The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels--A Love Story (2011 original; edició 2011)

Okay, I'm a little embarrassed to be caught reading this book, but I was also pleasantly surprised at how well-written, entertaining and funny Ree's book is. She tells you in her introduction that it started out as kind of a lark, writing in her blog about how she met her husband following a 4-year dead-end (for HER) relationship, and the whirlwind, steamy, every day courtship that ensued with her "Marlboro Man" cowboy suitor who would soon become her husband. She's also pretty honest about how she patterned her writing after Harlequin-style romance novels. And that is indeed how her story reads. (Yes, I have peeked into a few Harlequins - BLUSH!)

I "know" Ree Drummond through her daily cooking shows on the Food Network, which my wife checks in on almost every day. I'm not a fan of the show, by the way. A bit too nasal, syrupy and cutesy for my taste - and who really cares about cooking anyway? (Not I.) But I bought Ree's memoir, PIONEER WOMAN: BLACK HEELS TO TRACTOR WHEELS, for my wife a few years ago, and just got around to trying it myself. And I made it through over 200 pages of it, before it finally got just a little too redundant - all that endless "Marlboro Man" stuff and how hot and sexy he was, etc. It was kinda surprising to find that she grew up very privileged and wealthy - the middle child of an Oklahoma physician, in a big suburban house on a golf course. And went to college and lived in California for a time, and had planned to go to law school in Chicago, until she met this guy, who quite literally swept her off her feet. And they are still married, twenty-some years and four children later. So I knew how their story ended - like a Harlequin romance, "happily ever after," I'm sure - so far so good, so to speak. Two-hundred plus pages was enough for me. I've got other books waiting.

But Ree Drummond is actually a pretty bright woman, who writes engagingly and well, and I'm not surprised her memoir was a bestseller - women would REALLY love her story, I'm sure. Well, obviously they DO, because there are several thousand reader reviews on the book's Amazon page and elsewhere online, and most of them are very positive. And I liked her writing, up to a point. Highly recommended - especially to women, even those who do not number in her legions of fans for her cooking show. Good job, Ree.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER ( )

The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels To Tractor Wheels 🍒🍒🍒
By Ree Drummond
2011
Harper Collins

There is a saying - you'll find love in the strangest places, when you least expect it- and this memoir of Ree Drummond decision to forego her Big City Girl high class life to become the wife of a rancher, begs us to follow this premise. This novel reads like a made for TV Hallmark movie. Just plain sweet, gooey and.oozing with love for her Marlboro Man. It seems throughout the book, she is trying more to sell the story, then tell the story. For.me, some.of references and how she.portrays hee developmentally disabled brother were rather, odd and cold. Distant. Referring to the man she is so smitten with as Marlboro Man, never giving him a name, an identity. Just Marlboro Man....
"I'd found the one man on earth who would appreciate my spots if imperfection....and who wouldn't try to polish them all away." p.107

" I knew the last of the struggles weren't fully behind us.
But still.....I couldn't shake the feeling.
I could see it. I knew
The sun was getting ready to rise."

I do like Ree and adore her daily show on Food Network, The Pioneer Woman. I enjoy watching her cook and bake and her family, which are center on her show. She is a woman very sure of her capabilities, and knows the importance of selling the product. In this case, herself. But her sincere love of cooking and baking are always refreshing. She seems to have seamlessly evolved from a city girl to a pioneer woman, has several cookbooks, a popular blog, and her own store, the Merc. Her success speaks for.itself, as does her love of her family, esp her children and, of course, her work.
Why does she sound so lonely?

Easy and good read. Recommended. Includes some family recipes. ( )

Stumbled on Ree's (Pioneer Woman, plus other offshoots) blog by accident and enjoyed it for a while, until I got sick of seeing 9K photos of her ugly dogs. Her story of city-girl winds up on a ranch could have been really entertaining and insightful, but it is not. Drummond really needs an editor to teach her to avoid endless repetition, unnecessary details and off-topic tangents. One can only read about "marlboro man's" biceps so many times. She leaves out so much, yet repeats herself so often. Her writing is light and breezy, fluffy. I will stick to her blogs, but will press delete whenever I see those dogs... ( )

UGH. I had been familiar with Drummond's work after reading parts of her blog years ago and occasionally reading it now and again. I knew some the story of her Marlboro Man, but thought it'd be worth buying the book instead of trying to sort it through the places on her blog.

What an awful load of tripe. It reads very much like a terrible romance novel, complete with trying to adjust to his world of working on a ranch, her parents divorcing, a perhaps unstable boyfriend, etc. At first it started off well, with her breaking things off with a boyfriend, however things start to go sour when she "disinvites" him from her older brother's wedding and he seems to be somewhat stalker-y. She meets her future husband and most of the book discusses their courtship and the beginning of the marriage.

I got bored when she described snuggling and cuddling with Marlboro Man (who is never named. I realize she used/uses this in her blog, that I find it really strange. It seems to indicate she has this idealized vision of him which is a little creepy) repeatedly. Yes, he's romantic and there's chemistry and it's great. But it got really repetitive after a while.

To be honest, I'm not really sure what MM sees in this woman. She comes across as narcissistic, selfish, immature and just downright annoying. It's not really clear if she was trying to make herself more sympathetic or feel she was not good enough or what by relating her anxieties and what seems like an inability to cope sometimes.

She doesn't appear to change throughout the book, despite her parents divorce and the marriage and pregnancy of her first child. I realize this was very much a memoir of her early part of her relationship to MM, but holy cow did she come across as irritating. I was also surprised to see she appears to be happy living on a ranch. I have family that did something similar, giving up relatively well-paying jobs in a major metropolitan area to work on a farm. But Drummond doesn't seem the type (to me, from the book) that would have adjusted to living on a ranch and the work that comes with it. But apparently they made it work and good for them.

Honestly, you're probably a lot better just reading her blog. Don't buy this book. Borrow it if you really want to read it, but it's my understanding that most of this material can be found on her blog anyway. ( )

Fun, Lite, Quick... where's my beach??
The blogger Pioneer Woman wrote her meeting/courtship/marriage of Marlboro Man as a serial blog on her website. This is the collection plus more meat to the story.
I've enjoyed her website for some time (and the book was given to me) so a no-lose situation. ( )