Bed of Roses by Caylee Hammack and Carolyn Brown
What do you do when your love life turns into a country song cliche? Hit the road and head out for a fresh start.
In Bed of Roses, inspired and written by country star Caylee Hammack, alongside author Carolyn Brown, our protagonist, Samantha, speeds away in her 1965 Mustang from her cheating ex-boyfriend and the best friend she caught him with.
Bed of Roses is based on Caylee Hammack’s latest album, with musical breadcrumbs throughout. You’ll want to cue it up as the soundtrack for your reading. Alongside the book’s namesake, there are many references to country music throughout, including the Mustang lovingly called Patsy — after Patsy Cline — who got Sam through many heartbroken nights, crying in her beloved car.
Small-Town Romance and Female Friendship
Turns out Patsy’s last act as Samantha’s companion is to strand her just outside a town smaller than the one she’s escaping. It’s just her luck that the local mechanic, Jack, is in the right place at the right time and comes to her rescue — albeit in the least comforting way possible. Sam’s spidey senses tell her not to trust him, but without other options, she accepts the tow and ride into town, where she’s unceremoniously deposited down a steep hill from the only lodging available.
After trudging her way toward the bed and breakfast, Sam realizes she’s a bit lost when the pull of the used bookstore draws her in. There’s something magical about the way she’s pushed toward the store and its owner, Noah. His is the only storefront with the lights on, and Sam’s just lost enough to need help.
And help he did, by guiding her to Loretta and Kathleen, who become central roles in Sam’s fresh start. Kathleen owns the B&B; Loretta owns the flower shop. They both need help after their shared employee quit to stay at home with her new baby. That leaves a vacancy which includes room and board that Sam’s happy to fill. Little does she know these women will become so much more than employers.
Good Chemistry and Hard Lessons
This is most certainly a romance, but its central theme is the importance of female friendships and the fortune of having the wisdom and protection of older women. This story has no shortage of life advice earned the hard way from lives filled with infidelity and abuse. Sadly, some lessons have to be learned the hard way, but having women who stand by you even when you don’t take their advice — offering a safe place to land — makes making mistakes easier.
As the story unfolds, Jack’s true colors are shown. He has a history of cheating, using and abusing women, and he set his sights on the fiery redhead who just got stuck in his town. Sam’s belief that no one is all bad leads her into his web, and she finds that he’s not willing to let her go without a fight. Good thing Sam’s dad trained her to be a fighter.
Meanwhile, Noah — who happens to be in a long-term relationship — is a natural caretaker and offers a library system to the older women and widows in town. Sam finds solace in the bookstore and her friendship with Noah during daily visits to exchange books and read in the comfy chairs. Unfortunately for Sam, Noah’s girlfriend pops up at the most inopportune times to ensure these two never get too close.
Sam may have felt love at first brush of hands with Noah on her first fateful night in town, but it takes the rest of the book for them to find the right timing to surrender to the chemistry.
Lovable Characters and the Importance of Community
Church and Southern values play an important role in this book. Sam’s parents’ 50-year marriage is an inspiration to her. Even when she’s 30 years old, they never let her disappear, always checking in, keeping her safe from afar. Kathleen and Loretta show support through heartfelt and hilarious group prayers, and Sam finds herself seeking God’s help to forgive the ghosts of her ex-boyfriend and best friend so she can move on with an open heart.
While I’m neither southern nor a churchgoer, I appreciated the community the town has built and the clarity Samantha has found through church. I adored the characters in this small town and found myself laughing at their antics. The friendships and different kinds of love explored were as relatable as they were aspirational. We should all be so lucky to find people like these in our lives.
About the Authors:
Caylee Hammack is a country singer, songwriter and producer signed with Capitol Records Nashville. A co-recipient, with Miranda Lambert, of the Academy of Country Music’s “Music Event of the Year” honor, she has been identified as an “Artist to Watch” by The Bobby Bones Show, Rolling Stone and Hits magazine. Her debut album, If It Wasn’t for You, earned high praise from critics, with her deeply personal song “Small Town Hypocrite” named a “Best Song of 2020” by NPR and Esquire. Her sophomore album, Bed of Roses, is a sonic storybook of the tales and characters that shaped her into who she is today.
With the help of her close friends and creatives, including John Osborne of the Brothers Osborne, Hammack has tended the garden of her life and fostered her most authentic sound, harnessing the power of raw storytelling that has set her apart as an artist. A native of Ellaville, Georgia, she has lived in Nashville since she was nineteen.
Carolyn Brown is the New York Times–, USA Today–, Wall Street Journal– and Washington Post–bestselling author of more than a hundred novels and several novellas. A recipient of the Booksellers’ Best Award and the Montlake Diamond Award as well as a three-time recipient of the National Readers’ Choice Award, her work has been published for more than 20 years, and her books have been translated into 21 languages. When she’s not writing, Brown enjoys plotting new stories in her Davis, Oklahoma, backyard with her tomcat, Boots Randolph Terminator Outlaw, who protects the yard from all kinds of wicked varmints, including crickets, locusts and spiders.
