Upside Down in a Laura Ingalls Town

Upside Down in a Laura Ingalls Town

It has been a long and difficult year for the Decker family, especially for sixteen-year-old Brooke. Her grades have plummeted. She deliberately breaks curfew. She makes out with boys she hardly knows. And now her father has totally lost it. When Tim Decker signs up his family of three to be contestants on a Hollywood reality show, Brooke’s life turns upside down. The place: The North Carolina backcountry. The year: 1861. Brooke is forced to trade in her Victoria’s Secret bra for a rib-cracking corset, her comfy jeans for an ugly farm dress, and her private bathroom for an outhouse. Television cameras will follow her every move as she lives the grueling life of a mid-nineteenth-century farm girl: milking a cow, churning butter, fetching water countless times a day, and riding in a horse-drawn wagon along a rutted road to spend pennies in town. This will be Brooke’s life for four awful months. Unless, of course, she breaks the rules and the producers kick her off the show…Other families are scattered throughout Sweet Sugar Gap. The snotty Prudence Miller soon becomes Brooke’s rival. Wendell Murphy, who works at the local mercantile, is instantly smitten with Brooke—but also makes her suspicious. Does the only cute boy in town really like her, or is he merely showing off for the cameras?Brooke Decker may just have to find a way to make it in the backcountry, leaving behind the modern frills she can’t live without. But can a young girl’s wishful heart surrender to a time and place she believes she can never call home? "Brooke's voice feels authentic as she struggles to reconnect with her fractured family, and Manning's historical research shows...an entertaining novel with realistic characters readers should find it easy to invest in." ~Publishers Weekly "Touching, heartwarming, humorous and inspiring." ~ Midwest Book Reviews "Clearly, [Manning] has researched living situations at that time very well...I appreciated how much more in depth this was when describing the differences in living circumstances...nice twists at the end!" ~ YA Books Central "This endearing tale will make any young reader realize the importance of family, especially when one of them is no longer there." ~ Story Monsters Ink "Poignant and funny by turns, Upside Down in a Laura Ingalls Town touches the heart through both the tears and laughter." ~ Teresa Lynn, Hen Scratches Reviews For the writing of this book, I interviewed a tonsorial owner who still shaves his clients with a straight razor (he practiced on my husband's face); I drove to different working farms to see how the homesteads were laid out; I watched countless videos on milking cows and churning butter; and, of course, I had to make sure my Civil War facts were straight! What if you went back in time...and Hollywood was watching? Leslie Tall Manning is a private English tutor and writing specialist. She spends her evenings working with students of all ages and her days working on her own writing projects. When she isn't clacking away at the computer keys or conducting research for her books, she loves traveling with her artist husband. She is happily represented by the TridaUS Literary Agency.