These Is My Words (Sarah Agnes Prine, #1) in Around the World in 80 Books

Jul 16, 2011 mstan rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favourites, american, historical-fiction, src-summer-2011

I wasn't really looking forward to reading this; I was doing it for my geeky Summer Reading Challenge, and thought that a loooong story about pioneers and Indians written in incomprehensibly ungrammatical English (why not 'this are my words', which is a more common error?) would be a chore to read. Then again, I wouldn't have read it if not for the Challenge, so I heart the Challenge.

This is not literature; it is a sappy love story with an ass-kicking Scarlett O'Hara (OK, not really - she just g I wasn't really looking forward to reading this; I was doing it for my geeky Summer Reading Challenge, and thought that a loooong story about pioneers and Indians written in incomprehensibly ungrammatical English (why not 'this are my words', which is a more common error?) would be a chore to read. Then again, I wouldn't have read it if not for the Challenge, so I heart the Challenge.

This is not literature; it is a sappy love story with an ass-kicking Scarlett O'Hara (OK, not really - she just gets a scarlet cloak at some point) in the Arizona Territories as the protagonist. Within the first twenty pages, about five people close to Sarah Agnes Prine have succumbed to bullet wounds, Indian arrows and snakebites while on their way to seek a better living in the territories from Texas. There is a particularly disgusting river scene involving Sarah, her female Quaker friends, and two brutes.

I couldn't quite look away - it's like an adult Laura Ingalls Wilder - with peach cobblers and pecan trees on the one hand, and train robberies and scalping on the other.

Jack Elliott is simply wonderful - it's a bit embarrassing for me to admit that I like him, because he isn't that complex and the parts of Sarah's diary that mention him are what I imagine those novels carrying 'romance' stickers on their spine would sound like... with a dose of ranch-related reality.

pg. 164 - "I must think about something else for a while. But then I remember his warm arms and his big strong legs touching mine, and how hard and wide his chest was and how hot his kiss was, and I go outside and feed the chickens. They are getting mighty fat."

pg. 274 - "Then I was done crying. Crying over that man is a waste of water. And I still have to go to the outhouse again."

I was thinking about a 4-star rating, but did enjoy the experience of reading this so much that I know I will always think of this book with fondness, and probably want to reread bits of it at some point in the future (something I rarely feel because I am always trying to forge ahead and devour new things). ...more

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Sep 24, 2023 Julie rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: to-read-own

Really good! Hard to put down once you start reading it, this quiet yet powerful story of a young surprised me. Her strength and independence, her intelligence and grit. Loved hearing about these settlers in the territories, though the times were hard and heartbreaking in so many ways. I understand all the love for this book!

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Oct 15, 2011 Heather-Lea rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Loved this book. There were so many interesting things that happened to this woman- good and bad. I enjoyed reading every moment, though the sad times were very sad. Well written and time period appropriate.

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