Lori Wilde’s The Welcome Home Garden Club joins the proliferation of books set in small towns. Honestly, I didn’t realize until I started reading new-to-me authors how rampant these type of Americana stories are in contemporary fiction now. This book is fourth in the series of books set in Twilight, Texas. While I liked Ms. Wilde’s writing, the plot concept and setting didn’t exactly electrify me.

Gideon Garza, former Green Beret, returns home just in time for his father’s military funeral. In fact he drives up on his 2000 Indian Chief motorcycle in his black leathers just as his father’s folded American flag is given to his half brothers. He had no sentimental reason to attend as he was the product of an extramarital affair and his father never recognized him. Gideon only discovered this information at age nineteen, after the death of his mother, via a letter she left him. He confronted his moneyed father who emphatically denied paternity and he was then beaten by his two half brothers not once but three times (which had me wondering if the first beating caused brain damage since he kept returning for more). After the last thrashing, in a fit of rage, he freed the animals, and torched the barn.

Facing Judge Richard Blackthorne, the disapproving father of his girlfriend Caitlin, with only a public defender for support, he was given two choices- join the service or spend time in jail for arson. Of course Gideon chose the service and left in the dark of night, unaware that he was leaving behind a pregnant girlfriend. He did attempt to communicate with her, but his letters came back unopened. Now he is back because his father sent for him before his death, but the eight years in the service have taken their toll. Gideon lost his dominant hand, and suffers from post traumatic stress disorder.

If Caitlin’s father had his way, her son Danny would have been put up for adoption. Judge Blackthorne wanted his daughter to go off to college and marry someone worthy of their family name. Upon finding herself pregnant at seventeen, she saved up enough money to hire a private detective to find Gideon. After being told that he died in an bomb blast, she married Kevin Marsh, twelve years her senior and the owner of the local flower shop. This resulted in a long estrangement from her father. Married for eight years, Caitlin is now a widow,struggling to keep her business operational while providing for her son. She is staggered when Gideon shows up alive at his father’s funeral as is Gideon when he sees Caitlin‘s son. Gideon hadn’t planned on staying but now he has two compelling reasons, Caitlin and her son. Working together on the town’s victory garden allows them to reevaluate their feelings for one another.

Ms. Wilde is a talented author and I like her writing style. While I know that in real life having one true love is fictional, I love this trope in romance novels and with this author’s expert handling, I believed in it again. I liked the fact that Gideon and Caitlin talk without the rancor so common in many books. Caitlin and Gideon are admirable, likable characters. However the plot of (a) the motorcycle riding bad boy, (b)illegitimate son of the one of the richest men in town, (c)given the choice of prison or service and (d) leaving behind a pregnant girlfriend then reuniting is pretty cliched. In chapter one I thought that the secondary characters, especially Raylene, an aging former Dallas Cowboy cheerleader, would add layers of nuance to the story but this thread wasn’t developed. Instead the author focuses on Gideon’s half brothers and Caitlin’s inflexible father, all of whom have reasons for wanting Gideon to leave town.

The sex scenes are nicely sensual except for the authors use of what seemed like silly euphemisms. While I know this seems nitpicking, using “queendom” to describe the heroine’s private parts had me rolling my eyes. In the end,this well-written book with its One True Love theme combined with stereotypical characters and cliched plot to make for an only slightly better than average read for me.