town in the middle of the Mojave Desert, and I saw an old guy in a battered jeans jacket leaning against a pole. He might have been hitchhiking. I thought about what his story might be. The second idea cropped up when we were in the Sierra foothills, driving past cattle ranches. My mind turned to cowboys, of course. Then we spent a few days in Angels Camp, a former Gold Rush town with a hotel from the 1850s, and the whole story began to fall into place.
What are your favorite qualities about each of these main characters?
Jimmy has led a really rough life. He's never had a home or anyone he can lean on, and he doesn't see much value in himself. But what I love about him is that he's still fundamentally a good guy. He has a lot of empathy for other people and an ethical code that he tries hard to hang onto. Now, Shane has always had a home and a big, supportive family, but he's also had more than his share of pain. My favorite thing about him is that he's stubbornly optimistic. He pushes Jimmy when Jimmy needs pushing. And despite his physical ailments, Shane's incredibly strong.
The name of the town is Rattlesnake. How did that come about?
The town is modeled loosely on a real place--Angels Camp. And there's a restaurant there called Sidewinders, so that gave me the idea, I think. It's a fitting name for a place in the Sierra foothills, where there are a lot of real rattlesnakes. It's also a metaphor for something that lies quiet and unseen until you stumble upon it, and then it bites you.
In the book, you learn that the town got its name from a founder, George "Rattlesnake" Murray. Which is a little bit of an in-joke, because in my family, whenever the kids ask how something got its name, we say it was named after George Something. As in, "Mom, why are tornadoes called tornadoes?" "They were named after George Tornado." It's always George. And one time when we visited Angels Camp, the kids asked for the source of the town name, so of course I said it was named for George Angel. Then we found a plaque that informed us that, in fact, the city was named for George and Henry Angel.
When did you first know you wanted to be a writer?
Always. I remember writing little stories back when I was in kindergarten. I never had the confidence to pursue fiction writing as a career, although writing has always been a big part of what I do as a university professor. But I somehow started writing fanfic, and when I got up enough courage to share it, people liked it. I finally got brave enough to try to get original fiction published. I think that's worked out very well--Rattlesnake is my 13th novel!
Describe your perfect book hero.
I like a hero with a lot of faults, one who's not overly self-confident, but who has an inner strength that pulls him through when things get tough. I don't mind if he's a little snarky, but it's important to me that he's not cruel.
Eat in or dine out?
That depends on the laziness factor. I tend to wear really comfy clothes around the house and sometimes I just can't be bothered to make myself presentable for public viewing. But my husband does about 80% of the cooking, and sometimes we get bored with his fairly limited range of dishes. Then we eat out.
Mari's Review:
***ARC provided to Bayou Book Junkie in exchange for a fair and honest review.***
I absolutely adored this story! It was so different to anything I've ever read and I really enjoyed it.
Jimmy Dorsett has been a drifter since his stepdad threw him out of his house at 14, just after his mother died. He's learned to depend only on himself and squashes every bit of hope that tries to sneak in. He picks up a hitchhiker and that changes his life in ways he never envisioned. For one, the hitchhiker dies right in his car, so he travels to deliver a letter to the dead man's son who lives in a small, quaint town called Rattlesnake.
Once there, and after meeting Shane, he can't bring himself to deliver the letter to the handsome bartender. After Jimmy's car dies, Shane gets him a job at the inn he works in, and Jimmy and him end up growing closer. But Jimmy is not sure how long he can remain in one place and he knows Shane deserves way better than him, so staying might not be in the cards for him after all, no matter how much he wishes that wasn't the case.
Jimmy is a wonderful character. Personable, polite to a fault, hard worker, he's had to go through a lot in his life, and feels like he's never going to belong anywhere.
Shane is sweet, and has gone through a lot, too. He had an accident when he was 23 that left him with some degree of incapacity, but he is stubborn and has a big family that supports him no matter what.
I loved them together. Jimmy never treats Shane differently, just helping him out in every way he can. And Shane shows Jimmy his interest and tries to show him that he really cares for Jimmy every chance he gets. They are adorable together, complementing the other perfectly.
The book was amazing, loved the stories that Jimmy told throughout it, loved seeing their relationship grow. I cried and laughed and awww'd, and above all, I felt for these characters, all of them, main and secondary, were awesome and made the story so much richer and deeper.
Rating: 5 Stars!!!
Kim Fielding is the bestselling author of numerous m/m romance novels, novellas, and short stories. Like Kim herself, her work is eclectic, spanning genres such as contemporary, fantasy, paranormal, and historical. Her stories are set in alternate worlds, in 15th century Bosnia, in modern-day Oregon. Her heroes are hipster architect werewolves, housekeepers, maimed giants, and conflicted graduate students. They’re usually flawed, they often encounter terrible obstacles, but they always find love.
After having migrated back and forth across the western two-thirds of the United States, Kim calls the boring part of California home. She lives there with her husband, her two daughters, and her day job as a university professor, but escapes as often as possible via car, train, plane, or boat. This may explain why her characters often seem to be in transit as well. She dreams of traveling and writing full-time.
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