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A Wilder Rose
In 1928, Rose Wilder Lane—world traveler, journalist, much-published magazine writer—returned from an Albanian sojourn to her parents’ Ozark farm. Almanzo Wilder was 71, Laura 61, and Rose felt obligated to stay and help. To make life easier, she built them a new home, while she and Helen Boylston transformed the farmhouse into a rural writing retreat and filled it with visiting New Yorkers. Rose sold magazine stories to pay the bills for both households, and despite the subterranean tension between mother and daughter, life seemed good.
Then came the Crash. Rose’s money vanished, the magazine market dried up, and the Depression darkened the nation. That’s when Laura wrote her autobiography, “Pioneer Girl,” the story of growing up in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, on the Kansas prairie, and by the shores of Silver Lake. The rest—the eight remarkable books that followed—is literary history.
But it isn’t the history we thought we knew. For the surprising truth is that Laura’s stories were publishable only with Rose’s expert rewriting. Based on Rose’s unpublished diaries and Laura’s letters, A Wilder Rose tells the true story of the decade-long, intensive, and often troubled collaboration that produced the Little House books—the collaboration that Rose and Laura deliberately hid from their agent, editors, reviewers, and readers.
Why did the two women conceal their writing partnership? What made them commit what amounts to one of the longest-running deceptions in American literature? And what happened in those years to change Rose from a left-leaning liberal to a passionate Libertarian?
In this impeccably researched novel and with a deep insight into the book-writing business gained from her own experience as an author and coauthor, Susan Wittig Albert follows the clues that take us straight to the heart of this fascinating literary mystery.
Then came the Crash. Rose’s money vanished, the magazine market dried up, and the Depression darkened the nation. That’s when Laura wrote her autobiography, “Pioneer Girl,” the story of growing up in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, on the Kansas prairie, and by the shores of Silver Lake. The rest—the eight remarkable books that followed—is literary history.
But it isn’t the history we thought we knew. For the surprising truth is that Laura’s stories were publishable only with Rose’s expert rewriting. Based on Rose’s unpublished diaries and Laura’s letters, A Wilder Rose tells the true story of the decade-long, intensive, and often troubled collaboration that produced the Little House books—the collaboration that Rose and Laura deliberately hid from their agent, editors, reviewers, and readers.
Why did the two women conceal their writing partnership? What made them commit what amounts to one of the longest-running deceptions in American literature? And what happened in those years to change Rose from a left-leaning liberal to a passionate Libertarian?
In this impeccably researched novel and with a deep insight into the book-writing business gained from her own experience as an author and coauthor, Susan Wittig Albert follows the clues that take us straight to the heart of this fascinating literary mystery.
288 pages, Paperback
First published August 28, 2013
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5123 people want to read
About the author
Susan Wittig Albert
119 books2,373 followersSusan is the author/co-author of biographical/historical fiction, mysteries, and nonfiction. Now in her 80s and continuing to write, she says that retirement is not (yet) an option. She publishes under her own imprint. Here are her latest books.
A PLAIN VANILLA MURDER, #27 in the long-running China Bayles/Pecan Springs series.
Two Pecan Springs novella trilogies: The Crystal Cave Trilogy (featuring Ruby Wilcox): noBODY, SomeBODY Else, and Out of BODY; and The Enterprise Trilogy (featuring Jessica Nelson): DEADLINES, FAULTLINES, and FIRELINES.
THE DARLING DAHLIAS AND THE POINSETTIA PUZZLE #8 in the Darling Dahlias series, set in the early 1930s in fictional Darling AL
THE GENERAL'S WOMEN. Kay, Mamie, and Ike--the wartime romance that won a war but could have derailed a presidency.
LOVING ELEANOR: A novel about the intimate 30-year friendship of Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok, based on their letters
A WILDER ROSE: the true story of Rose Wilder Lane, who transformed her mother from a farm wife and occasional writer to a literary icon
THE TALE OF CASTLE COTTAGE, #8 in the Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter
DEATH ON THE LIZARD, the 12th and last (2006) of the Robin Paige series, by Susan and Bill Albert
TOGETHER, ALONE: A MEMOIR OF MARRIAGE AND PLACE
AN EXTRAORDINARY YEAR OF ORDINARY DAYS
WORK OF HER OWN: A WOMAN'S GUIDE TO RIGHT LIVELIHOOD
WRITING FROM LIFE: TELLING YOUR SOUL'S STORY
A PLAIN VANILLA MURDER, #27 in the long-running China Bayles/Pecan Springs series.
Two Pecan Springs novella trilogies: The Crystal Cave Trilogy (featuring Ruby Wilcox): noBODY, SomeBODY Else, and Out of BODY; and The Enterprise Trilogy (featuring Jessica Nelson): DEADLINES, FAULTLINES, and FIRELINES.
THE DARLING DAHLIAS AND THE POINSETTIA PUZZLE #8 in the Darling Dahlias series, set in the early 1930s in fictional Darling AL
THE GENERAL'S WOMEN. Kay, Mamie, and Ike--the wartime romance that won a war but could have derailed a presidency.
LOVING ELEANOR: A novel about the intimate 30-year friendship of Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok, based on their letters
A WILDER ROSE: the true story of Rose Wilder Lane, who transformed her mother from a farm wife and occasional writer to a literary icon
THE TALE OF CASTLE COTTAGE, #8 in the Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter
DEATH ON THE LIZARD, the 12th and last (2006) of the Robin Paige series, by Susan and Bill Albert
TOGETHER, ALONE: A MEMOIR OF MARRIAGE AND PLACE
AN EXTRAORDINARY YEAR OF ORDINARY DAYS
WORK OF HER OWN: A WOMAN'S GUIDE TO RIGHT LIVELIHOOD
WRITING FROM LIFE: TELLING YOUR SOUL'S STORY
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June 5, 2015
A Wilder Rose
Rose Wilder Lane, Laura Ingalls Wilder and Their Little Houses - by Susan Wittig Albert.
The novel is based on the lives of Laura Ingalls Wilder and her daughter, Rose Wilder Lane and highlights the years between 1928 and 1939. A more compelling, fascinating blend of fact and fiction could not have been written by these two remarkable women behind "Little House on the Prairie" and the rest of the books in the Little House Series.
"Sometimes we need to use fiction to tell the truth. Sometimes fiction tells a truer story than facts."
As an editor once said to me: "Do not allow the truth to spoil a good story." And it is true of the Little House Series as being one of the best to ever come out of American literature and became popular in just about the entire world, as well as of this novel.
Ghostwriting is also not a cut and paste reality. Sometimes it is done openly, other times there are excellent editors without whom many books would never have seen the light of day and whom are seldom mentioned, as is still happening to this day. There are also ghostwriters who nowadays claim their piece of the cake.
So if anybody suspected anything at the time, nobody was going to blow the whistle."Readers and librarians and teachers and schoolchildren loved the idea of an author who, as a little girl, had lived an adventurous life on the American prairie. Laura Ingalls Wilder was good for business."
Many excellent storytellers are not excellent writers, that we know. This was the case with Laura Ingalls Wilder as well. "Mama Bess was an oral storyteller. She could recall dozens of stories about her family's pioneer wanderings, but when she wrote them down, they sounded like...well, they sounded like stories told by your favorite grandmother in front of the fire on a winter's night, without--as George Bye, Rose's agent, had once said --"the benefit of perspective or theater."
This novel, however, is the story behind the story. Of two women both set up to rule the roost,like mother like daughter, and the power struggles that ensued."She(Laura) and I (Rose)were like neighboring states with a long history, with shared and very porous boundaries, she constantly invading, I continually repelling."
If it wasn't for Rose accidentally burning down their house as a little girl, and the fall of the Stock Market in 1929, this duo would never have taken place and the popular series would never have been written.
This novel explains in detail how it came about in a very well-written, compassionate tale.
Rose thought she had a responsibility towards her parents, but in the end, thanks to the actions of John, one of her adoptive sons, she finally learnt the truth behind her own choices :
"Generocity as a means of controlling is no gift at all. It's a curse."
It was the years of Depression, drought, hardship and hope in which these two women were forced to live and survive together, trying to get small town morals(Laura) married to a cosmopolitan lifestyle(Rose). They looked backwards while trying to move forward. "Slowly, slowly, and little by little, Glory to your lips. It is so."
It would take eleven years of survival in dire economic conditions and harsh world politics for Rose to grow from a staunch Liberal to Libertarian. "Every American is governed only by the principle of personal responsibility and that his or her most important freedom is the absolute freedom to flourish or fail."
Rose wrote about herself: " I am now a fundamentalist American. Give me time and I will tell you why individualism, laissez-faire, and the slightly restrained anarchy of capitalism offer the possibilities for the development of the human spirit."
This books is about all of the above, but also about mothers and daughters, of bonding and hardships, politics and war, droughts and endurance. And pride.
Mark Twain: "Don't part with your illusions; when they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live."
It is much much more than just biographical fiction.
I recommend it wholeheartedly. What an absolute thought-provoking, yet delightful, spellbinding experience!
Rose Wilder Lane, Laura Ingalls Wilder and Their Little Houses - by Susan Wittig Albert.
The novel is based on the lives of Laura Ingalls Wilder and her daughter, Rose Wilder Lane and highlights the years between 1928 and 1939. A more compelling, fascinating blend of fact and fiction could not have been written by these two remarkable women behind "Little House on the Prairie" and the rest of the books in the Little House Series.
"Sometimes we need to use fiction to tell the truth. Sometimes fiction tells a truer story than facts."
As an editor once said to me: "Do not allow the truth to spoil a good story." And it is true of the Little House Series as being one of the best to ever come out of American literature and became popular in just about the entire world, as well as of this novel.
Ghostwriting is also not a cut and paste reality. Sometimes it is done openly, other times there are excellent editors without whom many books would never have seen the light of day and whom are seldom mentioned, as is still happening to this day. There are also ghostwriters who nowadays claim their piece of the cake.
So if anybody suspected anything at the time, nobody was going to blow the whistle."Readers and librarians and teachers and schoolchildren loved the idea of an author who, as a little girl, had lived an adventurous life on the American prairie. Laura Ingalls Wilder was good for business."
Many excellent storytellers are not excellent writers, that we know. This was the case with Laura Ingalls Wilder as well. "Mama Bess was an oral storyteller. She could recall dozens of stories about her family's pioneer wanderings, but when she wrote them down, they sounded like...well, they sounded like stories told by your favorite grandmother in front of the fire on a winter's night, without--as George Bye, Rose's agent, had once said --"the benefit of perspective or theater."
This novel, however, is the story behind the story. Of two women both set up to rule the roost,like mother like daughter, and the power struggles that ensued."She(Laura) and I (Rose)were like neighboring states with a long history, with shared and very porous boundaries, she constantly invading, I continually repelling."
If it wasn't for Rose accidentally burning down their house as a little girl, and the fall of the Stock Market in 1929, this duo would never have taken place and the popular series would never have been written.
This novel explains in detail how it came about in a very well-written, compassionate tale.
Rose thought she had a responsibility towards her parents, but in the end, thanks to the actions of John, one of her adoptive sons, she finally learnt the truth behind her own choices :
"Generocity as a means of controlling is no gift at all. It's a curse."
It was the years of Depression, drought, hardship and hope in which these two women were forced to live and survive together, trying to get small town morals(Laura) married to a cosmopolitan lifestyle(Rose). They looked backwards while trying to move forward. "Slowly, slowly, and little by little, Glory to your lips. It is so."
It would take eleven years of survival in dire economic conditions and harsh world politics for Rose to grow from a staunch Liberal to Libertarian. "Every American is governed only by the principle of personal responsibility and that his or her most important freedom is the absolute freedom to flourish or fail."
Rose wrote about herself: " I am now a fundamentalist American. Give me time and I will tell you why individualism, laissez-faire, and the slightly restrained anarchy of capitalism offer the possibilities for the development of the human spirit."
This books is about all of the above, but also about mothers and daughters, of bonding and hardships, politics and war, droughts and endurance. And pride.
Mark Twain: "Don't part with your illusions; when they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live."
It is much much more than just biographical fiction.
I recommend it wholeheartedly. What an absolute thought-provoking, yet delightful, spellbinding experience!
February 2, 2021
Oh wow, but I do have to consider that Susan Wittig Albert’s historical fiction but according to the latter supposedly and strongly based on truth and reality novel A Wilder Rose is unfortunately yet another of these annoying and in my opinion not to be in any way taken seriously and considered viewpoints that Rose Wilder Lane was some poor, misunderstood and verbally/emotionally abused victim (of mostly her mother Laura Ingalls Wilder), that Laura Ingalls Wilder actually could not adequately and coherently write (that her literary talents were somehow mostly if not entirely oral) and that therefore, it was actually not Laura Ingalls Wilder but Rose Wilder Lane who should be considered as the true and actual author of the Little House on the Prairie series.
But to tell the truth and from what I have both recently and not so recently read in particular with regard to Rose Wilder Lane’s life and personality, including her relationship with her parents (and yes, in those Laura Ingalls Wilder biographies in fact worth their academic salt) and how the Little House on the Prairie series did come to fruition, sorry, but it looks pretty well like historic reality that Rose Wilder Lane obviously had some very serious and major mental health challenges and personality disorders and often tried to condescendingly lord it over her parents, that she tended to rather massively resent her parents, that she was indeed annoyed and furious with Laura and Almanzo being content as farmers and that Rose even tried to use bullying tactics with regard to the editing she was doing for her mother (that of course Rose Wilder Lane’s editing of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie series manuscripts was important and certainly polished what her mother had penned but that the main writing was of course by Laura Ingalls Wilder, that Laura Ingalls Wilder should thus and definitely be considered the author of the Little House on the Prairie novels and her daughter Rose Wilder Lane as Laura’s editor and yes also as an editor who often had the tendency to be overreaching and act in a nasty and condescending manner towards her mother’s work, and towards Laura and Almanzo in general, and for Susan Wittig Albert to suggest otherwise in A Wilder Rose, I do find this both ridiculous, insulting and a huge and problematic falsehood).
And no, I therefore just do not feel like continuing with A Wilder Rose, I just do not want to keep reading Susan Wittig Albert’s text and I also am rather majorly annoyed having purchased a copy of A Wilder Rose for my personal library.
But to tell the truth and from what I have both recently and not so recently read in particular with regard to Rose Wilder Lane’s life and personality, including her relationship with her parents (and yes, in those Laura Ingalls Wilder biographies in fact worth their academic salt) and how the Little House on the Prairie series did come to fruition, sorry, but it looks pretty well like historic reality that Rose Wilder Lane obviously had some very serious and major mental health challenges and personality disorders and often tried to condescendingly lord it over her parents, that she tended to rather massively resent her parents, that she was indeed annoyed and furious with Laura and Almanzo being content as farmers and that Rose even tried to use bullying tactics with regard to the editing she was doing for her mother (that of course Rose Wilder Lane’s editing of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie series manuscripts was important and certainly polished what her mother had penned but that the main writing was of course by Laura Ingalls Wilder, that Laura Ingalls Wilder should thus and definitely be considered the author of the Little House on the Prairie novels and her daughter Rose Wilder Lane as Laura’s editor and yes also as an editor who often had the tendency to be overreaching and act in a nasty and condescending manner towards her mother’s work, and towards Laura and Almanzo in general, and for Susan Wittig Albert to suggest otherwise in A Wilder Rose, I do find this both ridiculous, insulting and a huge and problematic falsehood).
And no, I therefore just do not feel like continuing with A Wilder Rose, I just do not want to keep reading Susan Wittig Albert’s text and I also am rather majorly annoyed having purchased a copy of A Wilder Rose for my personal library.
October 4, 2013
A Wilder Rose is a novel about the decade Rose Wilder Lane spent working with her mother, Laura Ingalls Wilder, on the manuscripts that became the Little House books—which were published under Wilder’s name, even though Lane did much to shape and improve them.
Those who’ve read extensively about the lives of these two women (especially William Holtz’s biography of Lane, The Ghost in the Little House) are already familiar with this story, but in A Wilder Rose, Susan Wittig Albert casts it as a novel, building on facts to create a version told by Rose herself. The source material Albert drew from is extensive—Rose (yes, I’m switching to first names here) left behind a considerable collection of journals and letters that detail her life on a near-daily basis. Some readers will recognize lines quoted directly from the real-life Rose, and events mentioned in the Holtz book are related in first-person.
I found A Wilder Rose to be both fascinating and frustrating. As a writer and editor I loved the glimpses into the publishing world of the 1930s and reading about Rose’s working life, which was equal parts literary ambition and desperate hustle to pay the bills. I think for the most part Albert succeeds in bringing “Rose’s side” to a wider audience, but I found myself wishing she’d take more advantage of fiction’s possibilities—she colors within the lines, so to speak, in her portrait of Rose.
The book purports to show that Rose deserves at least as much credit for the Little House series as her mother does, and Albert relies on the material archived letters and correspondence to make that point. But for all the research, A Wilder Rose never fully convinces, because it lacks the same thing that’s missing among the harder evidence supporting Rose’s role in creating the Little House books—the sense that Rose herself was very much engaged with these stories on some level.
As Albert diligently shows us, Rose recorded only her frustration with working on the Little House books, complaining in her letters and journals that they took her away from her own writing; fans of the books are left to accept that the stories they loved and experienced so deeply were co-authored by someone who considered them a miserable chore. Yet anyone who has read the biographies has wondered how much of Rose is in the Little House books—did she, inadvertently or otherwise, express or work through her feelings about her own impoverished childhood and her fraught relationship with her mother? For the Little House books to have—as so many readers testify—such a deep sense of presence, it seems she must have. It’s an interesting literary question, and I wish Albert had used her license as a fiction writer to explore that, rather than simply animating Rose’s biography and giving many readers what they already know.
Unexplored as well is Rose’s later-life relationship with the Little House books—her curious insistence in the 1960s that the books were true and that her mother wrote every word; the complicated feelings she must have had when her mother’s legacy began to eclipse her own. Considering Albert’s focus and her interest in relationships between truth and fiction, these omissions make the book feel incomplete.
Nonetheless A Wilder Rose still serves as a very engaging, non-academic introduction to the Little House authorship discussion, and as a sort-of biography of Rose that’s much far more readable and enjoyable than The Ghost in the Little House. (It’s an interesting time to be reading about Rose and the Little House books—the publication of A Wilder Rose is being followed by two very different books titled Pioneer Girl: one is the long-awaited annotated version of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s adult memoir, and the other is a novel by Bich Minh Nguyen that considers Rose’s life in ways that are wildly imaginary yet satisfying. Both will be interesting counterparts to this book.) As A Wilder Rose shows, Rose Wilder Lane deserves to be more widely known, and so much about her remains a mystery.
Those who’ve read extensively about the lives of these two women (especially William Holtz’s biography of Lane, The Ghost in the Little House) are already familiar with this story, but in A Wilder Rose, Susan Wittig Albert casts it as a novel, building on facts to create a version told by Rose herself. The source material Albert drew from is extensive—Rose (yes, I’m switching to first names here) left behind a considerable collection of journals and letters that detail her life on a near-daily basis. Some readers will recognize lines quoted directly from the real-life Rose, and events mentioned in the Holtz book are related in first-person.
I found A Wilder Rose to be both fascinating and frustrating. As a writer and editor I loved the glimpses into the publishing world of the 1930s and reading about Rose’s working life, which was equal parts literary ambition and desperate hustle to pay the bills. I think for the most part Albert succeeds in bringing “Rose’s side” to a wider audience, but I found myself wishing she’d take more advantage of fiction’s possibilities—she colors within the lines, so to speak, in her portrait of Rose.
The book purports to show that Rose deserves at least as much credit for the Little House series as her mother does, and Albert relies on the material archived letters and correspondence to make that point. But for all the research, A Wilder Rose never fully convinces, because it lacks the same thing that’s missing among the harder evidence supporting Rose’s role in creating the Little House books—the sense that Rose herself was very much engaged with these stories on some level.
As Albert diligently shows us, Rose recorded only her frustration with working on the Little House books, complaining in her letters and journals that they took her away from her own writing; fans of the books are left to accept that the stories they loved and experienced so deeply were co-authored by someone who considered them a miserable chore. Yet anyone who has read the biographies has wondered how much of Rose is in the Little House books—did she, inadvertently or otherwise, express or work through her feelings about her own impoverished childhood and her fraught relationship with her mother? For the Little House books to have—as so many readers testify—such a deep sense of presence, it seems she must have. It’s an interesting literary question, and I wish Albert had used her license as a fiction writer to explore that, rather than simply animating Rose’s biography and giving many readers what they already know.
Unexplored as well is Rose’s later-life relationship with the Little House books—her curious insistence in the 1960s that the books were true and that her mother wrote every word; the complicated feelings she must have had when her mother’s legacy began to eclipse her own. Considering Albert’s focus and her interest in relationships between truth and fiction, these omissions make the book feel incomplete.
Nonetheless A Wilder Rose still serves as a very engaging, non-academic introduction to the Little House authorship discussion, and as a sort-of biography of Rose that’s much far more readable and enjoyable than The Ghost in the Little House. (It’s an interesting time to be reading about Rose and the Little House books—the publication of A Wilder Rose is being followed by two very different books titled Pioneer Girl: one is the long-awaited annotated version of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s adult memoir, and the other is a novel by Bich Minh Nguyen that considers Rose’s life in ways that are wildly imaginary yet satisfying. Both will be interesting counterparts to this book.) As A Wilder Rose shows, Rose Wilder Lane deserves to be more widely known, and so much about her remains a mystery.
February 10, 2017
I'm a little sad and disappointed after reading this book. First off I did enjoy learning all about Rose Wilder Lane, the daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder the author of the Little House Books.
The author's premise is that Rose did most of the writing of the Little House Books; while Laura just wrote down her memories with Rose editing and expanding upon them.
The author was not content with stopping there though and continues on to present Rose as the much put upon daughter of LIW who was portrayed as being difficult whenever possible.
I find it very sad that such accusations are leveled against LIW when she is no longer here to defend herself. There is no evidence that Laura was a bad mother to Rose.
Since Rose was an only child I'm more inclined to believe that Rose was spoiled instead of mistreated. Rose continually whines through out this book about her mother always cautioning her to be careful of what the neighbors might say. Rose lived a very unconventional life and I'm sure any mother would be afraid of what the neighbors might think if Rose was their daughter.
Rose whines and whines some more and then takes credit for Laura's books after her mother passes away. Although I'm sure Rose helped Laura with the books as far as editing goes I'm not sure what to believe about the charges laid against LIW in this book.
Rose's childhood was certainly difficult due to the extreme poverty her family experienced. Rose talks about her parents working so hard in order to survive that they never had time to pay much attention to her. I don't recall Laura complaining about the extreme poverty her own family experienced when she was a child and I'm sure she didn't get a lot of attention from her parents either; especially since she had 3 sisters also competing for quality time with their parents.
If you're interested in learning more about Rose Wilder Lane this book is an excellent source. If you're a LIW fan you might want to skip it though.
The author's premise is that Rose did most of the writing of the Little House Books; while Laura just wrote down her memories with Rose editing and expanding upon them.
The author was not content with stopping there though and continues on to present Rose as the much put upon daughter of LIW who was portrayed as being difficult whenever possible.
I find it very sad that such accusations are leveled against LIW when she is no longer here to defend herself. There is no evidence that Laura was a bad mother to Rose.
Since Rose was an only child I'm more inclined to believe that Rose was spoiled instead of mistreated. Rose continually whines through out this book about her mother always cautioning her to be careful of what the neighbors might say. Rose lived a very unconventional life and I'm sure any mother would be afraid of what the neighbors might think if Rose was their daughter.
Rose whines and whines some more and then takes credit for Laura's books after her mother passes away. Although I'm sure Rose helped Laura with the books as far as editing goes I'm not sure what to believe about the charges laid against LIW in this book.
Rose's childhood was certainly difficult due to the extreme poverty her family experienced. Rose talks about her parents working so hard in order to survive that they never had time to pay much attention to her. I don't recall Laura complaining about the extreme poverty her own family experienced when she was a child and I'm sure she didn't get a lot of attention from her parents either; especially since she had 3 sisters also competing for quality time with their parents.
If you're interested in learning more about Rose Wilder Lane this book is an excellent source. If you're a LIW fan you might want to skip it though.
January 9, 2016
Laura Ingalls Wilder, a name most of probably recognize, either becomes of her books, or the TV-series, or both. Ingalls Wilder is probably one of the most known children author thanks to her fictional retelling of her childhood. But, what not many people know is that without her daughter, Rose Wilder Lane is it a strong possibility that the never would have been any books.
Susan Wittig Albert has written a book about Rose Wilder Lane life and how it came to be that she ghostwrote the Laura Ingall Wilders books. Her mother wrote her memories and Rose Wilder Lane transformed the memories into the books we know today. It wasn't even supposed to be children's books, and absolutely not fiction. Laura Ingalls Wilder was adamant about that is should not be turned into fiction. But, the stubborn women caved in, in the end.
I had some problems getting into the story. I actually put it away and to read other books because I just couldn't seem to get into the story. It just didn't feel interesting enough. So it was with a bit of a heavy heart that I returned to read it. I've seen so many reviews from people that loved the book and I felt like I was the odd one out. And, it took some time for me to really get into the book. But, it grew on me. It's one of the books that kind of sneaks up on you and take you by surprise. I don't say it was an easy read. There are some parts that were better than others. For me has Rose Wilder Lane always just been the daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder, but here she comes out of her mother's shadow. And, I think she deserves that. She deserves the credit for helping her mother write the books.
I just wish I could read Laura Ingalls Wilder's real biography. Not the fiction books that were written for children.
I want to thank the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!
Susan Wittig Albert has written a book about Rose Wilder Lane life and how it came to be that she ghostwrote the Laura Ingall Wilders books. Her mother wrote her memories and Rose Wilder Lane transformed the memories into the books we know today. It wasn't even supposed to be children's books, and absolutely not fiction. Laura Ingalls Wilder was adamant about that is should not be turned into fiction. But, the stubborn women caved in, in the end.
I had some problems getting into the story. I actually put it away and to read other books because I just couldn't seem to get into the story. It just didn't feel interesting enough. So it was with a bit of a heavy heart that I returned to read it. I've seen so many reviews from people that loved the book and I felt like I was the odd one out. And, it took some time for me to really get into the book. But, it grew on me. It's one of the books that kind of sneaks up on you and take you by surprise. I don't say it was an easy read. There are some parts that were better than others. For me has Rose Wilder Lane always just been the daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder, but here she comes out of her mother's shadow. And, I think she deserves that. She deserves the credit for helping her mother write the books.
I just wish I could read Laura Ingalls Wilder's real biography. Not the fiction books that were written for children.
I want to thank the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!
February 6, 2017
This book is a novelized biography of Rose Wilder Lane, the daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder who is the credited author of the
Little House on the Prairie
series of children's books. Over time critics and historians have come to believe that Rose's involvement in helping her mother write the Little House series exceeded that of editor, that in reality Rose filled the role of what would generally be considered "ghostwriter." My interest of this controversy is what prompted me to read this book.
This book is written in the style of a novel and frames the story by having Rose in her older years reminisce with friends about her past. Thus the vast majority of the narrative is in her first person voice which makes it sound much like a memoir. I'm fairly confident that the author was able to capture the correct facts of Rose's story and the general characteristics of her personality because she left an extensive record was an author of multiple books, many magazine articles, and numerous letters. The novel format allowed the author of this book, Susan Wittig Albert, to assign direct quotations and thoughts to Rose which couldn't be done in the strict biography format. The result is an interesting story that's easy to read, and any reader upon reaching the end of this book will feel a genuine familiarity with Rose Wilder Lane.
As portrayed in this book the market for written material dropped during the 1930s economic depression. Rose was forced to keep writing and submitting articles and books to publishers in a desperate attempt to pay the bills.
Meanwhile her mother wrote a biography of her life titled Pioneer Girl which she asked Rose to type and submit to publishers. The writing efforts of her mother were an intrusion into Rose's other professional writing, nevertheless she complied with her mother's wishes. In Rose's judgement the biography needed extensive rework in order to be accepted by publishers but her mother resisted those changes. As expected, multiple publishers turned down the manuscript. The book was never published in that form, however an annotated version was published in 2014 by the South Dakota State Historical Society under the title of Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography,
Then a publisher suggested that some of the stories in the Pioneer Girl manuscript be turned into a children's book. Rose finally talked her mother into letting her edit the early parts of Pioneer Girls into what became titled Little House in the
Big Woods . A publisher accepted the book and contracted for a second book. Rose's mother dug in her heels on the second book and insisted Rose not do extensive editing. Consequently the publisher rejected the second book. After the rejection her mother allowed Rose to edit it. The publisher accepted that version and titled it Farmer Boy
Laura's mother finally realized that she needed to allow Rose to edit her writing in order to be accepted by the publishers. Then came the rest of the books in the series, and the rest is history.
The series was published between the years of 1932 to 1943 at a rate of almost one per year. Laura initially gave her mother full credit as author partly to please her mother and also to provide some income to her parents in their retirement years. Rose didn't consider them to be important books and certainly didn't expect them to be as successful as they turned out to be. Once her mother was designated as the author of the early books it was difficult to make any changes toward crediting Rose's part in the writing.
During this time Rose continued to write her own books and magazine articles which in her mind were more serious than her mother's books. It was also during this period that Rose wrote several articles opposing FDR's New Deal and became involved with the cause that is now known as the American libertarian movement.
It's an irony of history that Rose's mother is widely remembered today as the writer of the beloved Little House series, and that the product of Rose's professional writing career is mostly forgotten.
This book is written in the style of a novel and frames the story by having Rose in her older years reminisce with friends about her past. Thus the vast majority of the narrative is in her first person voice which makes it sound much like a memoir. I'm fairly confident that the author was able to capture the correct facts of Rose's story and the general characteristics of her personality because she left an extensive record was an author of multiple books, many magazine articles, and numerous letters. The novel format allowed the author of this book, Susan Wittig Albert, to assign direct quotations and thoughts to Rose which couldn't be done in the strict biography format. The result is an interesting story that's easy to read, and any reader upon reaching the end of this book will feel a genuine familiarity with Rose Wilder Lane.
As portrayed in this book the market for written material dropped during the 1930s economic depression. Rose was forced to keep writing and submitting articles and books to publishers in a desperate attempt to pay the bills.
Meanwhile her mother wrote a biography of her life titled Pioneer Girl which she asked Rose to type and submit to publishers. The writing efforts of her mother were an intrusion into Rose's other professional writing, nevertheless she complied with her mother's wishes. In Rose's judgement the biography needed extensive rework in order to be accepted by publishers but her mother resisted those changes. As expected, multiple publishers turned down the manuscript. The book was never published in that form, however an annotated version was published in 2014 by the South Dakota State Historical Society under the title of Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography,
Then a publisher suggested that some of the stories in the Pioneer Girl manuscript be turned into a children's book. Rose finally talked her mother into letting her edit the early parts of Pioneer Girls into what became titled Little House in the
Big Woods . A publisher accepted the book and contracted for a second book. Rose's mother dug in her heels on the second book and insisted Rose not do extensive editing. Consequently the publisher rejected the second book. After the rejection her mother allowed Rose to edit it. The publisher accepted that version and titled it Farmer Boy
Laura's mother finally realized that she needed to allow Rose to edit her writing in order to be accepted by the publishers. Then came the rest of the books in the series, and the rest is history.
The series was published between the years of 1932 to 1943 at a rate of almost one per year. Laura initially gave her mother full credit as author partly to please her mother and also to provide some income to her parents in their retirement years. Rose didn't consider them to be important books and certainly didn't expect them to be as successful as they turned out to be. Once her mother was designated as the author of the early books it was difficult to make any changes toward crediting Rose's part in the writing.
During this time Rose continued to write her own books and magazine articles which in her mind were more serious than her mother's books. It was also during this period that Rose wrote several articles opposing FDR's New Deal and became involved with the cause that is now known as the American libertarian movement.
It's an irony of history that Rose's mother is widely remembered today as the writer of the beloved Little House series, and that the product of Rose's professional writing career is mostly forgotten.
March 26, 2016
This was pretty awful. I read that Albert self-published because, in her words, "publishers were afraid fans of Laura Ingalls Wilder would be too upset by the book". (The book takes the stance that Rose Wilder Lane co-authored the Little House books). I think she had to self-publish because it is not well written. There is no character development and the book is a series of " I did this, and then I did that". None of the characters are fleshed out and there is no real plot. Lane is a fascinating person in her own right and there were something interesting facts about her adult life, but in all this fails as a novel. I have seen Albert online responding to negative reviews of the book and she seems to feel people are reacting negatively because they don't want to believe Wilder didn't write the books on her own. There is nothing new or shocking to the theory that Lane was a "ghost writer" of the books. This is simply not well written. Some of the "dialogue" is lifted almost verbatim from other sources (On the Way Home, for example).
March 8, 2015
This was a nice book about how the Little House on the Prairie books came about. I remember my mother reading these to my sister and I when we were growing up. It was an interesting to learn Wilder's daughter really shaped the books into what they became. A very good read for fans of Wilder's books.
November 8, 2017
This was a disappointing read for me, and I'm glad I didn't buy this book like I was planning to. I'm a big fan of both Laura Ingalls Wilder's stories and Rose Wilder Lane's writings. If ghost writing happened at least it was all in the family. This book was just not as well-written as it could be; I can see why publishers didn't want to take her on as a client since it was all so negative. Pretty much all the characters were shown in their worst light. Honestly I wonder if Ms. Wittig Albert took the time to even look at any good characteristics as they all seemed so unlikeable through out the story and I don't mean focusing on just physical beauty.
I appreciate how Ms. Wittig Albert hinted at Rose's possible relationship with her close friend Troub since it's only speculation. The gap between this care of writing was so different from the care the author took with the rest of the book. This relationship wasn't the main focus of the story but it is an example of how the book could have been written. Since it wasn't a big part I could only give it a 1 star instead of 2.
This isn't my first time reading a book by this author but I'm pretty sure it will be my last. Her book Loving Eleanor was much better written probably due to it being published in 2016 (a year after this book). If you wanted to check out her historical fiction try that one first, or just stick to her mystery books since that's what she is known for.
I appreciate how Ms. Wittig Albert hinted at Rose's possible relationship with her close friend Troub since it's only speculation. The gap between this care of writing was so different from the care the author took with the rest of the book. This relationship wasn't the main focus of the story but it is an example of how the book could have been written. Since it wasn't a big part I could only give it a 1 star instead of 2.
This isn't my first time reading a book by this author but I'm pretty sure it will be my last. Her book Loving Eleanor was much better written probably due to it being published in 2016 (a year after this book). If you wanted to check out her historical fiction try that one first, or just stick to her mystery books since that's what she is known for.
January 9, 2014
I loved Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House series growing up. Twenty years later, I still set aside time for Hallmark's Little House on the Prairie Marathons and am just as enraptured by her books as I was at age eight. It recently came out the Laura's daughter Rose may have been the steamroller behind the writing. Between my nostalgic love and curiosity by this new snippet of information the novel, A Wilder Rose grabbed my interest.
During a rewrite of By the Shores of Silver Lake Rose takes the time to reminisce with a young aspiring author, making the bones of this storytelling. As informative as these break-ins were I think I preferred the flashbacks, Rose's protege annoyed me and felt it took some meat away from the bones. As for Rose herself, she came off as a whiny kid. maybe my childhood self was siding with Laura but Rose got on my nerves and had to put down this book numerous times.
Rose's story got repetitive, she lives at Rocky Ridge until she feels stifled and must purge herself of Mansfield. After her leave, she complains of the burden editing the Little House books is and prohibits her from working on her own material. Eventually she ends up back at Rocky Ridge and the cycle continues. It became tedious.
While I found Susan Wittig Albert's writing to be agreeable the fan girl in me was disappointed. Laura came off as petty and was described by Rose the way a sixteen year would after being grounded. I did think the concept was a good one and does make me want to read a biography or even some of Rose Wilder Lane's original work but as for A Wilder Rose, I think it could have been better executed.
During a rewrite of By the Shores of Silver Lake Rose takes the time to reminisce with a young aspiring author, making the bones of this storytelling. As informative as these break-ins were I think I preferred the flashbacks, Rose's protege annoyed me and felt it took some meat away from the bones. As for Rose herself, she came off as a whiny kid. maybe my childhood self was siding with Laura but Rose got on my nerves and had to put down this book numerous times.
Rose's story got repetitive, she lives at Rocky Ridge until she feels stifled and must purge herself of Mansfield. After her leave, she complains of the burden editing the Little House books is and prohibits her from working on her own material. Eventually she ends up back at Rocky Ridge and the cycle continues. It became tedious.
While I found Susan Wittig Albert's writing to be agreeable the fan girl in me was disappointed. Laura came off as petty and was described by Rose the way a sixteen year would after being grounded. I did think the concept was a good one and does make me want to read a biography or even some of Rose Wilder Lane's original work but as for A Wilder Rose, I think it could have been better executed.
June 30, 2013
A must-read for anyone who, like many of my generation, was obsessed with the Little House series before it became a TV juggernaut. Just as the books are a fictionalized account of Laura's childhood, this is a fictionalized account of how the LH books very likely came to be. Is the story true? I can't judge, but after reading Susan Wittig Albert's imagined account, I find myself wanting to read Rose's books, if only to see how they compare the books "written" by her mother.
March 21, 2020
I read this book with interest since our family lives by Walnut Grove and we are rather immersed in the real history of Laura Ingalls Wilder. The book is a fictionalized account of Rose Wilder (Laura's daughter), mostly during the 1920's and 30's as she came home to her parents' Missouri home and supported them with her writing, eventually helping her mother write the Little House books.
I am not one of those fans who's going to say that Rose didn't do the bulk of the writing of those books, as it's patently obvious that she did. Laura was a fine writer for newspaper pieces but she did not have any experience or talent for writing dramatic fiction. The correspondence between mother and daughter clearly shows that Rose took Laura's bits of memories and crafted good fiction (but fiction, nonetheless) out of it to help her mother sell those books. My husband and kids act in a local outdoor play every year that tells the real history of the Ingalls Family's life here in SW Minnesota, and even that bit is completely different from the books. The timeline is completely different, they were here twice, they lived in a house and not a dugout for much of it, Pa went to work in Mankato, they had a little brother, there was no one Nellie Oleson (she was based on three different girls Laura disliked growing up) and so on. We also know from Laura's own diary how different her life was than the one in the books, and we can clearly see how she actually wrote when we compare Laura's book that was published posthumously by Rose's money-hungry adopted libertarian grandson, which reads nothing like the other books since Rose wasn't around to edit it and was a huge disappointment to many fans.
So I have no issue with the premise that Rose did the work, and why. My issue with the book is that it's just not interesting other than the look into the publishing world and politics of the time. Rose was a fascinating woman and if you're going to fictionalize her life then give her a heartbeat. Why did so many women live with her for years at a time? Can we address the lesbian rumors please? Why not deal with her terrible depression and mental health issues, and the fact that she herself self diagnosed herself with mental illnesses and also said that she seriously contemplated killing the president. The book is so dry and dull, written like someone writing her autobiography who doesn't want to give out any of the juicy bits, the way you'd detail your life in an interview for the local college.
Very sanitized and dull, sadly. Three stars for some history I didn't know (not the family's but the country's and places like Albania, where Rose traveled extensively), but mostly a wasted opportunity.
Digital ARC courtesy NetGalley.
I am not one of those fans who's going to say that Rose didn't do the bulk of the writing of those books, as it's patently obvious that she did. Laura was a fine writer for newspaper pieces but she did not have any experience or talent for writing dramatic fiction. The correspondence between mother and daughter clearly shows that Rose took Laura's bits of memories and crafted good fiction (but fiction, nonetheless) out of it to help her mother sell those books. My husband and kids act in a local outdoor play every year that tells the real history of the Ingalls Family's life here in SW Minnesota, and even that bit is completely different from the books. The timeline is completely different, they were here twice, they lived in a house and not a dugout for much of it, Pa went to work in Mankato, they had a little brother, there was no one Nellie Oleson (she was based on three different girls Laura disliked growing up) and so on. We also know from Laura's own diary how different her life was than the one in the books, and we can clearly see how she actually wrote when we compare Laura's book that was published posthumously by Rose's money-hungry adopted libertarian grandson, which reads nothing like the other books since Rose wasn't around to edit it and was a huge disappointment to many fans.
So I have no issue with the premise that Rose did the work, and why. My issue with the book is that it's just not interesting other than the look into the publishing world and politics of the time. Rose was a fascinating woman and if you're going to fictionalize her life then give her a heartbeat. Why did so many women live with her for years at a time? Can we address the lesbian rumors please? Why not deal with her terrible depression and mental health issues, and the fact that she herself self diagnosed herself with mental illnesses and also said that she seriously contemplated killing the president. The book is so dry and dull, written like someone writing her autobiography who doesn't want to give out any of the juicy bits, the way you'd detail your life in an interview for the local college.
Very sanitized and dull, sadly. Three stars for some history I didn't know (not the family's but the country's and places like Albania, where Rose traveled extensively), but mostly a wasted opportunity.
Digital ARC courtesy NetGalley.
June 18, 2013
Susan Wittig Albert has done a masterful work with the two subjects of her book, Laura Ingalls Wilder and her daughter Rose Wilder Lane. It is a novel, but a novel with facts. In her very fine readers companion to A Wilder Rose, Albert says " Writing novels about real people can be a tricky business"
What can be so tricky about it, you might well ask? Laura Ingalls Wilder's stories about a time gone by are now a fabric of our society, part legend and part of our childhood. Let me let Laura herself explain " All I have told is true but it is not the whole truth".
We knew her as an unpublished, inexperienced writer who put pencil to paper and wrote her memories of life on the prairie and frontier as a girl. In actuality, Wilder and her daughter Rose were collaborators in taking the memories of pioneering and making them publishable and saleable.
The author's years of meticulous study of original documents including the diaries and day journals of both women and scholarly comparisons of the writing of both are compelling but sympathetic. We can enjoy them by understanding that both of these women lived through hard times and created stories that endure.
What can be so tricky about it, you might well ask? Laura Ingalls Wilder's stories about a time gone by are now a fabric of our society, part legend and part of our childhood. Let me let Laura herself explain " All I have told is true but it is not the whole truth".
We knew her as an unpublished, inexperienced writer who put pencil to paper and wrote her memories of life on the prairie and frontier as a girl. In actuality, Wilder and her daughter Rose were collaborators in taking the memories of pioneering and making them publishable and saleable.
The author's years of meticulous study of original documents including the diaries and day journals of both women and scholarly comparisons of the writing of both are compelling but sympathetic. We can enjoy them by understanding that both of these women lived through hard times and created stories that endure.
August 7, 2013
Brings William Holtz's academic biography of Rose Wilder Lane to vivid fictional life, telling the story of two strong women who collaborated to develop the "Little House" books.
Like many, I read and re-read the "Little House" books, and believed that they were memoir, not fiction. As I grew older, I happened on bits of debate about the extent to which the stories were exaggerated for dramatic effect, but never seriously questioned the fundamental truth of the stories. I also learned that that Laura Ingalls Wilder had a daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, who grew into an author and journalist. But I never gave the subject of Rose, or the authorship of the "Little House" series, much thought.
Many, many years later, I happened on William Holtz' "The Ghost in the Little House: A Life of Rose Wilder Lane,” a dense academic biography that chronicles Rose's life and makes a compelling argument that Rose strongly influenced her mother's books.
"A Wilder Rose" brings that academic biography (along with other research) to fictional life, answering some questions that the biography left open, in the form of an aged Rose telling her memories to a younger protégé.
It's really at least three stories in one:
First, it does answer the central mystery of this collaboration: why would Rose and Laura keep their collaboration secret? In my opinion (details withheld to avoid spoilers) the reasons are entirely believable.
It is also a biography of a particular time and place. Through Rose's journalistic eyes, we see the desperation of the Depression, Dust Bowl, and pre-WWII era. Through Rose's relationship with her mother and hometown, we feel viscerally the stresses of an agricultural society rapidly turning urban. And through the stories of Rose's time in Europe, and of the friends growing out of her writing work and European travels—and her mother's reaction to these people—we see the reactions of a nation (America) considering socialism and Communism and grappling with the New Deal.
And most fundamentally, we hear from a fascinating and contradictory woman. Rose was a generous woman who would give money to strangers even when she didn't have enough herself…and preached the value of "self-sufficiency." Rose did as much as anyone—both through her own writing and ghosting her mother's writing—to romanticize the "rural pioneer" lifestyle, while hating the life and heading toward cities whenever she could. Rose resented influence, but exerted an outsize influence on most who knew her, to the point that some of them fled. Rose desperately wanted love and cherished her sexuality…but rejected long-term interests in both to maintain her freedom.
The picture that emerges of Rose is of a real, aggravating, stubborn, generous and talented woman, who suffered from the constraints of her time and place.
The picture of Laura that emerges from these pages is equally vivid. I know that some readers found it hard to move from the persona of Laura in the Little House books to Rose's view of Laura in "A Wilder Rose." However, I thought that “Wilder Rose” painted a convincing picture, especially knowing that many of Rose’s words in this book came directly from her diary. I could certainly see how the "sweet and spunky Laura" could have grown into the adult "Mama Bess," who seems to have worked hard at making sure that her daughter kept helping to support the family and who worried excessively about what people thought.
Look at the threads that run through the Little House series. Laura repeatedly works hard to support her family in general and Mary in particular (shades of Rose). And one of the strongest motifs is that of Caroline (Ma) trying to tame her daughter Laura, and teach her that she must be "ladylike." How surprising is it that Rose would express similar loyalty, and that Laura, especially after moving into a settled Midwestern culture where "Mrs. Grundy" flourished, would start to harp on Rose's iconoclastic nature and friends?
It's an interesting question whether Laura herself expressed both of those ideas in her drafts, and that those experiences explain who Laura grew into, or whether Rose inserted or highlighted those themes because of the internal pressure she felt to explain her mother (perhaps another book…hint, hint?)
I personally loved Rose's voice, and could have dispensed with the framing story introducing the person listening to Rose's memoirs. Still, the frame was a tiny part of the story. You can even skip those parts if you want, without missing much.
In the end, Susan Wittig Albert has done the same thing Laura/Rose did: she told a story to tell the truth. Even knowing that the "Little House" stories were extensively modified for dramatic effect and narrative smoothness, they still "read as truth." So does Albert's book.
Disclaimer: I received an advance review copy of this book from the author
Like many, I read and re-read the "Little House" books, and believed that they were memoir, not fiction. As I grew older, I happened on bits of debate about the extent to which the stories were exaggerated for dramatic effect, but never seriously questioned the fundamental truth of the stories. I also learned that that Laura Ingalls Wilder had a daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, who grew into an author and journalist. But I never gave the subject of Rose, or the authorship of the "Little House" series, much thought.
Many, many years later, I happened on William Holtz' "The Ghost in the Little House: A Life of Rose Wilder Lane,” a dense academic biography that chronicles Rose's life and makes a compelling argument that Rose strongly influenced her mother's books.
"A Wilder Rose" brings that academic biography (along with other research) to fictional life, answering some questions that the biography left open, in the form of an aged Rose telling her memories to a younger protégé.
It's really at least three stories in one:
First, it does answer the central mystery of this collaboration: why would Rose and Laura keep their collaboration secret? In my opinion (details withheld to avoid spoilers) the reasons are entirely believable.
It is also a biography of a particular time and place. Through Rose's journalistic eyes, we see the desperation of the Depression, Dust Bowl, and pre-WWII era. Through Rose's relationship with her mother and hometown, we feel viscerally the stresses of an agricultural society rapidly turning urban. And through the stories of Rose's time in Europe, and of the friends growing out of her writing work and European travels—and her mother's reaction to these people—we see the reactions of a nation (America) considering socialism and Communism and grappling with the New Deal.
And most fundamentally, we hear from a fascinating and contradictory woman. Rose was a generous woman who would give money to strangers even when she didn't have enough herself…and preached the value of "self-sufficiency." Rose did as much as anyone—both through her own writing and ghosting her mother's writing—to romanticize the "rural pioneer" lifestyle, while hating the life and heading toward cities whenever she could. Rose resented influence, but exerted an outsize influence on most who knew her, to the point that some of them fled. Rose desperately wanted love and cherished her sexuality…but rejected long-term interests in both to maintain her freedom.
The picture that emerges of Rose is of a real, aggravating, stubborn, generous and talented woman, who suffered from the constraints of her time and place.
The picture of Laura that emerges from these pages is equally vivid. I know that some readers found it hard to move from the persona of Laura in the Little House books to Rose's view of Laura in "A Wilder Rose." However, I thought that “Wilder Rose” painted a convincing picture, especially knowing that many of Rose’s words in this book came directly from her diary. I could certainly see how the "sweet and spunky Laura" could have grown into the adult "Mama Bess," who seems to have worked hard at making sure that her daughter kept helping to support the family and who worried excessively about what people thought.
Look at the threads that run through the Little House series. Laura repeatedly works hard to support her family in general and Mary in particular (shades of Rose). And one of the strongest motifs is that of Caroline (Ma) trying to tame her daughter Laura, and teach her that she must be "ladylike." How surprising is it that Rose would express similar loyalty, and that Laura, especially after moving into a settled Midwestern culture where "Mrs. Grundy" flourished, would start to harp on Rose's iconoclastic nature and friends?
It's an interesting question whether Laura herself expressed both of those ideas in her drafts, and that those experiences explain who Laura grew into, or whether Rose inserted or highlighted those themes because of the internal pressure she felt to explain her mother (perhaps another book…hint, hint?)
I personally loved Rose's voice, and could have dispensed with the framing story introducing the person listening to Rose's memoirs. Still, the frame was a tiny part of the story. You can even skip those parts if you want, without missing much.
In the end, Susan Wittig Albert has done the same thing Laura/Rose did: she told a story to tell the truth. Even knowing that the "Little House" stories were extensively modified for dramatic effect and narrative smoothness, they still "read as truth." So does Albert's book.
Disclaimer: I received an advance review copy of this book from the author
September 11, 2019
In this NOVEL about the writing of the “Little House” books, Ms. Albert gives a glossy version of the complicated truth about the actual authorship from Rose Wilder Lane’s viewpoint. Ms. Lane tells this story to an admirer of hers, an aspiring journalist, who helps Ms Lane w/ daily activities at her house in Connecticut in 1939, the eve of the outbreak of WWII. I feel that the jumping back-and-forth from the 1939 interaction to the actual story interrupts the flow of the actual story.
What is the story? Ms. Lane was born to a young, dirt-poor mother in the very early years of her parents’ marriage. She is very precocious, and claims to remember burning down her parents’ house at two-plus years old. This guilt warps her relationships w/ her parents from then on. You get a big dose of Rose’s self-pity about growing up poor doing hard work on the farm, Rocky Ridge. She moves to KC at 17, after finishing high school in Louisiana w/ her aunt EJ, made famous in the “Little House” books as the spinster school teacher, Eliza Jane Wilder. She moves all around the country, and then the world, as a journalist/ghostwriter. The first section of the book is actually about her living w/ a friend in Albania. This friend moves back to the Mizzou farm w/ her when they have to leave Albania. Rose’s mother, Mama Bess, is painted as a disagreeable woman much too concerned about what her small-town neighbors think about Rose and Rose’s friends/lifestyle. Rose is stuck at the farm b/c of the stock market crash in 1929 and subsequent depression. Mama Bess presents her w/ a stack of the now-famous “Indian Chief” tablets filled w/ her life stories that she has named “Pioneer Girl.” (This was published recently in a lovely edition.). Rose now has a dilemma: she knows that the story is too rough and wooden to get an agent interested, yet she wants Mama Bess to feel good about being an author. So what to do? Mama Bess is adamant that she doesn’t want to write “fiction;” she wants her life story to be “truthful.” Admirable, but not saleable, in Rose’s opinion, nor her literary agent’s, as it turns out. Mama Bess reluctantly agrees to some editing, after the agent suggest writing the Big Woods’ stories as their own book. Rose edits the stories and expands them w/ dialogue, and the book gets published.
Rose now has a serious dilemma b/c her mother now has a three-book contract. Rose will obviously have to continue her serious editing of the stories w/o any credit for doing so. Mama Bess won’t even READ the books after their final editing, so Rose can’t teach her how to write what sells! Rose also has her own publishing pressures, b/c they all have to pay the bills somehow. She writes her two most critically-acclaimed books herself during these years. Between editing her Mom’s books (which end up being a series of EIGHT books!) writing her own, and having a social/family life, Rose is a very busy woman, whose days/work are constantly interrupted by her lonely, interfering mother! Rose’s post-1939 life is summarized in the epilogue, so you really only get a glimpse of her and her parents anti-FDR, anti New Deal feelings.
If you want a well-documented, factual reading on the Lane/Wilder relationship, w/ all its warts and full political rants, please read Caroline Fraser’s excellent “Prairie Fire: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder,” winner of the 2018 Pulitzer Prize.
You’ll get a fuller understanding of the complicated relationship between fiction and autobiography in the “Little House” books. Read this book for fun, but take Rose’s self-pity w/ a grain of salt.
What is the story? Ms. Lane was born to a young, dirt-poor mother in the very early years of her parents’ marriage. She is very precocious, and claims to remember burning down her parents’ house at two-plus years old. This guilt warps her relationships w/ her parents from then on. You get a big dose of Rose’s self-pity about growing up poor doing hard work on the farm, Rocky Ridge. She moves to KC at 17, after finishing high school in Louisiana w/ her aunt EJ, made famous in the “Little House” books as the spinster school teacher, Eliza Jane Wilder. She moves all around the country, and then the world, as a journalist/ghostwriter. The first section of the book is actually about her living w/ a friend in Albania. This friend moves back to the Mizzou farm w/ her when they have to leave Albania. Rose’s mother, Mama Bess, is painted as a disagreeable woman much too concerned about what her small-town neighbors think about Rose and Rose’s friends/lifestyle. Rose is stuck at the farm b/c of the stock market crash in 1929 and subsequent depression. Mama Bess presents her w/ a stack of the now-famous “Indian Chief” tablets filled w/ her life stories that she has named “Pioneer Girl.” (This was published recently in a lovely edition.). Rose now has a dilemma: she knows that the story is too rough and wooden to get an agent interested, yet she wants Mama Bess to feel good about being an author. So what to do? Mama Bess is adamant that she doesn’t want to write “fiction;” she wants her life story to be “truthful.” Admirable, but not saleable, in Rose’s opinion, nor her literary agent’s, as it turns out. Mama Bess reluctantly agrees to some editing, after the agent suggest writing the Big Woods’ stories as their own book. Rose edits the stories and expands them w/ dialogue, and the book gets published.
Rose now has a serious dilemma b/c her mother now has a three-book contract. Rose will obviously have to continue her serious editing of the stories w/o any credit for doing so. Mama Bess won’t even READ the books after their final editing, so Rose can’t teach her how to write what sells! Rose also has her own publishing pressures, b/c they all have to pay the bills somehow. She writes her two most critically-acclaimed books herself during these years. Between editing her Mom’s books (which end up being a series of EIGHT books!) writing her own, and having a social/family life, Rose is a very busy woman, whose days/work are constantly interrupted by her lonely, interfering mother! Rose’s post-1939 life is summarized in the epilogue, so you really only get a glimpse of her and her parents anti-FDR, anti New Deal feelings.
If you want a well-documented, factual reading on the Lane/Wilder relationship, w/ all its warts and full political rants, please read Caroline Fraser’s excellent “Prairie Fire: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder,” winner of the 2018 Pulitzer Prize.
You’ll get a fuller understanding of the complicated relationship between fiction and autobiography in the “Little House” books. Read this book for fun, but take Rose’s self-pity w/ a grain of salt.
October 14, 2013
I read an advanced reading copy of the book, via NetGalley.
As a child, I was obsessed with Laura Ingalls Wilder and her Little House books. They were my first great loves in the field of historical fiction. I went so far as to join my grandma in her trips to the little genealogy library at the Mormon church in town, where I researched the Wilders and Ingalls. That was how I learned the books had a lot more fiction to them--because their journey didn't follow the order of the series, and several dead babies were buried along the way. This untruth bothered me a lot at age 9.
On NetGalley, I saw this fictionalized account of Laura's relationship with her daughter Rose Wilder Lane, and I knew I wanted to read it. In recent years I've become aware that Lane heavily rewrote her mother's childhood stories, and I wanted to know more. As a writer, I now understand how real events sometimes must be softened and edited for the sake of storytelling.
Albert has created a solid work. It may be fictionalized, but she obviously put a lot of work and research into it, and it's an enthralling read. The book focuses on the 1930s when the stock market crash left Rose destitute and forced her prolonged stay at her parents' farm in rural Mansfield. If, like me, you have grown up with an image of a sassy yet good Laura, you have to reconcile yourself with the grown up Laura as shown through her daughter's eyes. Laura is meddlesome, gossiping, and very worried about appearances in town. It feels real and nuanced, and 3rd person sections set in the "present" (later in the 30s) show Rose has become much like her mother in some ways.
One thing that stood out to me was that it is heavily implied that Rose is bisexual. I can see why the author might avoid making an absolute declaration, but since it IS in Rose's viewpoint so much, it felt odd that it just hinted. The book certainly didn't need anything graphic, but something more definitive within Rose's viewpoint would have clarified things.
I highly recommend this for grown up readers with fond memories of the Little House books.
As a child, I was obsessed with Laura Ingalls Wilder and her Little House books. They were my first great loves in the field of historical fiction. I went so far as to join my grandma in her trips to the little genealogy library at the Mormon church in town, where I researched the Wilders and Ingalls. That was how I learned the books had a lot more fiction to them--because their journey didn't follow the order of the series, and several dead babies were buried along the way. This untruth bothered me a lot at age 9.
On NetGalley, I saw this fictionalized account of Laura's relationship with her daughter Rose Wilder Lane, and I knew I wanted to read it. In recent years I've become aware that Lane heavily rewrote her mother's childhood stories, and I wanted to know more. As a writer, I now understand how real events sometimes must be softened and edited for the sake of storytelling.
Albert has created a solid work. It may be fictionalized, but she obviously put a lot of work and research into it, and it's an enthralling read. The book focuses on the 1930s when the stock market crash left Rose destitute and forced her prolonged stay at her parents' farm in rural Mansfield. If, like me, you have grown up with an image of a sassy yet good Laura, you have to reconcile yourself with the grown up Laura as shown through her daughter's eyes. Laura is meddlesome, gossiping, and very worried about appearances in town. It feels real and nuanced, and 3rd person sections set in the "present" (later in the 30s) show Rose has become much like her mother in some ways.
One thing that stood out to me was that it is heavily implied that Rose is bisexual. I can see why the author might avoid making an absolute declaration, but since it IS in Rose's viewpoint so much, it felt odd that it just hinted. The book certainly didn't need anything graphic, but something more definitive within Rose's viewpoint would have clarified things.
I highly recommend this for grown up readers with fond memories of the Little House books.
June 14, 2017
In the Team Laura vs. Team Rose debate, author Susan Wittig Albert is decidedly on Team Rose. Based on William Holtz’s biography
The Ghost in the Little House
as well as Rose’s journals, she has fictionalized the years in which Rose lived on Rocky Ridge Farm with her aging parents and worked on her mother’s novels. I’d read the Holtz biography, but not the journals, so while the novel seemed accurate based on what I know, much of it seemed like speculation that only the journals can corroborate. Laura is not a likable character in this book, so if you’re on Team Laura, beware. As for me, the book has only made me even more curious about Rose’s original writings.
After my last review, my Goodreads friend Sara asked if I’m sick of Little House already. The answer is no. I’ll never get sick of it. But after two Rose books back to back, I am ready for something different.
After my last review, my Goodreads friend Sara asked if I’m sick of Little House already. The answer is no. I’ll never get sick of it. But after two Rose books back to back, I am ready for something different.
September 29, 2013
As a lifelong Little House fan, I found this fascinating, although it paints both Rose and her mother as somewhat unsympathetic. I'm not sure about the extent of the collaboration between Laura and Rose; since this book depicts Rose doing most of the writing, I'm now reading Pamela Smith Hill's LIW biography to sort of balance things out.
December 30, 2013
What did I think? It was an interesting novel about 10 years in Rose Wilder Lane's life, the years that she moved her parents into a house that she built for them so she could take over the family farm house, where she could write and entertain her female friends. There is an air of mystery around Rose's relationship with her friend Troub -- I kept thinking of the relationship between Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok. (Oh, wouldn't Rose the Roosevelt Hater love that comparison.)
The focus of the novel, though, is Rose's participation in the creation of the Little House novels. In particular, with the first four books, with just a mention of By the Shores of Silver Lake at the beginning that gets the novel started. The story is meant to show just how much of the beloved books are Rose's work, and how little of the writing was her mother's, Laura Ingalls Wilder.
I enjoyed the book. Rose was an interesting character, and the point of the novel was to show the classic mother-daughter struggle that defined the relationship between these two women. I liked that it took place in a very defined period of time and gave some insight to life as a writer during the Depression. (However, I would have liked some more in-depth details about Rose's fiction. Was everything serialized or just some pieces? She seemed to get the same kind of pay for everything she wrote, no matter the length.)
However, there were a lot of things about this book that really bugged me. It draws heavily from The Ghost in the Little House by William Holtz, a book I read when it first came out. The reason I didn't like that book was because the unfiltered contempt of LIW, the person and the writer. I didn't understand why there was so much anger there. I got the exact same feeling when I read A Wilder Rose. Albert the author seems to want to paint Rose as this wonderful, caring person and writer in contrast to the overbearing and manipulative Mama Bess, as Rose called her mother. Albert did a good job as painting LIW as a hateful, spiteful person, but she also did a good job setting up Rose as the one who is overbearing and manipulative. There were no scenes that show them in a truly loving relationship. Nor were there any scenes that gave the reader any idea why Rose would be drawn to live in Mansfield for years. This is fiction, Mrs. Albert. It was okay to stretch the truth and create something. The irony here is that while the character Rose is talking about the importance of adding fictional touches to the Little House books to expand the story and fill in the holes for the reader, Albert ignores that advice. Luckily, I could fill in some of the holes because I know the stories of LIW's and RWL's lives well enough. However, I suspect that the goal here was to make the book appear to be nonfiction. I thought the book itself had the look and feel of a college-level textbook, the texture of the cover, the extreme white pages and the font, even the size/shape of the book is more in line with the women's studies and political science academic books I have on my shelf rather than the softcover novels I buy.
That said, I still don't understand the seething animosity toward LIW in books that focus on the life of Rose. Was she the horrible person they make her out to be or is this a contrived caricature to reinforce the idea that LIW wasn't the lovable little old lady who wrote those endearing children's novels? But I think Albert glossed over a lot of the realities here. In other books, the reaction Laura had after Rose lifted Pioneer Girl's story for her own book was not meek and mild as this book portrayed it. It also doesn't explain why the Little House books read so much smoother than anything I've read of Rose's.
I'm in the camp that believes Laura wrote the books and Rose provided a heavy dose of editing, possibly more than she needed to. I've never met a writer yet who wasn't benefited by a good editor.
The focus of the novel, though, is Rose's participation in the creation of the Little House novels. In particular, with the first four books, with just a mention of By the Shores of Silver Lake at the beginning that gets the novel started. The story is meant to show just how much of the beloved books are Rose's work, and how little of the writing was her mother's, Laura Ingalls Wilder.
I enjoyed the book. Rose was an interesting character, and the point of the novel was to show the classic mother-daughter struggle that defined the relationship between these two women. I liked that it took place in a very defined period of time and gave some insight to life as a writer during the Depression. (However, I would have liked some more in-depth details about Rose's fiction. Was everything serialized or just some pieces? She seemed to get the same kind of pay for everything she wrote, no matter the length.)
However, there were a lot of things about this book that really bugged me. It draws heavily from The Ghost in the Little House by William Holtz, a book I read when it first came out. The reason I didn't like that book was because the unfiltered contempt of LIW, the person and the writer. I didn't understand why there was so much anger there. I got the exact same feeling when I read A Wilder Rose. Albert the author seems to want to paint Rose as this wonderful, caring person and writer in contrast to the overbearing and manipulative Mama Bess, as Rose called her mother. Albert did a good job as painting LIW as a hateful, spiteful person, but she also did a good job setting up Rose as the one who is overbearing and manipulative. There were no scenes that show them in a truly loving relationship. Nor were there any scenes that gave the reader any idea why Rose would be drawn to live in Mansfield for years. This is fiction, Mrs. Albert. It was okay to stretch the truth and create something. The irony here is that while the character Rose is talking about the importance of adding fictional touches to the Little House books to expand the story and fill in the holes for the reader, Albert ignores that advice. Luckily, I could fill in some of the holes because I know the stories of LIW's and RWL's lives well enough. However, I suspect that the goal here was to make the book appear to be nonfiction. I thought the book itself had the look and feel of a college-level textbook, the texture of the cover, the extreme white pages and the font, even the size/shape of the book is more in line with the women's studies and political science academic books I have on my shelf rather than the softcover novels I buy.
That said, I still don't understand the seething animosity toward LIW in books that focus on the life of Rose. Was she the horrible person they make her out to be or is this a contrived caricature to reinforce the idea that LIW wasn't the lovable little old lady who wrote those endearing children's novels? But I think Albert glossed over a lot of the realities here. In other books, the reaction Laura had after Rose lifted Pioneer Girl's story for her own book was not meek and mild as this book portrayed it. It also doesn't explain why the Little House books read so much smoother than anything I've read of Rose's.
I'm in the camp that believes Laura wrote the books and Rose provided a heavy dose of editing, possibly more than she needed to. I've never met a writer yet who wasn't benefited by a good editor.
February 11, 2014
I read this book on my kindle. this is about Rose Wilder Lane and her famous mother, Laura Ingalls Wilder. it mostly follows the life of Rose wilder Lane. she was a known writer. who often was a ghost writer for famous celebrities and other authors. it has been rumored for years that Rose Lane helped write her mother Laura ingalls Wilder with her famous children' books about her life growing up as a pioneer girl. Laura was known to tell stories about her childhood and was encouraged to write about them. the problem was although Laura was good at verbally telling stories, writing them down was a different story.
Rose helped her mother by editing the book fleshing it out. at first with protests by Laura Ingalls. it was a slow process to get those books published and awhile before they became famous. for one thing by the time the second book "Farmer Boy" came out the depression hit and most people could not afford the luxury of buying books. even reading this book about Rose I can still see the strong willed and fiery personality that Laura Ingalls had. It was also of interest to read about Rose Wilder Lanes life. she was quite the lady herself. she helped out the less fortunate even taking in two brothers and sending them to school. a life they would not have had before. she had her own heart breaks and tragedies. i liked this book for the most part. I dragged in parts. if it were not for Rose Lane i do not think there would have been the success of the Little house on the Prairie series. she never took credit for any of the her mother's books.or took royalties. until the very end when she inherited them when her mother died. If you ever read any of Laura Ingalls Wilder books, this may be of interest to read.
Rose helped her mother by editing the book fleshing it out. at first with protests by Laura Ingalls. it was a slow process to get those books published and awhile before they became famous. for one thing by the time the second book "Farmer Boy" came out the depression hit and most people could not afford the luxury of buying books. even reading this book about Rose I can still see the strong willed and fiery personality that Laura Ingalls had. It was also of interest to read about Rose Wilder Lanes life. she was quite the lady herself. she helped out the less fortunate even taking in two brothers and sending them to school. a life they would not have had before. she had her own heart breaks and tragedies. i liked this book for the most part. I dragged in parts. if it were not for Rose Lane i do not think there would have been the success of the Little house on the Prairie series. she never took credit for any of the her mother's books.or took royalties. until the very end when she inherited them when her mother died. If you ever read any of Laura Ingalls Wilder books, this may be of interest to read.
April 27, 2015
I received a copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
And honestly? This is a book that felt like a very rough cut. I've read a bit of Susan Wittig Albert before, and while her mysteries aren't my cup of tea, I had no reason to doubt her writing ability. Like most women who grew up in my generation, I've got a bit of a soft spot for the Little House books by Laura Ingalls Wilder ( or by Rose Wilder Lane?) and so I was interested to read some background about how the books were created.
I had no idea that Rose Wilder Lane had so much influence about the editing and publication of these books. The book is written mostly from RWL's perspective, and she's mostly exasperated by and intimidated by her mother and her mother's small-town and conservative outlook. RWL, according to this book, took very rough work from her mother and edited and tightened them up while refusing to take credit so that her mother could enjoy the reputation of a writing prodigy.
This book itself feels like a very rough work that needed a ton of editing and momentum added in order to feel like there was anything like a plot progression or indeed much beyond the bare recitation of thinly fictionalized facts. I wonder if this was originally intended as non-fiction and then put hastily into a novel format. If so, the book was done no favors by it. I find it quite ironic that all the problems that RWL had with her mother's writing are present (in spades) in this book. Unfortunately, I don't think this irony was on purpose. Instead, the book just wandered its way through the history of its heroines and utterly failed to engage me.
And honestly? This is a book that felt like a very rough cut. I've read a bit of Susan Wittig Albert before, and while her mysteries aren't my cup of tea, I had no reason to doubt her writing ability. Like most women who grew up in my generation, I've got a bit of a soft spot for the Little House books by Laura Ingalls Wilder ( or by Rose Wilder Lane?) and so I was interested to read some background about how the books were created.
I had no idea that Rose Wilder Lane had so much influence about the editing and publication of these books. The book is written mostly from RWL's perspective, and she's mostly exasperated by and intimidated by her mother and her mother's small-town and conservative outlook. RWL, according to this book, took very rough work from her mother and edited and tightened them up while refusing to take credit so that her mother could enjoy the reputation of a writing prodigy.
This book itself feels like a very rough work that needed a ton of editing and momentum added in order to feel like there was anything like a plot progression or indeed much beyond the bare recitation of thinly fictionalized facts. I wonder if this was originally intended as non-fiction and then put hastily into a novel format. If so, the book was done no favors by it. I find it quite ironic that all the problems that RWL had with her mother's writing are present (in spades) in this book. Unfortunately, I don't think this irony was on purpose. Instead, the book just wandered its way through the history of its heroines and utterly failed to engage me.
July 20, 2013
I never read the Little House books and barely watched the tv show growing up but of course, Laura Ingalls Wilder is an icon of children's literature. Who knew that her daughter was more of the driving force behind the books, which won an incredible number of awards? Albert has used in-depth research to tell a story steeped in historical facts. The relationship between Rose and Laura hit a little too close to home; mothers and daughters are often competitors. Rose's life had so many interesting moments and I really enjoyed hearing about all of the famous writers she knew. This was a real page-turner in the best sense of the term. I couldn't put it down.
October 16, 2013
Like many a young girl, I treasured the classic historical novels of Laura Ingalls Wilder. I used to read the books over and over, captivated by the descriptions of American frontier life, the optimistic themes of family togetherness and survival amid challenging circumstances, and the appealing character of spunky Laura, the author’s younger self.
And, like many other children, I had read the final book, The First Four Years, with a sense of puzzlement. It lacked the sparkle of the others. The heroine had turned bitter and unsympathetic, and the storyline, which recounted the hardships and less frequent joys of the first years of Laura Ingalls’ and Almanzo Wilder’s marriage and the birth of their daughter, Rose, felt dreary and depressing. I chalked it up to the subject matter, not being old enough to note the stylistic dissimilarities from the earlier books.
The reasons behind the differences are complex and, as has been revealed, involve a carefully concealed literary partnership. Susan Wittig Albert is best known for her mystery novels, but A Wilder Rose is riveting biographical fiction based upon research positing that Rose Wilder Lane, Laura’s daughter, was the ghostwriter for most of the Little House books. Unlike the others, The First Four Years, a posthumous release, didn't benefit from Lane’s talent.
Series fans may find this news about a beloved literary figure unwelcome, but the novel isn’t an unsubstantiated interpretation designed to stir up controversy. Rather, Albert has followed where the evidence led and fictionalized the scenarios documented in sources such as Rose’s unpublished journals, Laura’s letters, and scholarly secondary works, most prominently William Holtz’s groundbreaking The Ghost in the Little House: A Life of Rose Wilder Lane (Univ. of Missouri Press, 1993).
The result is a credible and convincing account of the middle years of Rose’s life, her tense relationship with her “Mama Bess” (her name for Laura), and the powerful forces of duty and ambition that fueled their separate and intertwined journeys as writers. It also tells a much larger story about the changes affecting America as it sank from the buoyant optimism of the Roaring ‘20s into the depths of the Great Depression.
The majority of A Wilder Rose is written as if Rose is speaking directly to the reader, and her voice brims with energy, keen intelligence, and honest directness. Framed by sections in which she interacts with one of the up-and-coming writers she mentors, Rose relates her story over an eleven-year period, from 1928 through 1939. Since the novel reads like a memoir, Rose often tells as much as she shows – but it doesn’t matter one bit. Great writers know when and how they can break the rules.
A prolific and astonishingly successful author of magazine fiction and quasi-sensational biographies, Rose is a fortyish divorcée and avid world traveler with strong connections in America’s literary community when she’s called home from Albania to care for her aging parents at their farm at Rocky Ridge in Mansfield, Missouri, population 870.
The two women are very different personality-wise. “My mother is a mystery in many ways, at least to me,” says Rose, knowing that the opposite is true as well. Having grown up with very little, “Mama Bess” is self-reliant and proud, yet bossy, overly critical, and very conscious about what others think. Cosmopolitan, adventurous, and overly generous to others – she spends money as fast as it comes in – Rose tries her mother’s patience when her bohemian New York friends come to stay and meet up against Mansfield’s small-town narrow-mindedness.
Then the stock market crash of ’29 hits, causing both women to lose their life savings – and prompting Mama Bess, who had previously written only columns for a rural newspaper, to try her hand at an autobiography. A Wilder Rose details the dire economic circumstances that drew Rose into assisting with, editing, and finally rewriting her mother’s words in fictional form, and the literary deception that ensued.
Rose’s gift for penning realistic scene-setting details are evoked through Albert’s bountiful descriptions of the Missouri farmlands, richly abundant as the novel begins: "... in an impetuous rush, the wild flume of wild plums and the pinks of peach blossom spill across the hillsides." These same lands turn heartbreakingly desolate during the Dust Bowl years.
She also provides brilliant insight into the mindset and methods of a talented commercial fiction writer – something ordinary readers rarely get to see – and New York’s vibrant publishing scene, as children’s literature establishes itself as an important, lucrative genre.
Along the way, Albert examines Rose’s personal relationships and her growth as a political activist and libertarian, provoked by her observations on how Roosevelt’s New Deal policies on agriculture affected local farmers, with decisions on their livelihood being taken out of their expert hands.
My favorite parts, though, are her wise observations on stories, truth, and life.
Although well known in her day, Rose Wilder Lane is an obscure author now, and A Wilder Rose makes a compelling case why this label is unfair. It certainly inspired me to seek out her published work. Beyond that, though, Albert’s sensitive approach acknowledges the faults in each woman’s character while highlighting their gifts and strengths: Laura/Mama Bess’s extraordinary personal history and oral storytelling abilities, and Rose’s skills at transforming her mother’s life into dramatic, page-turning fiction.
Their collaboration was fraught with difficulties, but Albert explains how in many ways it was necessary – and how the Little House books, cherished by several generations of both children and adults, wouldn't have existed without it.
And, like many other children, I had read the final book, The First Four Years, with a sense of puzzlement. It lacked the sparkle of the others. The heroine had turned bitter and unsympathetic, and the storyline, which recounted the hardships and less frequent joys of the first years of Laura Ingalls’ and Almanzo Wilder’s marriage and the birth of their daughter, Rose, felt dreary and depressing. I chalked it up to the subject matter, not being old enough to note the stylistic dissimilarities from the earlier books.
The reasons behind the differences are complex and, as has been revealed, involve a carefully concealed literary partnership. Susan Wittig Albert is best known for her mystery novels, but A Wilder Rose is riveting biographical fiction based upon research positing that Rose Wilder Lane, Laura’s daughter, was the ghostwriter for most of the Little House books. Unlike the others, The First Four Years, a posthumous release, didn't benefit from Lane’s talent.
Series fans may find this news about a beloved literary figure unwelcome, but the novel isn’t an unsubstantiated interpretation designed to stir up controversy. Rather, Albert has followed where the evidence led and fictionalized the scenarios documented in sources such as Rose’s unpublished journals, Laura’s letters, and scholarly secondary works, most prominently William Holtz’s groundbreaking The Ghost in the Little House: A Life of Rose Wilder Lane (Univ. of Missouri Press, 1993).
The result is a credible and convincing account of the middle years of Rose’s life, her tense relationship with her “Mama Bess” (her name for Laura), and the powerful forces of duty and ambition that fueled their separate and intertwined journeys as writers. It also tells a much larger story about the changes affecting America as it sank from the buoyant optimism of the Roaring ‘20s into the depths of the Great Depression.
The majority of A Wilder Rose is written as if Rose is speaking directly to the reader, and her voice brims with energy, keen intelligence, and honest directness. Framed by sections in which she interacts with one of the up-and-coming writers she mentors, Rose relates her story over an eleven-year period, from 1928 through 1939. Since the novel reads like a memoir, Rose often tells as much as she shows – but it doesn’t matter one bit. Great writers know when and how they can break the rules.
A prolific and astonishingly successful author of magazine fiction and quasi-sensational biographies, Rose is a fortyish divorcée and avid world traveler with strong connections in America’s literary community when she’s called home from Albania to care for her aging parents at their farm at Rocky Ridge in Mansfield, Missouri, population 870.
The two women are very different personality-wise. “My mother is a mystery in many ways, at least to me,” says Rose, knowing that the opposite is true as well. Having grown up with very little, “Mama Bess” is self-reliant and proud, yet bossy, overly critical, and very conscious about what others think. Cosmopolitan, adventurous, and overly generous to others – she spends money as fast as it comes in – Rose tries her mother’s patience when her bohemian New York friends come to stay and meet up against Mansfield’s small-town narrow-mindedness.
Then the stock market crash of ’29 hits, causing both women to lose their life savings – and prompting Mama Bess, who had previously written only columns for a rural newspaper, to try her hand at an autobiography. A Wilder Rose details the dire economic circumstances that drew Rose into assisting with, editing, and finally rewriting her mother’s words in fictional form, and the literary deception that ensued.
Rose’s gift for penning realistic scene-setting details are evoked through Albert’s bountiful descriptions of the Missouri farmlands, richly abundant as the novel begins: "... in an impetuous rush, the wild flume of wild plums and the pinks of peach blossom spill across the hillsides." These same lands turn heartbreakingly desolate during the Dust Bowl years.
She also provides brilliant insight into the mindset and methods of a talented commercial fiction writer – something ordinary readers rarely get to see – and New York’s vibrant publishing scene, as children’s literature establishes itself as an important, lucrative genre.
Along the way, Albert examines Rose’s personal relationships and her growth as a political activist and libertarian, provoked by her observations on how Roosevelt’s New Deal policies on agriculture affected local farmers, with decisions on their livelihood being taken out of their expert hands.
My favorite parts, though, are her wise observations on stories, truth, and life.
Although well known in her day, Rose Wilder Lane is an obscure author now, and A Wilder Rose makes a compelling case why this label is unfair. It certainly inspired me to seek out her published work. Beyond that, though, Albert’s sensitive approach acknowledges the faults in each woman’s character while highlighting their gifts and strengths: Laura/Mama Bess’s extraordinary personal history and oral storytelling abilities, and Rose’s skills at transforming her mother’s life into dramatic, page-turning fiction.
Their collaboration was fraught with difficulties, but Albert explains how in many ways it was necessary – and how the Little House books, cherished by several generations of both children and adults, wouldn't have existed without it.
August 30, 2013
I admit, I approached this book with some trepidation, being a diehard Laura Ingalls Wilder/Little House fan. Like millions of other girls, I wanted to be, if not Laura herself, then her best friend, sharing in her adventures as well as the many times of love and laughter she shared with her close knit family. That being said, though, it never bothered me overmuch when I read that she may not have written the books totally on her own. It was the spirit of the girl in the stories that I loved, and Susan Wittig Albert keeps that spirit alive in A Wilder Rose. In it, she combines extensive and thorough research with her immense gift of storytelling, giving the reader a glimpse into the "how it might have been" in the writing of the Little House books. After a few pages, I was simply caught up in the story and the characters, as well as the times in which they lived. Albert has always shown a strong understanding of the importance of place in her writings, whether fiction or nonfiction, and this shines through in A Wilder Rose as well. The complexity of Rose's emotions concerning the farm, her love and longing for Albania as it was when she lived there with her friend Troub, and her final move to her own little house away from her parents all show this clearly. The story centers on Rose, but in it we also get a taste of the adult Laura, who, it seems, ended up much more like Ma than Ma ever would have expected when Laura was little, preferring playing in the creek to going to school in town. Truly a well-crafted, well-told story, one I would not hesitate to recommend to others, whether they were little Laura wannabes as children or not!
I read the book in three days, unable to put it down, then passed it on to my daughters to read. The last time I saw it, it showed a lot of love, as every good book should!
I read the book in three days, unable to put it down, then passed it on to my daughters to read. The last time I saw it, it showed a lot of love, as every good book should!
June 17, 2015
This book is about the writing and publishing of the "Little House on The Prairie" books that like so many other little girls, I read and loved. Supposedly written by Laura Ingalls Wilder, it turns out that the books were pretty much rewritten by her daughter Rose although this was not publically known at the time.
Although this aspect of the story was interesting, what I found much more interesting was the time period in which this book takes place - in the 1920s through the late 1930s. Rose Wilder Lane was a fascinating woman and before her time in many aspects of her life. Married for a short period of time when she was young, she had a son who died in infancy, then divorced and lived the remainder of her life as a single woman traveling the world, supporting her parents as a writer. She was well educated, worldly, passionate about politics, yet baked cookies and pies, farmed, and "adopted" three young men who she financially supported and nurtured.
I learned a lot about the period in history in which this book took place and what life was like in rural Missouri early in the 20th century. I really enjoyed all of the details about her life as a writer, traveler, farmer, daughter and friend.
An easy and enjoyable read.
Although this aspect of the story was interesting, what I found much more interesting was the time period in which this book takes place - in the 1920s through the late 1930s. Rose Wilder Lane was a fascinating woman and before her time in many aspects of her life. Married for a short period of time when she was young, she had a son who died in infancy, then divorced and lived the remainder of her life as a single woman traveling the world, supporting her parents as a writer. She was well educated, worldly, passionate about politics, yet baked cookies and pies, farmed, and "adopted" three young men who she financially supported and nurtured.
I learned a lot about the period in history in which this book took place and what life was like in rural Missouri early in the 20th century. I really enjoyed all of the details about her life as a writer, traveler, farmer, daughter and friend.
An easy and enjoyable read.
July 15, 2013
Like so many American girls, I grew up a rabid fan of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books (despite the cheesy television series). Over the years, I read many books about Laura, and begged my long-suffering husband to detour on road-trips so that I could make pilgrimages to Laura’s houses. (You’re a saint, honey!) But I never knew much about Rose (and frankly wasn’t that interested… she didn’t bring in the whole woodpile during a blizzard)
I wondered why the literary style of “The First Four Years” was so different than the other books, and at one point I read some of Laura’s columns from The Missouri Ruralist – they were *nothing* like the books I so loved - but never gave it much thought beyond the fact that the original books must have had a dynamite editor.
This novel opened my eyes to the fact that Rose was actually the ghost writer who made the books into such beloved American icons. It was a fascinating look at the dynamics between a brilliant headstrong daughter and a domineering perfectionist mother. Although it is presented as a work of fiction, the author obviously did exhaustive research to capture Rose’s voice – and now I want to learn more about her.
I wondered why the literary style of “The First Four Years” was so different than the other books, and at one point I read some of Laura’s columns from The Missouri Ruralist – they were *nothing* like the books I so loved - but never gave it much thought beyond the fact that the original books must have had a dynamite editor.
This novel opened my eyes to the fact that Rose was actually the ghost writer who made the books into such beloved American icons. It was a fascinating look at the dynamics between a brilliant headstrong daughter and a domineering perfectionist mother. Although it is presented as a work of fiction, the author obviously did exhaustive research to capture Rose’s voice – and now I want to learn more about her.
May 4, 2015
I marked this as a DNF for several reasons. I never seemed to get into the story. I found the writing to be choppy and uninteresting. It didn't flow very well. Also, I just couldn't get behind Rose as a character. In just about everything I've read about her, she comes across as a spoiled brat. She talks about needing money, but she is always blowing it on more houses, clothes, or other things she does not need. She also acts like she is the one completing supporting her parents. She acts like the farm doesn't bring in any money. What did they do all those years when she was younger? I found the characters and story uninteresting and just plain boring. I have to much on my TBR list to waste time on something like this.
December 11, 2017
I really wanted to like this book as I loved the "Little House" books growing up. I had a hard time engaging with the story from the beginning as the movement of the story felt contrived. Rose Wilder tells her story because a friend keeps asking about it. These breaks in the narrative to the "present" day to ask more questions did not add anything to the story; I wish the author had just stayed in the past. Also, I felt that there were a lot of repetitions in the book; or maybe it was just Rose with the same complaints over and over again. I did however appreciate the explanation of the political climate of the time; the novel gave me a better understanding of the Depression and the government's dealings in the aftermath.
July 2, 2021
An interesting look into Rose Wilder Lane's years living back at Rocky Ridge and her role in helping her mother write the Little House on the Prairie books. I learned some interesting facts about the interesting life that Rose led, her political beliefs and the many articles and books she wrote. This book did show Laura Ingalls Wilder in a different light than I imagined her to be. I did have to keep reminding myself that the Laura portrayed in the beloved tv show, as the rest of the show & its characters, are loosely based on the real Ingalls family. This story though did bring back some wonderful memories of growing up reading these books and made me want to revisit them.
My daughter Carina chose this as my surprise read for February.
My daughter Carina chose this as my surprise read for February.
August 18, 2017
I found the premise of the book to be fascinating. However, I could not finish this book. I found it laborious and confusing to read. Disappointingly, there was nothing that was able to draw me into the novel.
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