101 Books to Read Before You Die discussion

It's obvious that this is the last book that Wilder was working on and didn't complete. It doesn't have the polish and spark that the rest of the series does. It reads more like a long string of events and facts than flesh-out stories of prairie life, but it does convey the hope and heartache of trying to eke out a living as a farmer. It certainly makes me want to read her actual autobiography and other biographies about her to learn what happened to the family later and how they managed after these first four, incredibly difficult years. The story is full of love, but also very full of unimaginable struggle, maybe only understood today in some sense by other farmers; I don't think the rest of us can really have an inkling of the blood sweat and tears that make that kind of life go on.
3/5