Sweetwood Bride

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. (July)