A Wilder Life

I loved the Little House on the Prairie books when I was a kid so The Wilder Life by Wendy McClure was fun for me to read.

I loved how the writer infused historical research with her own personal quest to visit places where Laura lived. This is the type of memoir I do like: taking a topic and researching it and having personal real life experiences.

I enjoyed the tidbits I learned. I knew that Laura's daughter Rose was a libertarian who edited out the fact that Laura's parents received government assistance but I did not know that she had a strained relationship with Rose who wanted to be a fiction writer.

And I understand that traveling to places can make a beloved book come to life more. I remember my own excitement with Keats apartment next to the Spanish steps in Rome, walking next to a home where Edith Wharton lived in Greenwich Village NY and how thrilled I am that the Commodore where F Scott Fitzgerald lived in St Paul isn't too far from where I live.

This is what this author is accomplishing with Laura. When she listed Spring Valley MN and Burr Oak being part of Decorah IA Laura's past seemed to intersect with my own past. Working at Good Earth Village in Spring Valley on my summers away from Luther College in Decorah IA it never occurred to me on a Laura Ingallas Wilder quest at that point in time. Somehow that point of identification made the stories more vibrant for me.

I also really enjoyed her descriptions of "Little House Home Economics." I personally  wouldn't even bother to try to churn my own butter or to make the bread in the Little House Cookbook. But she tried to make these things from her New York apartment and was comical in her depictions of her disappointment.

The degree author took her interest in Laura Ingallas Wilder is not the degree that I would take it. But her excellent writing made it enjoyable to read about her own journey. After all I also loved the Little House books in my youth!