About the Book

Book: The Debutante’s Second Chance

Author: Lisa M. Prysock

Genre: Christian Historical Romance

Release date: January 28, 2025

As the horseracing world teeters on the brink of collapse, she fights to save her family’s stables.
The return of the man who once shattered her heart is the last thing she needs—or is it?

Miss Gladdie Lyndon’s world is turned upside down when her father’s stroke leaves her in charge of Velvet Brooks Horse Farm. With the horseracing industry in decline and the 1908 Kentucky Derby on the brink of cancellation, Gladdie faces an uphill battle to save her family’s legacy. The pressure mounts as clients abandon the farm, leaving her to pin all hopes on a mysterious new horse champion.

As she grapples with these challenges, Gladdie is blindsided by the return of Clay Grinstead—the man who left her heartbroken on the eve of their wedding. Now a widowed father, Clay has come back to Lexington with dreams of a fresh start and a determination to win back Gladdie’s love. He sees an opportunity to help her save Velvet Brooks and the Derby, but Gladdie must decide if she can trust him.

As they navigate financial peril and emotional wounds, Clay works to tear down the walls around Gladdie’s heart. Together, they must confront their shared history and forge a path forward. Can they rescue the farm and revive the Derby, or will their past heartbreak thwart their future happiness?

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About the Author

Lisa M. Prysock is a USA TodayBestselling Author who writes both Christian Historical Romance and Contemporary Christian Romance books—”Romance with a Dash of Food, Fashion, Faith, & Fun.” She writes both traditionally and indie published novels.

Kentucky inspires her writing and is home. Happily married to her husband of more than 24 years, she homeschooled two of their five children, now grown. When she isn’t writing, she likes to cross stitch, crochet, sew, scrapbook, read, swim, dance, take walks, travel, explore historical homes, garden, cook for her family, learn to play the piano and violin, and read great books.

More from Lisa

I wrote this book because I firmly believe in second chances. In fact, I believe in third, fourth, and fifth chances too. I’m a recipient of God’s grace and He’s been so good to me, giving me many second chances when I didn’t always deserve it, and sometimes, just because it was needed. He also knows when something hasn’t necessarily been fair in our lives. He is the God who sees, and many times I’ve seen Him step forward to grant me an opportunity or a second chance in my life because something happened that wasn’t my fault, didn’t go in my favor, and actually made things harder for me, but He wanted to make it right and gave me something extra to work all things together for my good. I’m sure many of you can relate. Isn’t this a marvelous thing when it happens?

Our heroine, the main character, Gladdie—a family name for my maternal great aunt and my maternal grandmother—is given a second chance at romance after being jilted by the hero, Clay. But can Gladdie forgive him after he jilted her? Clay has reasons for what happened, but Gladdie has no idea what his reasons are. Will she ever give him a chance to explain? As you can see, it’s all about second chances, all the way around.

I also wrote this book because one of the secondary characters in the story reminds me of someone dear to my heart who went through tremendously difficult things. Unspeakable things I can’t write. Maybe it was therapeutic for me to write that character’s story somehow. Sometimes people we love experience hardship and there isn’t anything we can do about it except pray after we’ve done everything else we can do. I can’t wait to bring a beautiful ending for that particular character in a sequel.

There is a third and fourth reason I wrote this story. Thirdly, I wanted to give readers a glimpse of Gilded Age Europe and the horseracing world of England and France. I plan to write more of this in a sequel as well. It was so much fun to share more about the Gilded Age history of racing from a European perspective by taking readers to Ascot and Longchamps.

Fourthly, my research led me to understand more about the reality of the decline in horseracing in America that began around the time of the Gilded Age. Tracks were closing all around the nation. We’d gone from having more than three-hundred racecourses to fewer than fifty. New York had introduced legislation that could alter the course of racing in that state too, and many feared other states would soon follow.

I was fascinated to read about how Colonel Matt Winn, the President of Churchill Downs, helped to save the Kentucky Derby of 1908 as I read more about the opposition they faced. The changes in the industry brought about machine betting, or what is commonly known as pari-mutuel betting. It was so interesting that it didn’t take me long to begin to see my characters involved with saving the Derby of 1908 too. While most of my story is fictionalized, I think readers will find it a fascinating read as I’ve included the nuts and bolts from my research about this situation. In any case, I hope readers will immensely enjoy The Debutante’s Second Chance. It comes directly from my heart.

My Impressions

“He only allowed suffering to mold character into people or for some other good reason. Maybe affliction and suffering were what made the great truly capable of amazing things.”

In The Debutante’s Second Chance by Lisa Prysock, we return to the early world of Kentucky horse racing and the Velvet Brooks horse farm for yet a third sister’s story. This book has enough backstory so the novel could be read by itself, but it definitely builds on what has been learned in the first two books of the Kentucky Debutantes of the Gilded Age series.

Having read two of these stories, it appears jilting may be a common theme. In this case, it’s Gladdie who is jilted on the evening she runs away to elope. Her groom-to-be never shows. Instead, Gladdie shame-facedly returns home to find her former love already married, and some very puzzling actions taken by his family.

Seven years later, Clay Grinstead shows up in town, determined to get an invite to the biggest ball of the Lexington area and determined that Gladdie will be his beau. Gladdie has spent years nursing a broken heart and wants only to forget Clay was ever a part of her life. What will it take for Clay to convince Gladdie she’s always been in his heart?

If that weren’t heartache enough, Gladdie is now running the family horse farm by herself. Due to an upsurge in unpopularity of racetrack betting, racetracks are closing and clients are removing their horses from Gladdie’s trainers. It will take a miracle for the farm and horse racing to survive.

Prysock takes you to the Lexington countryside, where you can see miles upon miles of wooden fences with beautiful horses and huge barns and a few mansions. You will learn about the way of life during this time, and experience the excitement of watching some famous races. We meet the real-life president of Churchill Downs during this time, who did much to promote horse racing. While many may feel any betting is wrong, Prysock takes a more balanced approach: “When people chose to spend more than they should or drink excessively at these events, that was when they became evil. Moderation was key.”

I thought Prysock’s solution rather inventive and fun. I laughed a lot at one solution Gladdie came up with to a different problem. But, I did think the author let her off easy on that one!

I did war with myself about whether Clay deserved a second chance or not. After all, “perhaps forgiving did not necessarily include inviting someone to become so close that the individual might cause hurt, pain, and turmoil again.” Yet, we all want second chances for ourselves, and God is gracious.

Here is another thought that resonated with me. Gladdie tells Clay, “Family is family. We have to support and love each other, in good times and bad.” My own family is discovering this to be so true!

I received a copy of the book from Celebrate Lit. I also bought my own copy. No positive review was required, and all opinions are my own.

Notable Quotable:

“Nothing spoke the word love like good old-fashioned hard work.”