Rating: 
Summary: Not what I expected
Review: I vaguely remembered the name Willa Cather from my high school days, but I don't think I ever read anything by her. Maybe a poem. However, I decided to get one of her books after reading a recommendation in a recent National Geographic Magazine article on the Great Plains. It stated that she was known for writing books on the Plains and of the hardships the farmers faced there especially during the dust storms. But not in this book. Cather stresses that hardwork and scientific farming will lead to prosperity, and in fact most of the farmers we meet are prosperous. The book begins as we meet Alexandra, the next to youngest and only daughter of four offspring of an immigrant Swedish farming couple in Nebraska. Alexandra is in town to bring back the doctor to treat her ailing father. He refuses to come, because her father is hopelessly dying. Her father, knowing his fate is sealed, calls the family together and beliving that his daughter is the only one with intelligence and grit, installs her as the head of the family and orders his three sons to follow her advice on all matters. This is a unique situation, especially since the boys readily agree. Beyond the situation, the subject of the book is totally different from what is expected from a female author at the turn of the 20th Century. At that time, women wrote of well-to-do ladies whose lives revolved around parlors and social teas, not a common farmer. The father's wisdom proves sound as the family amasses the largest acreage in the area and the respect of their Swede and Bohemian neighbors. There is enough local color and description of daily activites included in the book to give a good flavor of the time and place. The story continues as Alexandra's best friend and neighbor, Carl, finds farming unsatisfactory and leaves to earn his fortune elsewhere. This leaves Alexandra facing spinsterhood. She sells Carl's farm to a young hard-working couple. The farmer's wife and Emil, Alexandra's youngest brother, form a fast friendship whose passion is headed out of bounds. Realizing this, Emil plans to move away for good. But, before he can leave, a shocking incident disrupts all of their lives. The event is made even more astounding because of the simple telling of the story to that point. The incident comes out of nowhere and, to me, was totally unexpected although believable. It's even more astounding when you realize it was created by a woman more than 90 years ago. Although the book didn't deliver what I expected, it did deliver the goods, and I will seek out more books by this ground-breaker author.
Rating: 
Summary: Cather's Second Best!
Review: "O Pioneers" is not "My Antonia", but it's pretty close. Anything that Willa Cather has written is great and you without a doubt want to add this one to your library.
Rating:
Summary: A great book
Review: After having read "My Antonia", I wanted to read more Cather, so I read this book. I was not disappointed. The writing is beautiful and the characters memorable. Alexandra is a great yet flawed protagonist and her struggles throughout her life reflect the universal struggles that occupy us all. Some reviewer called this book "dated" and I strongly disagree. There is something here for all human beings living in 2004.
Rating:
Summary: O Pioneers
Review: "O Pioneers" is a book about a girl named Alexandra, who takes charge of her house and family after her father dies. She goes through so much to keep and preserve the land. she makes it dependable, workable, and profitable, while keeping in the family, like her father had wished. Along the path of childhood to adulthood, with this goal in mind, Alexandra faces many challanges. She almost gets married twice. Two of her brothers refuse to speak to her. The third brother has an affair with a married woman. But this whole journey will only make her stronger.
The book was generally well written overall. At the beginning, it was a little slow. The 1st chapter is about a girl going to the doctor and then a little boy getting his kitten down from a pole before they go home. It picks up after that though. Overall, it was a really good read.
Willa Cather wrote this book in 1913. Cather is a Pulitzer Prize winning author, for her book "My Antonia", and has written more than 15 books. Cather was one of the most distinguished American writers of the late Ninetieth and early Twentieth century.
Rating:
Summary: The Price of Keeping the Land
Review: This early Cather novel introduces readers to the majesty and the fury of the untamed prairie, when the mid west was yet Americca's frontier. It obliquely asks the question: How did the Land shape its people--mainly immigrants from Scandinavia, Bohemia and France--and how did the hopeful settlers, true Pioneers, shape and share the land? Who ultimately can ever own the prairie; can mere mortals seriously hold the undulating waves of grain in trust for future generations? Spanning some 17 years this gripping novel depicts the struggle to tame the midwest by a Swedish family, whose lives intertwine with those of their neighbors. Against hostile and unforgiving nature
the simple tale is spun out: a wise teenage girl inherits control of the family farm from her dying fathr, since she alone of his offspring understands the importance of retaining the land at all costs. Despite interferance by her resentful, short-sighted brothers, Alexandra does just that, revealing vison and determination beyond her years. For it is thus that she honors the memory of their father, keeping his faith in the ultimate
productivity o the savage land, when many neighbors sell out.
Creating strong female characters--of which the land itself or Mother Nature may be considered a shadowy one--Cather glowingly describes the rugged beauty of the mid west: rolling grasses,
powerful sunsets, intoxicating spring blossoms, with fluctuating, unpredictable weather. A farmer's life is an annual gamble, but then so is any pilgrimmage of the heart. Totally absorbed in running her successful farm, Alexandra does not look beneath the surface; she does not Notice things. Like the illicit love which blooms unbidden between her young brother, Emil, and Marie, the restless married woman next door. Add a wild, jealous husband into the equation and a volatile situation is inevitable.
Cather's style draws the reader directly into the mindset of her main characters. Recognizing the danger signs before Alexandra does, we tremble with the realization of future emotional turbulence. The author' use of color to help us visualize her beloved landscape is remarkable, but most of all we marvel that she depicts the countryside itself as a non-verbal player in the repetitive tale of human stories. In the end readers must decide for themselves who is most to blame for the tragedy--if guilt must be parceled out. Her grim theme, that Happiness is easier to lose than to find, taints the backdrop of timid hope. The furrows of her novel are plowed and scored with attempts of her characters to "possess a personality apart from the soil. " This seemingly agrarian novel is less about the effect so grains of seed in the ground, than about the grains of love sown in a desperate search for joy in the hearts of the pioneers. How can Love survive in a barren wilderness? A true classic of human striving and passion.
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