Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography by Laura Ingalls Wilder, Edited by Pamela Smith Hill

 

Started reading Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography by Laura Ingalls Wilder and edited by Pamela Smith Hill. Not sure how long it will take me to get through it because of my limited reading time. Here is the book's description:

Follow the real Laura Ingalls and her family as they make their way west and discover that truth is as remarkable as fiction.

Hidden away since the 1930s, Laura Ingalls Wilder's never-before-published autobiography reveals the true stories of her pioneering life. Some of her experiences will be familiar; some will be a surprise. Pioneer Girl re-introduces readers to the woman who defined the pioneer experience for millions of people around the world.

Through her recollections, Wilder details the Ingalls family's journey from Kansas, Missouri, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, back to Minnesota, and on to Dakota Territory, sixteen years of travels, unforgettable stories, and the everyday people who became immortal through her fiction. Using additional manuscripts, diaries, and letters, Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography builds on Wilder's work by adding valuable context and explores her growth as a writer.

Author of an award-winning Laura Ingalls Wilder biography, editor Pamela Smith Hill offers new insights into Wilder's life and times. In an introduction, Hill illuminates Wilder's writing career and the dynamic relationship between the budding novelist and her daughter and editor, Rose Wilder Lane. Sharing the story of Wilder's original manuscript, Hill discusses the catalysts for Pioneer Girl and the process through which Wilder's story turned from an unpublished memoir into the national phenomenon of the Little House series.

Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography also explores the history of the frontier that the Ingalls family traversed and the culture and life of the communities Wilder lived in. This groundbreaking volume develops a fuller picture of Wilder's life and times for the millions of readers who wish to learn more about this important American author. It contains one hundred and twenty-five images, eight fully researched maps, and hundreds of annotations based on numerous primary sources, including census data, county, state, and federal records, and newspapers of the period.

An important historic and literary achievement, this annotated edition of Pioneer Girl provides modern readers with new insights into the woman behind the fictional classics Little House in the Big Woods, Farmer Boy, Little House on the Prairie, On the Banks of Plum Creek, By the Shores of Silver Lake, The Long Winter, Little Town on the Prairie, These Happy Golden Years, and The First Four Years.

Have you read it yet? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments. 

New Little House on the Prairie® Launched in March (Giveaway)

I recently received some great news--the official  Little House on the Prairie® launched in March. There is way too much information on the site to tell you about all of it, but I encourage all lovers of Laura to check it out because it is amazing!

It has something for lovers of the books and something for lovers of the television show. It talks about the 2005 mini-series, the musical, and the Laura Ingalls Wilder documentary. You'll find recipes and crafts, historical information, and they even have an online store. Maybe the best part of the site, however, is the Community section, where not only can you share your story, but you can find a bit of inspiration and meet the site's contributors.

Oh, and don't miss out on the great  Little House on the Prairie Prize Package Giveaway where you can enter for a chance to win the first four seasons of the newly remastered TV series, the best selling Pioneer Girl autobiography (packaged with an exclusive Pioneer Girl tote bag!), and the recently released documentary about Laura Ingalls Wilder. You can find more details at the website.

Visit now at http://littlehouseontheprairie.com/!

Book Review: Pioneer Girl by Bich Minh Nguyen

A fascinating novel of family and culture mingled with mystery and bound to the story of an American icon is what you'll find in Pioneer Girl by Bich Minh Nguyen.

After obtaining her PhD in American literature, a jobless Lee Lien finds herself heading home to the Chicago suburbs to work in her mother and grandfather's café. Before long, Lee's tense relationship with her overbearing mother leaves her hoping to break away from a life she always seems drawn back to. When her older brother comes home, only to quickly disappear again, he leaves behind a gold-leaf brooch from their mother's past in Vietnam that stirs up the forgotten childhood dream of an American reporter who visited her grandfather's original café in Saigon in 1965. Based upon a passage from the Little House books, Lee is convinced the reporter must have been Rose Wilder Lane, daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder. Could this pin link her family to one of America's most famous pioneering legacies?

Pioneer Girl dissects the intersection of culture and family. It puts under the microscope the life of immigrants and how they assimilate into American culture. But this is only part of Lee's story: the tense relationship with her mother; knowing she is not the favored child--that is reserved for her older brother, the one who should take over the family business and care of their widowed mother in her golden years; the way Lee's mother clings to the old ways, while Lee as a child struggled to fit in as a Vietnamese-American; and Lee's overwhelming desire to break away while not knowing exactly what she wants or where she belongs.

Woven into Lee's family story is the well-known tale of the Ingalls family, pioneers whose journeys were chronicled in the classic Little House books by Laura Ingalls Wilder that Lee enjoyed as a child. Convinced the gold-leaf brooch her mother brought to America was originally left behind by Rose Wilder Lane, Lee's search brings her through library archives and Laura Ingalls Wilder museums. A surprise discovery leads her to San Francisco, where Rose one lived, in an attempt to connect past and present.

Though I believe having a love for the Little House books, Laura Ingalls Wilder, or the Little House on the Prairie television show adds a greater depth to the enjoyment of Pioneer Girl, anyone will be captivated by this masterfully told, heartrending, and inspiring story of one woman's journey to find her place within her family and to boldly embrace the future. Well-drawn characters, rich descriptions, and the exploration of physical and metaphorical frontiers help to create an outstanding novel you will remember long after you've read the last word.

Highly recommended.

Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Viking Adult (February 6, 2014)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0670025097
ISBN-13: 978-0670025091

I received a copy of this book from the publisher. This review contains my honest opinions, which I have not been compensated for in any way.

New Release: Pioneer Girl: A Novel by Bich Minh Nguyen

From an award-winning author, a novel about a Vietnamese American family’s ties to The Little House on the Prairie

Jobless with a PhD, Lee Lien returns home to her Chicago suburb from grad school, only to find herself contending with issues she’s evaded since college. But when her brother disappears, he leaves behind an object from their mother’s Vietnam past that stirs up a forgotten childhood dream: a gold-leaf brooch, abandoned by an American reporter in Saigon back in 1965, that might be an heirloom belonging to Laura Ingalls Wilder. As Lee explores the tenuous facts of this connection, she unearths more than expected—a trail of clues and enticements that lead her from the dusty stacks of library archives to hilarious prairie life reenactments and ultimately to San Francisco, where her findings will transform strangers’ lives as well as her own.

A dazzling literary mystery about the true origins of a time-tested classic, Pioneer Girl is also the deeply moving tale of a second-generation Vietnamese daughter, the parents she struggles to honor, the missing brother she is expected to bring home—even as her discoveries yield dramatic insights that will free her to live her own life to its full potential.


Early praise for Pioneer Girl:

Elegant, sharp-eyed, and very funny, Pioneer Girl is ultimately about how one finds kinship -- familial, cultural, literary -- that transcends the usual lexicon about identity and belonging. Navigating Vietnamese "immigrant guilt" and a stalled academic career, Lee Lien finds escape in trying to solve a literary mystery which leads her deep into her own heart and history. A wonderful read! 

 - Cristina Garcia, author of Dreaming in Cuban and King of Cuba

I love how the Little House legend takes a wild detour into contemporary life in Pioneer Girl. Bich Minh Nguyen’s wonderfully imagined literary history gets to the truth about mothers, daughters, frontiers, and the meaning of home. I couldn't put this down!

—Wendy McClure, author of The Wilder Life

Available now from Viking!

Amazon    •    Kindle    •   Barnes & Noble    •    Nook

Indiebound    •   Powell's    •    Books-a-Million    •    iBooks

Little House, Long Shadow Book Discussion - Chapter 2

Chapter 2 - Creating the Little House

This chapter starts with Rose's return to Rocky Ridge Farm in 1928. Having spent time in her beloved Albania, she returned to help Laura with her writing, but also to recover from how the political landscape was changing Albania. As a freelance writer, Rose struggled with having to churn out story after story to make a living. Unlike her mother, who had many story ideas, Rose had difficulty coming up with ideas. It appears at this time, she was trying to start over. She wanted to build up her financial reserves so that when she was ready to leave the farm again, she would be free to do it.

Lane put herself into debt to build the English-style stone cottage for her parents to live in--despite Laura's lack of enthusiasm for the idea. The author claims Rose felt, no matter how much she did for her mother, it was never enough. It mentions a recurring dream Laura had about traveling a frightening road in a dark wood, which she interpreted as anxiety about money. According to the author, Laura's fear of doing without affected her relationship with her daughter.

When Lane's investments failed in 1931, her travel plans were thwarted. During the Depression, Laura opted to use her savings to pay off the mortgage on Rocky Ridge, but that also meant the Wilders had no money to retire. Lane resented having to churn out articles and stories to make a living. Neither Laura or Rose saw writing as a way out of their plight. Laura wrote Pioneer Girl during this time. Notations on the manuscript, according to Fellman, indicate Laura expected Rose to edit and embellish the work.

Little House, Long Shadow then goes on to talk about how Pioneer Girl was rejected, but the Wisconsin years turned into a children's book titled, "When Grandma Was A Little Girl," which was accepted for publication by Knopf. This would be picked up by Harper and Brothers after Knopf closed its children's division, and was published in the spring of 1932 as Little House in the Big Woods. Originally thrilled by the book's success, Rose watched her mother achieve public recognition while she was being forgotten by friends, which was hard for her.

Fellman shares much of what we already know about the writing of the books and the difficult relationship between Rose and her mother. It also talks about some of Laura's articles for the Missouri Ruralist on the topic of mother-and-child relations. While Laura didn't believe in whippings, she also didn't believe in displays of affection. By the end of the 19th century, female advice authors, however, would be talking about how a child must in every way be made happy. Rose seems to have accepted this new idea of love and emotional support easier than her mother. The book also talks about how even though Lane wished her mother could go it alone on her books, Rose couldn't pull away, and Laura may not have been confident enough to let her.

Rose completed Let the Hurricane Roar late in 1931. It covered much of the same ground as On the Banks of Plum Creek, but showed Lane's feelings of isolation and her idea that people are pretty much on their own. Not only was this a story about individual courage, it was about the current economic depression: how life is never easy and "our great asset is the valor of the American spirit." Laura, of course, resented Rose using this material without permission, and Rose was crushed by her mother's lack of support.

The book takes a look at how the country is changing at this time. The children's book, The Little Engine That Could, was released in 1930, and illustrated the can do spirit of the Hoover administration. The Wilders had been Democrats for many years, but they didn't like the shift in philosophy that came about with the New Deal. Lane became angry over government farm-relief programs that implied individuals were incapable of handling setbacks on their own. The Wilders couldn't fathom the idea of cutting down so-called crop surpluses. Fellman also mentions how Mansfield was affected by the Depression, and that the town had been struggling even before the crash.

My thoughts:

Why would you build your parents a house and go into debt doing it if they never seemed to want it in the first place? They seemed quite happy in the home Almanzo built. Once Rose left, they moved right back into it.

Why did Laura's success impact Rose in such a way? Was it because Rose struggled to come up with ideas while her mother had plenty of them? Was it just her nature? 

Is it any wonder Laura was upset with Rose over her alleged use of material she planned to use in her children's series? Especially since she didn't ask first.

The Wilders' concern over a shift in political philosophy makes me think of when Ronald Reagan claimed he didn't leave the Democratic party, it left him. As ideology shifted, the Wilders couldn't relate to this desire to have the government step in and assist. No matter how you lean politically, I think we can all relate to how that might happen if a party you believed in started promoting something that went against your grain.

You'll find Part One of this discussion here.