How to Lose a Bride in One Night (25 page)
A
few years ago I was reading from a book of fairytales to my daughter when we came across the Chinese fairy tale,
The Beggar Princess
. In this story, the Beggar King’s daughter marries a penniless young man with high social ambitions. Greedy for the money she brings to their union but embarrassed by his low-bred wife, he throws her overboard. Sound familiar? The Beggar Princess survives, of course. At this point in the story my daughter and I were breathless with anticipation to see the Beggar Princess overcome such a tragic turn, claim her happily ever after, and—fingers crossed!—watch as the wretched husband got his comeuppance. As I continued reading, that expectation was dashed.
The Beggar Princess and her husband eventually meet again. To make a long story short, he apologizes, she forgives him and they live happily ever after. The end. I was horrified . . . and left struggling to explain to my four-year-old daughter that women do not live happily ever with men who attempt to murder them.
Needless to say, the story of
The Beggar Princess
stuck with me all these years. It inspired the idea for the Forgotten Princesses series, and nothing is more fitting than concluding this series with Annalise’s story. She is
my
Beggar Princess—the way the story should have been told. I hope you agree and enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.
Happy reading,
Sophie
S
OPHIE
J
ORDAN
, a former high school English teacher, resides in Houston with her family. When she’s not writing, she divides her time between inventing what she likes to call culinary masterpieces—her husband won’t always agree—and visiting her family’s pecan ranch in the scenic Texas Hill Country.
Please visit her on the web at www.sophiejordan.net.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
HOW TO LOSE A BRIDE IN ONE NIGHT
. Copyright © 2013 by Sharie Kohler. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition AUGUST 2013 ISBN: 9780062033048
Print Edition ISBN: 978-0-06-203301-7
FIRST EDITION
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