As irrepressible as Ramona Quimby, as adventurous as Anne of Green Gables, and as spirited as Laura Ingalls Wilder, Helen Mar Carter Monson survives the aftermath of WWI, the deadly flu epidemic of 1918, sliding down a haystack into a convict's lap, the dissolution of her parents' marriage, skinny-dipping in the penitentiary pond, and two broken noses among many other adventures. All this in just the first book of three about her young life.

True stories originally told to entertain bored children, and then written in vivid first-person description, No Ordinary Life: An Autobiography of Helen Mar Carter Monson, offers honest and often humorous insight into the life of a little girl grappling with questions about right and wrong, God, social norms, and her role as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, while early twentieth century Salt Lake City grows up with her.