Spirited heiress Princess "Cessy" Calhoun falls head over heels in love with a sophisticated gentleman named Gerald, not realizing that her beloved is actually the ambitious Tom Walker, who plans to woo Cessy to pursue his dreams of finding oil
As always, Pamela Morsi portrays slice-of-life Americana to perfection. This time the setting is the boom-or-bust oil fields of Oklahoma at the turn of the 20th century. Morsi infuses the time with charm and excitement, and wonderfully captures the entrepreneurial spirit of those early oil magnates. Unfortunately, Princess Calhoun and Tom Walker were far from my favorite characters. Even Morsi's usually terrific secondary characters felt a little flat. In my humble opinion, this author cannot write a bad book, but this one just wasn't my favorite.
In No Ordinary Princess by Pamela Morse is a delightful western romance tale set in the early 1900s in the American west. I must say the title intrigued me as I made predictions of this story. Normally, the word princess denotes faraway lands with knights and royalty. This story takes place in the American west and the princess is a young woman, a daughter of an oil baron, who is named Princess. Destiny brings this princess together with Tom Walker, a decent guy who because of the circumstances of his birth, has seen a difficult life. Dreaming of bettering his life, Tom dreams of marrying a rich woman and sets his hat on Miss Princess. Hence the plot line follows these two main characters. Will Princess find true love? Will Tom's dream come true?
I love the way Ms. Morsi developed her characters, both main characters, but her secondary characters were equally crafted. The entire cast of characters were not only multi-layered; they were well rounded as well. They contributed to moving this character-driven plot line. I enjoyed the way Ms. Morsi used the literary devices of descriptive language and dialog in this tale to draw the reader into her plot. The descriptions of the oil drilling made the reader feel as though they were right along side the oil workers. Ms. Morsi did a great job and I highly recommend this book.
A re-read I picked up at the UBS for a buck several months back. Not one of my favorite Morsis, but good. I truly miss this turn of the century brand of historical. This one was more hero-centric than heroine, and I kind of appreciated it.
4.5/ Estrelas! Sim, o enredo é um tanto surreal, mas é muito bem contado e a escrita da autora é primorosa! Um história de amor super lindinha, que começa em meio a um emaranhado de mentiras, porém se equilibra ao final com grandes aprendizados.
My surprise was my own fault because I just started reading chapter 1 before I read what the book was about. I liked the cover and had been impressed by all the other Pamela Morsi books I've read. This Princess was not royalty though her dad was King Calhoun. In Texas, drilling for oil in the early 20th century, King thought he had found a good source of crude oil, but needed a refinery nearby to make money on the deal. Tom Walker, raised in a nearby orphanage, had fought with Teddy Roosevelt as a famous Rough Rider in Cuba. Now he meets Princess at a Fourth of July party and wants to impress her, so he pretends to be Gerald, a rich man from back east. However, he finds work on the oil rig and is known as Tom among those people. The characters were strong, deeply developed, flawed and realistic. I enjoyed the story as well as the social awareness of the people in different stations during that time. It rang true to the stories from my grandparents and brings more understanding between generations when you get immersed in a well developed story from over a century ago.
I absolutely loved this story! The kind that you find yourself smiling as you read. The characters are warm and well rounded. I especially loved Cedarleg and Ma Pease. Comical too! But my favorite is that the heroine Miss Princess Calhoun was not a beauty. My favorite kind of book! I always enjoy a Pamela Morsi. I hope you do as well. Enjoy! 😸
I am from Oklahoma and it was fascinating reading about the beginnings of the oil business . Since my husband and children are Choctaw, I was also interested in the Indian aspect, too. Add in that it was a good book, and you have the perfect book for me. You will love the book even if you aren't from Oklahoma.
This was a great story. I have it a four star due to the epilogue and ending. After such a wonderful love story with trials and tribulations the end was lousy. Can't explain it, I just didn't like it.
A life of deceit meets a maid who can stand up to it -- Oh, there is that little thing called love. It was an interesting read just to see how they would work thru that Much longer read than needed, but I sure didn't want to lay the book down. I'm glad love can win.
Early Oklahoma, before statehood and oil is all over. Rich are getting richer and riggers getting money but when wells dry up no $$$$$. Her father is an oil baron and named his only daughter Princess. Several men are interested in her daddy's money.
This one, admittedly, is not my favourite Morsi, maybe because I get frustrated when one character deceives the other for an extended amount of time, but Tom is a closet sweetheart n Cessy is better than all of us. So I enjoyed it, but not as much as the others.
What a sweet love story about a woman who lived before her time but married a man who was as progressive as she was. Although their lives together start out in quicksand, they find a solid foundation to build on.
I particularly like Pamela Morsi books. This one seems totally different from the others I've read. It's different but good. I hope everyone enjoys it.
This is a dnf. I was looking for a light fluffy read. Unfortunately, I disliked the characters, the way they treated each other, the story. So I bailed.
Most of the fun came from watching fuck-up no-good con-man Tom keeping his story together. I just wish there had been some satisfactory grovel, the h lets him off so easily.
This was a very interesting story. I enjoyed the clever wit , the mysticism and the banter between the two main characters. The length of the story was enough for the plot to really develop.
I was really hooked for the first half eagerly anticipating the BIG REVEAL and wondering how the author was going to create a HEA for this couple given the H’s deception. I was expecting a big grovel and a period of earning back trust by the H. I kept looking down at my Kindle page and when it got to about 70% of the way and the H hadn’t been found out yet I knew I was headed for disappointment. And I was! No big grovel! Just one big fight and then all was resolved very neatly.
I really wish we had more of the Syrian couple’s love story!! That was the h’s best friend’s arranged marriage. The author teased us with that wooing but we never got their HEA. If any book ever needed a secondary romance it was this one! The author had the right idea including not one but two secondary romances! The other one with the h’s father and a brothel madam was OK but the Syrian couple was much more endearing! That could’ve been a book on its own. So yeah I was disappointed by the way the author resolved the conflict between the MCs. But I still liked the writing and the secondary romance. This is a good author so she still gets 3 stars.
Príbeh mal svoje čaro aj keď mi dlho nešlo do hlavy, ako je možné, že to Tomovi všetko prechádza tak hladko? A vôbec, ako môže byť hlavný hrdina taký naivný, že sám seba presvedčí o tom, že vytvorením novej identity (Geralda Cranea) sa zabudne na jeho druhú osobnosť (Toma Walkera)? Aby som to uviedla na pravú mieru - Tom Walker túži po peniazoch a jediný spôsob akým ich vie získať je oženiť sa s Princess, dcérou Kinga Calhouna, majiteľa naftovej rafinérie Royal Oil. Láka ho však naftárčina a kým po večeroch chodí dvoriť Cessy (a tvári sa ako aristokrat Gerald), cez deň pracuje ako zoraďovač Tom na naftových poliach. Pri práci sa spoznáva s mnohými ľuďmi, ktorých pozná samotný King a jeho dcéra. Preto sa pýtam, ako mohol byť Tom taký naivný, keď si myslel, že akonáhle dostane Cessy "do chomúta" zmizne Tom Walker zo sveta a všetci naňho razom zabudnú? Zvyšok recenzie si môžete prečítať tu:
I read it again after two years and I find that I like it more now than I did the first time around. Not my favorite work of the author still good enough to be picked up and read once again.
None of the main characters are especially likable but they are good together.