Smoke River Bride

I've been into Western historical romance books lately, but this one was different. Leah, the heroine, is half-Scots, half-Chinese, which makes her an anomaly both in China and the American West, where she is disliked for her mixed race. She becomes a mail-order bride to Thad, a Scot, who doesn't realize his bride isn't all Scottish. He needs a wife for his farm and his small son. He's pretty absorbed with his wheat crop, which he's ridiculed since winter wheat was grown in Oregon then. His obsession is due to his starvation as a child back in Scotland and his grief over his dead wife, though I never really got how it all ties together. Thad isn't the most heroic of male leads, mostly ignoring his new wife and son for almost all of the show more book, but Leah comes across as much better, determined to make a family and fight the prejudice in her town. You don't read many romances that deal with prejudice in the Old West, except Native Americans, so this was an interesting twist. The story kind of sputters out at the end, though there was a nice epilogue. show less