What a wonderful book!
These is My Words is the sprawling, funny, sad, heart-racingly good story of a settler in the Arizona Territories. The book begins when Sarh Prine is seventeen. Her family tries a misbegotten trip East, ultimately ending with the death of a younger brother. They decide to return to the Arizona Territories, in a wagon train guarded by Army regulars.
It is there that Sarah meets the man who will be the love of her life, the dashing Captain Jack Elliott. Through Indian attacks, illness, more deaths, and shatteringly terrible weather, the Prine family perseveres and settles on new claims in Arizona.
And then the action really begins!
Sarah is a heroine for our age: feisty, capable, and stronger than the mesquite of her home, she faces horrors that most of us can only imagine. Through her eyes, we see the incredibly difficult process of taming an untamed land, building a life there, and raising children with honesty and similar strength. She endures a loveless first marriage and rebuilding her life afterward, as well.
Re enter Captain Elliott. Through the years, he's kept track of the Prines and kept a hand in their lives, enjoying a cantankerous relationship with Sarah over the years. It's clear to all but her that Jack is her other half, though she finally comes to recognize that fact. Some of the best repartee and scenes in the book are between her and her Army love ( and his love letter... *sigh*), but this book is not a historical romance. Though her relationship with her first husband and Jack are important parts of her life, they are only parts. Through her journal, we see the scope of pioneer life.
I can't say enough about this book. The prose is wonderfully written, and the characters believable. I'm a history nut, and so have read my share of true accounts of pioneer life. This story rings true. I give this four coffee cups on a five cup scale.
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