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Horizon Set #1
Beyond the Horizon
As the sheltered daughter of the once prosperous Branigan family, beautiful Shannon was ill-prepared for the rigors of the Oregon Trail, but she was still less prepared for half-breed scout Swift Blade. His dark eyes seemed to pierce her very soul, stripping away layers of civilization and baring her hidden longing to his savage gaze. His bronzed arms were forbidden to her, his searing kisses just a tantalizing fantasy; but as the countless miles passed beneath the wagon wheels, taking them to the heart of Indian territory, Shannon sensed that this untamed land would give her new strength and the freedom to love the one man who could fulfill her wild desire
443 pages, Paperback
First published November 1, 1990
20 people are currently reading
400 people want to read
About the author
Connie Mason
140 books534 followersConnie Mason or Cara Miles is the best-selling author of more than fifty historical romances and novellas. Her tales of passion and adventure are set in exotic as well as American locales. Connie was named Story Teller of the Year in 1990 by Romantic Times and was awarded Career Achievement award in the Western category by Romantic Times in 1994. Connie makes her home in Tarpon Springs, Florida with her husband Jerry.
Prior to her first published work in 1984, Connie was a full time homemaker. Always an avid reader, writing was one of Connie's dreams.
In 1995 Connie was featured on a segment of the CBS news show 48 Hours, a television production that devoted an entire program to the romance novel industry. Connie was also featured in an article published by National Inquirer.
In addition to writing and traveling, Connie enjoys telling anyone who will listen about her three children and nine grandchildren, and sharing memories of her years living abroad in Europe and Asia as the wife of a career serviceman. In her spare time Connie enjoys reading, dancing, playing bridge and freshwater fishing with her husband.
Prior to her first published work in 1984, Connie was a full time homemaker. Always an avid reader, writing was one of Connie's dreams.
In 1995 Connie was featured on a segment of the CBS news show 48 Hours, a television production that devoted an entire program to the romance novel industry. Connie was also featured in an article published by National Inquirer.
In addition to writing and traveling, Connie enjoys telling anyone who will listen about her three children and nine grandchildren, and sharing memories of her years living abroad in Europe and Asia as the wife of a career serviceman. In her spare time Connie enjoys reading, dancing, playing bridge and freshwater fishing with her husband.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
October 5, 2015
Wow, almost forgot to write a scathing proper review.
Basic plot set up: spoiled southern miss needs to cross the plains to join the rest of her family in Idaho after the death of her maidenly aunt, and she's gonna (sic) do that all by herself. Enter stage left the hero on a super-secret assignment from the President to find out who is smuggling rifles to the Indians. He's a half-breed (you will be clubbed over the head with that fact throughout the book), and the perfect man to lead the wagon train and carry on his undercover operation.
So...I think this is only the second or third Connie Mason book I've read, and so far all I've ended up with is mediocre writing, too many adjectives, a silly plot full of holes in a wallpaper historical setting and sex. And by sex, I mean just that - it isn't romantic, it doesn't enhance the plot and there is most definitely not any chemistry (at least for me) between the two.
Blah. I might have let that pass, but my copy was a Kindle edition I picked up on the freebies, and I'm glad I didn't pay a penny more. My copy was littered with typos and/or conversion errors. Examples:
"She turned to leave, but found her way blocked by the hard wall of dive’s chest. Short and stocky, Clive was an immovable force before Shannon’s meager strength."
dive's?
“Thank God Callie is made of stemer stuff."
I think that should be sterner...
“You are senous, aren’t you?"
"... ladies’ xroom..."
Oh, but there's much, much worse than that and I honestly can't tell you if this is also in the original edition. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but I've googled enough that it tells me how sergeant should be spelled.
47 times according to my Kindle search. 47 times.
Basic plot set up: spoiled southern miss needs to cross the plains to join the rest of her family in Idaho after the death of her maidenly aunt, and she's gonna (sic) do that all by herself. Enter stage left the hero on a super-secret assignment from the President to find out who is smuggling rifles to the Indians. He's a half-breed (you will be clubbed over the head with that fact throughout the book), and the perfect man to lead the wagon train and carry on his undercover operation.
So...I think this is only the second or third Connie Mason book I've read, and so far all I've ended up with is mediocre writing, too many adjectives, a silly plot full of holes in a wallpaper historical setting and sex. And by sex, I mean just that - it isn't romantic, it doesn't enhance the plot and there is most definitely not any chemistry (at least for me) between the two.
Blah. I might have let that pass, but my copy was a Kindle edition I picked up on the freebies, and I'm glad I didn't pay a penny more. My copy was littered with typos and/or conversion errors. Examples:
"She turned to leave, but found her way blocked by the hard wall of dive’s chest. Short and stocky, Clive was an immovable force before Shannon’s meager strength."
dive's?
“Thank God Callie is made of stemer stuff."
I think that should be sterner...
“You are senous, aren’t you?"
"... ladies’ xroom..."
Oh, but there's much, much worse than that and I honestly can't tell you if this is also in the original edition. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but I've googled enough that it tells me how sergeant should be spelled.
47 times according to my Kindle search. 47 times.
May 7, 2022
Just some Random Thoughts for this book but did enjoy it once the heroine stopped being a raging bitch. But once she did, she never doubted Blade at any moment and was a fierce protector of him. I accepted her in this book because of that. She may have been a bitch to him in the beginning but she defended him with a fire in her heart once she realized he was a good man and fell in love with him.
Random Thoughts:
☠ One antagonistic (a female) did not get her comeuppance and that really bothered me. She deserved to be punished.
💘 Obviously written in 1990 it had some issues that we wouldn't see in books published today.
💘 These two went through quite a bit to be together.
💘 Kidnappings, CW , racism and bigotry. Also, in CW, the hero does a forced seduction and he does
Random Thoughts:
☠ One antagonistic (a female) did not get her comeuppance and that really bothered me. She deserved to be punished.
💘 Obviously written in 1990 it had some issues that we wouldn't see in books published today.
💘 These two went through quite a bit to be together.
💘 Kidnappings, CW , racism and bigotry. Also, in CW, the hero does a forced seduction and he does
September 1, 2015
Oh for f*ck's sake. Does Connie Mason ever write anything different? I suppose her early books like Caress & Conquer count as different since she published them firmly in the Bodice Ripper era where rape, abuse, incest and all manner of heinousness was the "in" thing. Geez, I miss those days when a romance writer could shock and entertain you. This is one her later novels in which political correctness and emasculation of the hero is de rigeur. And an annoying heroine who won't STFU for anything. I love Native American culture. But good ol' Connie Mason manages to muck it up by making the Indians look like real morons. Or bloodthirsty. Or both. The heroine was really brainless. And the hero was a weak-willed dolt. Oy.
September 25, 2024
Beyond the Horizon (1990) is a typical vintage HR set in the Western U.S., 1867, that includes a wagon train, a beautiful Southern belle heroine, Shannon who falls in love with Blade who’s of NA and white heritage. Of course she’s stunningly beautiful, and he’s a hot hunk that all women lust after.
The story is fairly good… Blade who was a captain in the Union army, is now a secret agent for President Johnson and is investigating gun smuggling … someone is selling guns to the Sioux. That’s the best part of this book… the plot. Also, the prejudice against NAs and in particular Blade is raw and painful to read … realistic.
The attraction between Blade and Shannon is insta, and the sex scenes are overly dramatic with unbelievable over the top prose, the hero sure likes oral sex for the heroine. The author likes to drop sex in the story frequently… at times it’s cringy. All typical in a Mason HR.
The writing is run of the mill basic.., fairly simple sentences and at times repetitive descriptions. It didn’t soar for me or make me feel about the story emotionally. Why the name Swift Blade Stryker for the hero? I thought it stupid and slightly offensive.
Overall, okay average HR. ⭐️⭐️⭐️
The story is fairly good… Blade who was a captain in the Union army, is now a secret agent for President Johnson and is investigating gun smuggling … someone is selling guns to the Sioux. That’s the best part of this book… the plot. Also, the prejudice against NAs and in particular Blade is raw and painful to read … realistic.
The attraction between Blade and Shannon is insta, and the sex scenes are overly dramatic with unbelievable over the top prose, the hero sure likes oral sex for the heroine. The author likes to drop sex in the story frequently… at times it’s cringy. All typical in a Mason HR.
The writing is run of the mill basic.., fairly simple sentences and at times repetitive descriptions. It didn’t soar for me or make me feel about the story emotionally. Why the name Swift Blade Stryker for the hero? I thought it stupid and slightly offensive.
Overall, okay average HR. ⭐️⭐️⭐️
October 14, 2022
Read this for Regan Walker’s monthly theme/blog, June is Western\ American set month. Connie Mason has a distinct style and if you are familiar with her writing and like her books this is a good one. The H/h were good characters, and though the villain was obvious, I enjoyed the different turns the storyline took. Some of her scenes can be repetitive (again that can be CM) and she does hammer on Blade’s heritage a bit much, but it didn’t hinder the story for me and I enjoyed it.
February 7, 2021
Rating: 4.5 / 5 (rated down)
It's been a while since I've last read a native american romance and, as my first one of this year, Beyond the Horizon doesn't disappoint.
The plot is about as typical as you would expect: Shannon Branigan is headed west to meet up with her family, and so she joins a wagon train led by a half-breed scout named Swift Blade/Blade Stryker. What no one knows is that Blade is in fact an agent sent by the President to investigate the illegal smuggling and sale of guns to native renegades who attack wagon trains. What neither bargain for in their prospective journeys is love thrown into the mix, and it's on this premise that we begin our story.
So, again, pretty ordinary as far as plots go, though I did enjoy the story a lot. If there's one unique element I had to latch onto in this story, it's that both Blade and Shannon are caught between two roles and two identities: Shannon between what's expected of her in being ladylike and what she's really like with a fiery Irish temper; and Blade between how he's perceived by people in the west as a "dirty Injun half-breed" and how he lived in the east as a respectable union soldier. Of these two, obviously Blade's different identities are more interesting to shift through, though I did really appreciate how Shannon literally never just sits still and waits to be rescued or something. Nah, this girl takes action!
The historical context and support of "Women in the West" is really enjoyable as well, with suffrage movements and the importance of women in settling the west mentioned repeatedly. It's more part of the latter half of the book, but I though tit was a good addition to the overall storyline, so I thought it fit to mention it here.
Now....*sighs* the big reason for why I'm not rating this up to a full five stars. Put simply, I think that the story is too long. Or...maybe it just feels long because it's so fast-paced and so the author squeezes a lot of things in here. Just to mention some of what happens, there's:
- the wagon train journey
- Shannon being kidnapped by renegade natives
- Shannon almost being raped a couple of times by natives and white men alike (but no actual rape, thank goodness!)
- the whole gun-smuggling plot
- a few misunderstandings and jealousies to trip up the romance
- Blade's home village and family being attacked
- Blade being falsely accused of a crime and imprisoned by white men
- Blade being captured by natives and imprisoned by them for a short while
- the two mcs being separated for months at a time because their love is forbidden and whatnot
- several jealous and bad men
- one jealous and bad woman
- racism and prejudice against Shannon and Blade's marriage, including violent displays
- the women's suffrage movement in Wyoming
- the conflict between the army, settlers, and the native Sioux populations
And that's not even counting all of the sex scenes and Shannon's pregnancy that also comes into the mix. It's just...a lot. I'll admit that if I ever want a story that just keeps throwing plot points at me one after another in quick succession, then this is definitely an option to keep in mind. And, oddly enough, it's not like anything felt rushed at any time, since the author did give attention for the scenes that needed it so as to develop a story. Granted, there are some things, like Blade's grief for his family, that could have been stretched out more and made for a reasonable story, but that's not to say that there wasn't a good circulation of emotions, either.
My main and only problem was that by page 350 or so, and with nearby a hundred pages left still ot read, I felt like all the important parts of Blade and Shannon's story were kind of resolved once they moved from one location to another to begin a new life, and that everything else was just extra and adding on to new problems. It just felt unnecessary and thus unnecessarily long, you know?
Anyway, that's just my ending perspective on the book, even though I really did love it and enjoy reading every part of it. Overall, yet another fine addition to my romance shelves.
It's been a while since I've last read a native american romance and, as my first one of this year, Beyond the Horizon doesn't disappoint.
The plot is about as typical as you would expect: Shannon Branigan is headed west to meet up with her family, and so she joins a wagon train led by a half-breed scout named Swift Blade/Blade Stryker. What no one knows is that Blade is in fact an agent sent by the President to investigate the illegal smuggling and sale of guns to native renegades who attack wagon trains. What neither bargain for in their prospective journeys is love thrown into the mix, and it's on this premise that we begin our story.
So, again, pretty ordinary as far as plots go, though I did enjoy the story a lot. If there's one unique element I had to latch onto in this story, it's that both Blade and Shannon are caught between two roles and two identities: Shannon between what's expected of her in being ladylike and what she's really like with a fiery Irish temper; and Blade between how he's perceived by people in the west as a "dirty Injun half-breed" and how he lived in the east as a respectable union soldier. Of these two, obviously Blade's different identities are more interesting to shift through, though I did really appreciate how Shannon literally never just sits still and waits to be rescued or something. Nah, this girl takes action!
The historical context and support of "Women in the West" is really enjoyable as well, with suffrage movements and the importance of women in settling the west mentioned repeatedly. It's more part of the latter half of the book, but I though tit was a good addition to the overall storyline, so I thought it fit to mention it here.
Now....*sighs* the big reason for why I'm not rating this up to a full five stars. Put simply, I think that the story is too long. Or...maybe it just feels long because it's so fast-paced and so the author squeezes a lot of things in here. Just to mention some of what happens, there's:
- the wagon train journey
- Shannon being kidnapped by renegade natives
- Shannon almost being raped a couple of times by natives and white men alike (but no actual rape, thank goodness!)
- the whole gun-smuggling plot
- a few misunderstandings and jealousies to trip up the romance
- Blade's home village and family being attacked
- Blade being falsely accused of a crime and imprisoned by white men
- Blade being captured by natives and imprisoned by them for a short while
- the two mcs being separated for months at a time because their love is forbidden and whatnot
- several jealous and bad men
- one jealous and bad woman
- racism and prejudice against Shannon and Blade's marriage, including violent displays
- the women's suffrage movement in Wyoming
- the conflict between the army, settlers, and the native Sioux populations
And that's not even counting all of the sex scenes and Shannon's pregnancy that also comes into the mix. It's just...a lot. I'll admit that if I ever want a story that just keeps throwing plot points at me one after another in quick succession, then this is definitely an option to keep in mind. And, oddly enough, it's not like anything felt rushed at any time, since the author did give attention for the scenes that needed it so as to develop a story. Granted, there are some things, like Blade's grief for his family, that could have been stretched out more and made for a reasonable story, but that's not to say that there wasn't a good circulation of emotions, either.
My main and only problem was that by page 350 or so, and with nearby a hundred pages left still ot read, I felt like all the important parts of Blade and Shannon's story were kind of resolved once they moved from one location to another to begin a new life, and that everything else was just extra and adding on to new problems. It just felt unnecessary and thus unnecessarily long, you know?
Anyway, that's just my ending perspective on the book, even though I really did love it and enjoy reading every part of it. Overall, yet another fine addition to my romance shelves.
March 17, 2020
It took me a year to finish this one because I didn't like the characters, plot, settings and unnecessary side plots.
May 25, 2013
I like books about the settling of the west. This was a good one. It followed your typical wagon train pattern. Indian/part indian scout, single woman, they connect. There is public uproar, she's snatched by indians and he rescues her. But this particular one went further still. The addition of the womens suffrage and passing of the law to allow Wyoming to be the first state where women were allowed to vote and hold office was a nice addition. I also very much liked that the book was over 400 pages! Good story, very few typo's. Well developed characters. I recommend!
April 20, 2008
This is book #1 of the Horizon Set. Book #2 is A Promise of Thunder.
The setting is post Civil War, 1867. Shannon's Georgia home was destroyed and she decided to head west to find her brother. Even though it was a long time ago that I read this, I remember it well. **Wonderful story!** Shannon teams up with a wagon trail and their guide is Blade (Swift Blade).
The setting is post Civil War, 1867. Shannon's Georgia home was destroyed and she decided to head west to find her brother. Even though it was a long time ago that I read this, I remember it well. **Wonderful story!** Shannon teams up with a wagon trail and their guide is Blade (Swift Blade).
October 18, 2013
I would have given the book a higher rating, but I felt it was loaded down with unnecessary sex scenes. I'm not a prude, but I do prefer a little left to the imagination of the reader. I feel the over abundance of the very descriptive sex scenes took away from an otherwise good storyline.
October 12, 2014
love author one of my fav of hers
June 4, 2013
Excellent
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews