Mail-Order Brides of the West: Bertha

Montana Sky Series

By: Debra Holland

Narrated by: Lara Asmundson

Length: 3 hrs and 13 mins

Publisher's summary

Mail-Order Brides of the West: Bertha, a Montana Sky Series novella by NY Times and USA Today best-selling author Debra Holland

Bertha Bucholtz returns to her St. Louis home after an unsuccessful stay at the mail-order bridal agency. Her family house is overflowing with her thin, beautiful sisters and their many suitors, and shy, overweight Bertha is lost among the chaos. Even her baking skills - so praised at the agency - aren't special, for her six sisters and her mother are also excellent cooks. Desperate to be living on her own, Bertha searches for a job as a cook but with little success.

Then a letter arrives from her nemesis at the bridal agency. Shrewish Prudence Crawford, now Mrs. Michael Morgan, invites Bertha to move to Morgan's Crossing, Montana Territory and work as a cook and housekeeper at the boarding house for her husband's miners.

Upon her arrival in Morgan's Crossing, Bertha has to contend with Prudence, who seems to have mellowed - or has she? The boarding house is dirty, run-down, and full of uncouth miners. As the only single woman for miles around and a lauded cook, Bertha quickly becomes the siren of the tiny town as well as nearby Sweetwater Springs, as miners and cowboys flock to court her. Now the shy woman who had no choice of suitors has an abundance of them to pick from. She never would have dreamt having too many swains was a bigger problem than having none at all.

©2014 Debra Holland (P)2015 Debra Holland

Fantastic!

Bertha wanted to be a mail order bride. She didn’t make a match, so she took a job at Morgan’s Crossing managing a boarding house and doing the cooking. She met Howie who was a handyman for Mr. Morgan. He had been raised in an orphanage and was always in the shadows. Debra never disappoints in her very heartfelt stories. The narrator did a splendid job bringing the tale to life.

!love

This story was about people not fitting into the normal looks but being people whom also need and want love

Love finds you even when you are left behind. . .

What made the experience of listening to Mail-Order Brides of the West: Bertha the most enjoyable?

Reading the other books and wanting to know Bertha's story and how she would find love.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Howie was. He saw the beautiful woman that Bertha could not.

What about Lara Asmundson’s performance did you like?

Lara did a very good job at each character in this audible.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Prudence! Lara did a great job of showing how Prudence had changed from her book but how tough (and funny)she still was.

Any additional comments?

Debra does it again! This is the last of her Montana Brides series, for now, but I hope not for good! She does a beautiful job of bringing all the brides together along with their husbands this latest installment. What a delightful story of friendship, personal growth, and unforeseen love. Debra is a master at causing her readers to care for the people and towns that she creates. They are not merely stories in a book, but have quickly become a part of the reader's imagination! No wonder other authors have asked to continue stories about the people in Morgan Crossing, Montana through Amazon Worlds!

If you have ever been the last one to be picked on a team, you know how it feels to not really be wanted. Bertha was the last mail-order-bride to be left behind only to be sent home due to the agency's closing. Bertha's arch nemesis and fellow mail-order-bride, Prudence then informs her that there is a job opening at the mine that Prudence's new husband owns. All Bertha wants to do is bless people with her wonderful cooking and be left alone. Howie is the stable caretaker at Morgan's Crossing and does not see anything more for his life but work until he sees the new cook and boarding housekeeper, Bertha, for the first time. After that, he sees much more in his future and he plans to make Bertha part of it. Can Bertha overcome her shyness to see how much more her life can be? Can Howie persuade her that he is much more than just a mere stable "boy"? You will have to listen to find out!

More Of Bertha

I hope to hear more about Bertha and Howie soon. Such a sweet love story!

The end of the series

This is the last one from the Mail-Order Brides of the West series and just like the rest of them, this one is very sweet and clean. It doesn't have as much action / drama like others but its a very sweet story.
I will keep listening to this author and the Montana Sky series.
#tagsgiving #sweepstakes #audible #listeningatwork #mybooks

Delightful conclusion to Mail Order Brides series!

What made the experience of listening to Mail-Order Brides of the West: Bertha the most enjoyable?

Fans of the series will be thrilled that Bertha has finally received her own story! I know I was certainly happy for her! It was also a special treat to catch up with previous brides in Bertha’s story – Darcy, Lina, Trudy and Prudence all made appearances - as all of their stories seemed to coalesce herein. I loved hearing what they’ve been up to! This was a wonderful and fitting finale to the series. Bertha’s book is a funny, clean and highly satisfying novella with very little angst. It’s a delightful tale with genuinely likable characters.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Howie! He is Mr. Morgan’s stable caretaker at Morgan’s Crossing. Being an introvert, Howie doesn’t talk much. Women make him nervous and he never knows what to say – so he doesn’t. When Mrs. Morgan assigns him to making sure that the men’s new cook and housekeeper settles in and finds everything she needs, he is expecting a dried-up battle-axe. When Bertha literally falls into his arms, he is a gentleman extraordinaire. Howie immediately recognizes that Bertha is beautiful inside-and-out – something other men had missed much to their detriment. That's why he's my favorite!

Which character – as performed by Lara Asmundson – was your favorite?

It's a tie between Bertha and Prudence. Lara did a great job with both of their voices and their characterizations.

I enjoyed watching Bertha blossom with her new job through Lara's performance. As Bertha's confidence grew, her inner strength and courage came to the forefront and I was so proud of her! AND you could hear it in the way Lara voiced her character!

I was also most impressed with Prudence. She has come a long way from the bullying snit that she originally was as she has re-made herself into a much better person. Lara did a great job voicing Pru when she was fighting the devil on her shoulder and also when she was funny and someone others want to be around!

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The most memorable moment to me was when Bertha first arrived at Morgan's Crossing. She lost her balance and literally fell out of the wagon into Howie's arms. Even though she was heavy, he was a perfect gentlemen. He did not see her as heavy. He saw her as beautiful when she had been worried that she had crushed him. Here's a short snippet from that swoon worthy scene: “Don’t be sorry, Darlin’”, he said in his best cowboy drawl, “for I’m certainly not. It’s not every day a man like me gets to assist such a pretty lady. Any time you need help in or out of a wagon, you just give me a holler” he said in a teasing tone, “I’ll be right there, hoping you’ll fall in my arms again.”

Any additional comments?

Mail-Order Brides of the West: Bertha is the delightfully sweet and lovely conclusion to Debra Holland’s Mail Order Brides series. I’ve enjoyed this series so much that I hate to see it come to an end. I’m not ready to say goodbye! Bertha’s story could be enjoyed as a stand-alone read, if that is your preference. However, just know that previous characters in the series appear through-out.

Too Short!

The story was very good, but needed more character development. It would also have been nice to have Bertha & Howie develop their relationship further.

The perfect story to end the series!

Any additional comments?

Sweet, loving, and an amazing cook, Bertha had given up on finding love. After the agency closes she takes a great leap of faith in leaving home to travel out to see her old nemesis Prudence and take her up on her offer of a job. When she first arrives she is pretty sure she made a huge mistake but as she literally falls in to the arms of Howie the handyman she realizes that this may be the best decision she ever made after all!

This is my favorite book in the Mail Order Brides of the West series! We get to check back in on all of the amazing women from the agency and their families! I am sad to see their stories end but know that there will be glimpses of them in Debra's other books.

Mail Order Bride Bertha

A wonderful story of this character coming full circle and coming into her own. A great ending for the msil order bride series.

What a great character

I loved the main character, Bertha! Ms.Holland made her so entertaining. There were chuckles and teary eyes all wrapped into this heartwarming saga! I enjoyed my journey thoroughly with each page! Indeed!