For anyone who has ever turned their life around and turned a sinful life into a quest for forgiveness and faith, this book will strike a chord. This was very inspiring not because of the rags to riches back story, but the underlying story of redemption and how receiving a new identity in the eyes of others, removing their condemnation and receiving loving acceptance can enable a truly motivated person to change for the better. The scenes of unforgiving and unfair judgment teaches an excellent lesson to many Christians who are very eager to point out the speck in their brother's eye and ignore the plank in their own and who are unwilling or unable to comprehend the terrible circumstances that many must struggle past to achieve their dreams.

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I enjoyed this story a lot. The heroine was forced into prostitution at 14 to survive and the story starts off with her on a stagecoach trying to start over with her life. A woman befriends her who dies on the coach and the heroine assumes her name and takes the school teaching job the woman was headed for. The heroine can't read or write herself yet teaches herself the students' lessons the night before and the students like her so much they try to help her. The upright banker/rancher who hired her believes her to be innocent and falls in love with her yet she knows she has to tell him the truth. She hears the Message for the first time and realizes God loves her and she's forgiven yet the hero has a tough time with the truth. I would have given this 5 stars but the ending seemed a bit rushed to me and I wantd it to go a bit longer with things being resolved - I don't feel everything was resolved enough to be realistic. Some humor was sprinkled throughout - not silly humor but just humorous like her thinking the brand signs (lazy S on it's side, Rocking R, etc) were new alphabet letters unique to Texas! A secondary character is also fun in her pursuit of the local sheriff(she's a rich girl and he feels being a former gunslinger her father wouldn't approve of them together)

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