From her ranch home in Montana in the 1920s, Nettie Brady dreamed of joining the rodeo circuit and becoming a star.

Defying her mother''s wishes and trading her skirts for trousers--and riding the range with her brothers and taking on the occasional half-ton steer in local rodeos--Nettie bucked convention to compete with men in the arena. When family hardship and tragedy threaten her plans, she turns back toward a more traditional life as a ranch woman, but chafes against its restrictions. Then she meets and falls in love with a young neighbor who rides broncs and raises rodeo stock. Can Nettie''s rodeo dreams come true if she''s also a wife and mother?

Based on the life of the author''s grandmother, a real Montana cowgirl, this novel takes on the big issues of a woman''s place in the west, the crushing difficulties of surviving on a homestead, and the excitement and romance of a young girl aching to follow her dream.