LaVonne W. (Grnemae) - , reviewed on 7/4/2015 + 451 more book reviews

Julia Darling is a graduate of the Boston based Fannie Farmer's Cooking School who is engaged to a "great" catch. At least that is how everyone other than Julia feels. She ends her engagement and decides on a whim to respond to an ad by a desperate longtime rancher in Wyoming who is looking for a mature graduate of the Fannie Farmer's Cooking School to cook at his ranch. When she arrives in Wyoming her thoughts about what a longtime rancher would be and Paul Otto's idea of what a mature cook would be are very different than what they see in front of them. They begin an ongoing verbal sparring match which I found to be very funny. I do not know if the author intended that to be the reader response but it was mine. He calls her by her surname only, Darling and she calls him Mr Otto.

When they arrive at the "ranch", Julia is horrified by the conditions of the house. The only redeeming thing in her opinion is the Queen Atlantic cook stove - the best of the best. The Queen has been sadly abused and Julia resolves to remedy that with love and lots of elbow grease as she needs it to make the meals she was hired to prepare. As she meets the various ranch hands she realizes that they are all misfits of some kind who have been taken in by Mr Otto. Over time they tell her the story of how they were rescued by Mr Otto and how he often refers to the fact that they were/are all beggers at some time in life. Julia is really taken by James the young boy Paul has taken in and who is afraid of the wind and being left alone and often has nightmares.

The ranch hands all leave on a cattle drive the day after Julia finally gets the Queen Atlantic cleaned so that she can start to use it to prepare meal. She eagerly anticipates their return and although she was told to have fried steak and hash browns she decides that is not good enough. She prepares a "proper" meal that when set in front of the ranch hands sends them all running to the bunkhouse to eat canned peaches rather than her food. Parts of her meal menu items would have sent me running away from the table also. Eventually she learns that plain simple meals not fancy cooking school meals are what the men want and readily eat.

Mr Otto starts to ask her questions about her religious faith and Julia starts to realize that while she says she believes the various aspects of her religion she is basing her belief on the opinions of others. The borrowed light of the title references her using not her own religious convictions but those of others to say she believes. Paul encourages her to explore her own beliefs and to find her own light. At least 1/4 of the book is related to her searching for her own light and while some reviewers did not like that, I did not mind. We all at some time explore our own religious beliefs.

Some long time secrets and mysteries are explored and resolved but not in the way I was expecting, There are several twists and turns along the way which added to my enjoyment of the book.

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