What Price Paradise [Paperback]

Katherine Allred (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 29, 2007

All his life Tate McCullom has been taught to be responsible, and he is the very model of what a respectable man should be. Until the night he gets drunk and sleeps with a woman he barely knows. Now, six weeks later, she's pregnant, alone, and broke. Once again, Tate must take responsibility for his actions, and makes plans to marry his child's mother. There's only one problem...he has to tell his fiancée. Abby Grayson hasn't had an easy life. As the daughter of the town whore, people either avoid her or think she's like her mother. For Abby, it's a struggle just to fill her belly and keep a roof over her head. Loneliness and a secret yearning for this man she thought she'd never have led her to spend the night with Tate. But the last thing she needs is a baby when she can barely take care of herself. Desperate, but too proud to ask for help, she finally agrees to accept a job from Tate the job of being his wife. Now she has almost everything she's ever dreamed of. Unfortunately, only one thing will gain her Tate's love his realization that the night he spent with her was no drunken accident. It was a last-ditch attempt to win the woman he really wanted.

Product Details

• Paperback: 286 pages
• Publisher: Cerridwen Press (June 29, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1419954865
• ISBN-13: 978-1419954863
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 8.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #810,145 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars An Enjoyable Infuriating Mess, September 27, 2011

By 

The book lady - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: What Price Paradise (Paperback)

Abby is stuck in a small town, without the means to leave. She only works two nights a week waiting tables at the local bar being she doesn't have her diploma and that's all she can get. Every Friday Tate comes in to hang with his friends and have a beer and one Friday, after he has a big fight with his fiancée he is waiting in the parking lot to take her home and being she's the daughter of the town's (literal) whore she knows he's going to want to come inside.

Six weeks later and again Tate and his fiancée Diane are fighting, and for the 15th time she throws the ring back in his face and walks out the door to leave on vacation for two weeks. But this time when Tate talks to Abby he guesses she's pregnant and is determined to sacrifice his true love, Diane, and do right by Abby. He doesn't love Abby, he doesn't even know her but soon after they are married they are having an extremely hot and heavy sexual relationship, but that doesn't stop him from feeling massive guilt every time he hears anything about Diane.

What really bothered me about this book is that by the end we are supposed to believe that he used Abby to get out of his duty to marry Diane, being he had always had feelings for Abby, and yet he has a one night stand with her and doesn't say another word to her for six weeks and continues to maintain the love of his life is Diane? I guess that really stuck me the wrong way because he was so kind and eager in the beginning to please Abby and then Diane gets back in town and all he can feel is guilt. Tate is a straight up bumbling idiotic putz for 95% of the book. It's like one step forward two steps back for him . . . well, once he finally gets her into bed again anyway. He never cared when Diane ran around on him with the whole town so the fact he is jealous of any guy who smiles at Abby is just strange. Even if we are supposed to believe he didn't love Diane didn't he have any pride? What man wants to be cuckolded even if he doesn't care about the woman?

Another thing that bothered me is the obvious flubbing of their ages. Tate is supposed to be 13 years older than his 16 year old brother or 29 but he also went to college at 18, left 4 years later (22) and then cared of the family ranch for 4 years after that, or is 26. The same goes for Abby. She is supposed to be the daughter of the town whore but she had to drop out of high school to take care of her mom when she had cancer and then was on her own for 1 year after she died and she also never supported herself while her mother was alive so how is it that she's 23 unless her mother was dying of cancer for 5 years and yet still whoring? The whole thing is convoluted to get Abby in a position where she will be dependent on Tate.

The secondary characters of Buddy and Joe are good, but the whole thing was such a mess with Abby wanting Tate to actually chose her over Diane, which he never does and Tate feeling guilty about anything and everything, while trying to be a good husband to Abby and trying to move on from Diane who has her clutches deep in him.

This is a sweet tale that needed a bit more editing and a hero who wasn't so wishy-washy but for what it is it's an enjoyable little book.

3 stars.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great Author, December 10, 2009

By 

KT (Wisconsin) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: What Price Paradise (Paperback)

What Price Paradise is light, sweet romance composed of great characters and growing love.

Abby, after a drunken, one night stand finds out she is pregnant with Tate McCullom's baby. Tate, being the upstanding, responsible man he is asks Abby to marry him. Tate and Abby immediately get married, despite Tate's engagement to the woman he has been in love with his entire life. Tate and Abby struggle with their new life together, trying to get to know eachother, preparing for the baby, and fighting with Tate's lingering feelings for his former fiance'.

Katherine Allred has a gift for creating characters. These are realistic people who you would want as friends or family. Abby is a sweet, innocent, and shy young lady who starts out young and naive and grows throughout the story into a strong caring heroine. Tate is a tough yet loving cowboy who is trying to do what is right while struggling with his past.

I enjoyed What Price Paradise because of the wonderful characters. The storyline however I did feel was a bit flat. There was not really a strong climax in which the story led up to. I read The Sweet Gumtree prior to this book (which is one of my all time favorites also by Katherine Allred), so my expectations were rather high. But this story I felt was just lacking a bit of that excitement which grabs the reader until they cannot put the book down.

Overall I would recommend What Price Paradise I would just tell the reader to expect an even, easy going reading experience not a rock your world emotional roller coaster.

4.0 out of 5 stars Very good story, February 17, 2012

By 

Jennifer ""Jen"" (Santa Barbara, Ca) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: What Price Paradise (Kindle Edition)

I really enjoyed this book. It had my attention from the very begining. It was nice to see how the love between the characters built slowly over time. I would recommend to anyone that enjoys a good love story.