Sweetwood Bride

June 28, 1999
Celebrating the simple life, Morsi (The Love Charm) writes backwoods romances about people who do well at "doin' what comes naturally." In this sweet love story about the mountain community of Sweetwood, Tenn., heroine Eulie Toby, the eldest of six orphaned Toby children, forces Mosco Collier into marriage by accusing him of getting her with child. Poor, lonely Moss is the last man on earth to want to be saddled with a "stringy haired bride." Always prone to wanderlust, he's now planning to move to Texas after the expected death of his crippled uncle Jeptha. However, when Eulie gives him his freedom by promising to care for Jeptha, who lost both legs in the Civil War, Moss begins to invent reasons to delay his departure. As the reader learns about Tennessee mountain customs--shivarees, poundings, gauntlets, Wink-em--Moss begins to find that Eulie more than makes up for Texas. Occasionally saccharine, Morsi's folktales are nevertheless a welcome departure from run-of-the-mill historical romances.

August 1, 1999
A shotgun wedding isn't exactly the ideal way to begin a marriage, and lying about the need for one just makes matters worse; but Eulie Toby needs a home for her five younger siblings-and saying Moss Collier has gotten her in the family way is the only way she could think of doing it. Furious and frustrated, Moss vows revenge; but he reckons without his new bride's determination, and he certainly doesn't count on falling in love. A Tennessee setting that radiates down-home country charm, a cast of decent, touchingly human, and eminently appealing characters, and a liberal lacing of gentle humor combine to create a sweetly sensual, optimistic story that is vintage Morsi (Sealed with a Kiss). Morsi's Americana romances are some of the best of the genre. She lives in San Antonio, TX.

Copyright 1999 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.