Mail Order Promise
by Caroline Clemmons is the first, followed by Mail Order Ruckus by Jacquie Rogers
Clemmons has created a wonderfully real setting filled with
three dimensional characters we’d all love to meet in real life.
About Caroline
Clemmons
Caroline Clemmons is an Amazon bestselling author of
historical and contemporary western romances. Her books have garnered numerous
awards. Her most recent novel, BLUEBONNET BRIDE, is a poignant tale of tender
redemption. A frequent speaker at conferences and seminars, she has taught
workshops on characterization, point of view, and layering a novel.
About Mail Order
Promise
Mail Oder Promise
unfolds amongst the backdrop of the a-little-bit-tamed Wild West, on a cattle
ranch where the cowboys ride armed and the women earn their keep. It sets
itself up for a sweet romance between a tough, practical young rancher and a pampered
rich girl who has been brought down in the world and in desperation signed
herself up to be a mail order bride. They sum each other up pretty quickly,
each writing the other off as an unrefined bully and spoiled brat respectively.
How will they be persuaded to see past their prejudices?
The characters are beautifully portrayed. Ellie is hugely
dislikeable at the start, but still I couldn’t help relating to her. Her
greatest sin is the inability to shut up, and I think we’ve all been in the
position of putting foot in mouth at the worst possible time. Having been
brought up surrounded by prosperity and opulence, she has never worked a day in
her life, and her arrival on the ranch is a rude awakening.
Thank God her character is the one who goes through the
biggest transformation. It was a little bit of a stretch, but she becomes a
more likeable, hardworking ranch woman by the end of the story.
Kage, the male love interest, is hugely likeable. He sizes
her up pretty quickly and I have to admit fairly accurately. I think he’s way
too good for her, but it’s a mercy he didn’t listen to me because the ending is
predictably sweet. Where Ellie’s problem is her big mouth (and inability to
boil the jug), Kage’s problem is his stubbornness. They find each other
attractive but unsuitable, and the usual misunderstandings follow.
The pace of the story is mostly good. I felt the ending
didn’t have the “punch” in the right place, ending with a rather sickly picture
of family bliss, which I felt was not necessary to the story. I was wondering
if someone was about to jump out of a box. But no, it was just a few extra
pages of happiness.
The rest of the book however does some perfect head
switching from her to him and back again; just the right amount spent in his for us to know that she is the author’s main focus, but that
he doesn’t find her wholly unattractive… just annoying. Which I did too, so she
had to get herself over that.
I found the calf burial exceptionally comedic. It wasn’t
till I’d finished the scene that I realised I’d found it ridiculous, because I
think I expected a different point to it, but when it was over I realised it
was all about him showing his softer side. At the time it was telling me that
she was soft in the head, and I was seriously rethinking the direction the
story was taking. Markers about her “delicate condition” were beginning to make
sense, and I started wondering if the story would have a more serious side,
falling somewhere among the mental health stars. But no. It wasn’t that she was
a bit loony or seriously immature, she was just far too well bred. (A calf
burial though? On a cattle ranch? Bless his cotton socks, Kage found it
ridiculous too.)
So he is great the whole way through, she is annoying at the
start and less annoying at the end, and the rest of the cast are pretty darn
good. The sister is an also ran who could have been left out - I got no reading
at all on her personality. Not even a blip. Grandpa and Inga are simply gold.
They breathe beautifully. I especially I love the scene where Inga doesn’t let
the also-ran sister Laura go to help Ellie with the washing. She says it all in
that one line.
All in all Mail Order Promise delivers all it promises:
well-rounded characters, a slow-to-develop storyline that builds with good
pace, dialogue and beautiful scene-setting, and a very sweet romance between
two - er, one and a half - likeable characters.
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