Laura Ingalls Wilder (1867–1957)

This is my favorite book in this series. I love how hopeful it is. The farm is finally starting to produce and although they still have their challenges I love reading about how things are getting just a little bit easier. They now have a proper "house" with actual bedrooms. It was fun to read about how the town is starting to grow. It was bittersweet reading about Mary going away but exciting to know that now she is able to learn new things. I loved reading about all the events in town! The literaries were really fun and the birthday party. This is the period of the Little House "lifestyle" that I always fantasize about living in.
One thing that jumped out at me this time that I never really noticed before in the dozens of times I've read this book was "A grown-up person must never let feelings be shown by voice or manner." I wonder why this was. Why wasn't it okay to show any feelings, even surprise?
Another thing that just boggles my mind every time I read this book was during the school exhibition. How much more information they knew than people now. Being able to do the mental arithmetic. I'm sure there are still people that can do this in their head, but the majority of people that I know would not be able to divide 347,264 by 16 in their head.
This is a book that I really enjoy reading, even though I've read it dozens of times!… (more)

I really enjoyed my re-read of this book. I've read it many times in the past. I did find the first part quite disheartening reading of how hard it was for some of these women who didn't want to be in the west. There is something to be said for making the best of a bad situation but I can see the point of view of Mrs. Brewster as well. The monotony of day after day in a cold dreary home seeing no one but your husband and son. What a miserable place Mrs. Brewster made it for Laura.

I did find that this book moved so quickly. I would have liked to have read more about the other schools that Laura taught. The last school we don't even know how many pupils she had. It felt like so much was skipped over compared to the other books.
A really good book though.… (more)

Before Little House in the Big Woods launched her career in children's literature, Laura Ingalls Wilder tried her hand at autobiographical nonfiction with a manuscript aimed at an adult audience and entitled Pioneer Girl. Despite repeated attempts to sell it to a variety of publishers that even entailed some rewrites from Wilder's daughter, the successful author Rose Wilder Lane, the manuscript went unpublished for decades until this project driven by the South Dakota State Historical Society.

This unpolished first draft drawn from handwritten notebooks is a little wooden and meandering, which is to be expected, but it is an indispensable artifact for any fan of the Wilder's Little House books. While this manuscript wasn't published in Wilder's lifetime, she more than made up for that failure by mining it throughout her writing career, turning one unsold book into a franchise that continues to thrive to this day. And Wilder's daughter would also go on to write several books and stories drawn from material in her mother's autobiography. It reminds me of the time I applied for a job at my wife's company, and while I didn't get the position, my interview with her boss made him realize my wife was vastly underpaid and resulted in a huge raise for her that benefited our household finances.

The editors of the book enrich the manuscript with extensive annotations that research every name and situation that Laura mentions, providing mini biographies for all the people in Wilder's life and in-depth details about major events like the grasshopper plague, the hard winter, and the time the Ingalls family crossed paths with the Bloody Benders of Kansas.

Recommended for Little House completists. (Or in my case, the husbands of Little House completists. Thanks for reading this to me as I cooked our suppers over the past few months, Adele.)

FOR REFERENCE:

Contents:
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: "Will It Come to Anything?": the Story of Pioneer Girl / Pamela Smith Hill
• The Pioneer Girl Manuscripts / Pamela Smith Hill
• Editorial Procedures / Nancy Tystad Koupal & Rodger Hartley
• Pioneer Girl: Kansas and Missouri, 1869-1871 -- Wisconsin, 1871-1874 -- Minnesota, 1874-1876 -- Iowa, 1876-1877 -- Minnesota, 1877-1879 -- Dakota Territory, 1879-1880 -- Dakota Territory, the Hard Winter of 1880-1881 -- Dakota Territory, 1880-1885 -- Dakota Territory, 1881-1888 / Laura Ingalls Wilder
• Conclusion: "I Don't Suppose Anyone Will Take the Trouble" / Pamela Smith Hill
• Appendixes: A. Facsimile of "Juvenile Pioneer Girl" -- B. The Benders of Kansas -- C. The Gordon Party -- D. The Singing School
• Bibliography
• Index… (more)

Laura Ingalls Wilder is beginning life with her new husband, Almanzo, in their own little house. Laura is a young pioneer wife now, and must work hard with Almanzo, farming the land around their home on the South Dakota prairie. Soon their baby daughter, Rose, is born, and the young family must face the hardships and triumphs encountered by so many American pioneers.

And so Laura Ingalls Wilder's adventure as a little pioneer girl ends, and her new life as a pioneer wife and mother begins.… (more)