Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography Kindle Edition

My five stars are for the incredible amount of time and research the author put into what is obviously a work of love, and for all the interesting things I am learning because of that, not for layout. This is for the true blue die hard Laura Ingalls Wilder fan, not the casual watcher of the Little House on the Prarie TV series (which alot of true blue LIW fans - myself included - can't tolerate because it got so ridiculously off course.) As has been noted, the bulk of this book is annotations and introduction, not the actual text of Laura's Pioneer Girl manuscript. Oh its there, but its buried. Thankfully the manuscript has larger font than the annotations or it would have been impossible to find it in the mix. Would love to have seen the annotations on the left hand page and manuscript on right instead of all mixed together and for me, the intro was too long; it could have been summed up in half the space. It does give insight, though, into the working relationship between Rose and Laura and the fact that getting the series published was not a straight and easy path. I also have a much better understanding now of why the Little House books are classified as fiction, not non-fiction. Though the series is based on things that happened and people/pets that existed, the chronology, context and details were changed - sometimes quite a bit - for the sake of story telling. For that reason, be prepared for some reality checks that can at times even be little traumatizing. (Spoiler alert: I'm still recovering from finding out Pa gave Jack away when Laura was still a tiny girl! No!!! ) This is for the adult fan of LIW, not to read to your daughter at bed time (unless she is super analytical), but it is chock full of interesting trivia and some new pictures I had never seen before.

This book is absolutely gorgeous, and I was SHOCKED by the size. I had no idea it was going to be the size of a school text book. The paper quality is lovely, and the pictures are wonderful. The cover is beautiful, and not only does it look so much like teenage Laura, it also fits really well with the Garth Williams illustrations we are all familiar with.The information inside is absolute gold. I had no idea that there was anything else I could learn about Laura, as I have read every book written by, for, or about her, but there is so much. It truly gives new insight into what was true and what was fiction in the series. Reading Laura's words is like reading a letter written by my own grandmother, the style of writing is so honest and open. The side-bar information is fascinating. The depth of research that went into every name Laura mentions, every location, and every incident is mind-boggling.I'm even more stunned now at Laura's memory. Although she makes a few mistakes about some names, for the most part, she remembers names of neighbors and details about events that are verified by Hill and the other researchers. It's truly impressive that Laura was able to remember so much detail about her childhood.My absolute favorite little bit from Laura's writing was the story about the mitten she knitted for Baby Carrie. It is one of the sweetest stories I've read, and feels so absolutely true and with emotions that I can even remember feeling as a young child.I still have a bit of the book to go. I'm a speed reader, and it still takes me an hour to get through ten pages. There is just SO MUCH packed onto each and every page that it takes awhile to digest. I've literally been waiting twenty years to read Pioneer Girl, ever since I first found out it existed, when I was about ten years old. Finally reading it is a little stunning.

This is an excellent companion to the "Little House" series. My second grader had to read the first book for class, I had never read them myself and we ended up ordering the entire series. I would recommend a fresh reading of the "Little House" books prior to reading this book to ensure that the material is fresh.This annotated version is a combination of the Pioneer Girl which was meant to be a true account of events that go into the fictionized children series, and much commentary of the content as well as historical accuracy of events. I would say an exhaustive commentary. The annotated comments show the close collaboration between Laura Wilder and her daughter Rose Wilder in the compilation of this book and the Little House books. Much of the "contention" that you see in the annotation portion of the book between the two, I believe is really just looking inside the process of the development of the novels. The struggle between maintaining the balance of historical accuracy and making the books interesting enough to get published and sell; and for the children's books, acceptable for young readers. The comments gave me the impression that Laura and Rose worked well together, and that the collaboration helped both become better writers.I believe the publisher and/or author did an excellent job of separating out the annotation and the Pioneer Girl text. Keep in mind you can have 4 or 5 pages of commentary between pages of text. Though, you can ignore the commentary and read the novel straight through as well.One word of caution, if you would prefer to read only the Pioneer Girl, you could probably find a version cheaper and without the commentary. This books as I stated above gives exhaustive commentary, which personally I could not get enough of. Both the commentary and the novel give an excellent look into the times and experiences of Laura Ingalls Wilder and her family in the years that compile the content of the novel as well as the times in which these books were written."God hates a coward." I loved to find out that Laura insists the exploits of Cap Garland and Almanzo were true.

A fantastic wealth of detail and research has gone into this superb book. Highly recommended.

I love Laura Ingalls Wilder and am fascinated by her life. This book is great ! Being able to read and understand how she wrote the Little House books makes a great read. Now wouldn't it be fantastic if someone made a series of films based on the real life of Laura and used this book as its main source of information right through from the Little House in the big woods to Laura's life in Mansfield and how she came to write the stories of her life.

This was bought as a birthday present for a huge Lara Ingles Wilder fan. The book itself looked beautiful and has been rapturously received.

Great book, good price. Delivered quickly and in good condition. Very happy with purchase.

Wonderful annotated autobiography of Laura Ingalls Wilder. Any fan of the Little House books will enjoy the historical aspect of this book and discover so much more about the Ingalls and Wilder families, friends and places they lived.