Old Town in the Green Groves : Laura Ingalls Wilder's Lost Little House Years

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: This book is supposed to fill in the "lost" years that Laura Ingalls Wilder chose not to write about, when her family gave up their failing farm at Plum Creek and moved to work in a hotel in Iowa. The author did a good job of glossing over the sad things that happened in this time (such as the death of her baby brother), but you won't find any of Laura's vivid descriptions and enchanting storytelling here, as much of the writing is flat, undetailed, and repetitive. The book also ends misleadingly, without mentioning the family's return to Plum Creek, where "By the Shores of Silver Lake" picks up, so if you're following the series, you're still left with a gap. All in all, the writing really doesn't do justice to this classic series, and I'm surprised the publisher didn't make a better effort. (If you want to find out about what really happened in Laura's life, "Laura Ingalls Wilder: A Biography" is very well-done.)

Rating:
Summary: Anachronistic illustrations
Review: This book is written well, if a bit too simply. While this book has value as a fill-in, I was galled by the grossly inaccurate illustrations. Clearly illustrator Jim LaMarche failed to study Wilder's books beforehand. In every drawing, the girls have bangs, even though Laura herself did not cut her hair into bangs until much later in "These Happy Golden Years." And where are the ubiquitous sunbonnets that that were de rigueur for proper young ladies in that era? The girl on the dustjacket front looks smarmy, self-satisfied, and not a bit like the real Laura - an odd, inappropriate illustration for such a tragic story. I'm adding the book to my collection, but I will toss the dustjacket, and I wish I could delete the inside pictures.