People, especially western romance authors, have actually told me that they would like to borrow my life. Why? Because my maternal grandfather as well as my father were ranch foremen—real Texas cowboys, and I spent part of my growing up years on a sixty-thousand-acre cattle ranch in South Texas.
Some of the biggest ranches in the county, if not the world, are located in South Texas where I live—the King and the Kenedy ranches to name two. When I describe ranch scenes in my western romances, I am often describing something I have actually seen. And the history part? No problem.
I’m not telling my age here, but not getting any younger either. I’ve lived through a lot of changes and historic events, and the Lord has given me a good long-term memory, making it possible for me to recall these events and write about them.
My cowboy grandfather was a man named Seth. He’s the cowboy on the horse, and I’ve always liked his name. In fact, I named the hero in one of my westerns, Seth.
In South Texas, we call a row of cowboys on horses, the line up. Here is my grandfather again in the line up, waiting to go and work cattle horseback.
Probably the best western I’ve written so far is When the Cowboy Rides Away. It won the 2016 Texas Association of Authors contest in the Christian Western category and was a finalist in the Will Rogers Awards in the inspirational category that same year. God willing, I will continue to write novels and novellas until He takes me home.
Barbour Publishing published The Secret Admirer Romance Collection in May 2017, nine novellas by nine different authors. My novella was a historical western set in the Texas hill country titled “Too Many Secrets.”
Cinderella Texas takes place on a South Texas ranch in the same location as the setting for When the Cowboy Rides Away but in modern times. My agent published Cinderella Texas in June 2017.
Now, let’s talk about my cowgirl life. First of all, my family didn’t own the ranches I lived on. My father and grandfather worked there. But it didn’t really matter since I could ride out horseback whenever I liked, listen to the coyotes yapping a night after all the lights were out, go swimming in a water tank in the middle of a cow pasture, or pick wildflowers to my heart’s content.
But for me, dating was a problem before I met my future husband. A boy had to really like me to drive twenty or thirty miles on country roads just to go out with me when there were plenty of town girls to pick from. Once one of my dates finally arrived at the ranch where I lived, he had to—open, drive through, and then close four to seven gates just to reach our house. I remember sitting on the front porch at night waiting to see the first blink of car-lights in the distance. I knew that when I saw that first blink, my date would arrive in about twenty minutes. That’s what is meant by “living in the sticks.”
And if you would like the opportunity to borrow my cowgirl life, buy and read one of my Christian western romance novels. Better yet, read them all.
After having lived in isolated areas for much of my life, I love to talk to folks. So, stop by, chat and leave a comment.
Molly Noble Bull is a Christian author with a Texas cattle ranch background, and she has published with Zondervan, Love Inspired, Elk Lake Publishing, and Barbour Publishing. Several of her novels won contests for published authors. She has lived most of her life in South Texas or the Texas hill country, but most don’t know that she also lived in Germany for a year when her husband was in the United States military.
Molly is giving away a free paperback copy of either The Secret Admirer Romance Collection or When the Cowboy Rides Away to a contest winner with a address in the United States. She is also giving away a Kindle copy of Cinderella Texas.
To learn more about my books and ranch life through my eyes, please visit my website at http://www.mollynoblebull.com or my page at Amazon, http://bit.ly/mollynoblebull
