Little House on Rocky Ridge

I liked these books quite well. Mr. MacBride is a fine writer. As a stand alone series they are good stories. As a link to the original Little House Series you can tell the difference in styles. I couldn't help but read between the lines of Rose's only child upbringing. Great books to curl up with on a gray rainy day. Grab a blanket and a cup of cocoa and dig in.

It's Laura's road diary ficitionalized in Rose's voice, and just as charming as Little House. A little thinner on plot than the 7 books that follow, but kudos to those who thought to bring this series to print.

Mr. Roger Lea Macbride is a wonderful author; he makes Rose's life more exciting and enchanted, yet realistic and serious at the same time. I lived in another country in Eastern Asia a few years before. I am now a student in Luther School, where I realized that America is truly the greatest country in the world if the Little House girls had lived in it. "Little House on Rocky Ridge is the beginning of Rose's life, from South Dakota to Missori. When I used to live in that country in Asia, books came out slower than you could ever imagine! I had only read 6 books of the Little House books in my whole life-"Little House in the Highlands", "Little House in the Big Woods", "Little House on the Prairie", "Little House in Brookfield", "Farmer Boy",and "Little House by Boston Bay". Then when I moved to America, I started on the "Rose Years", beginning with "Little House on Rocky Ridge". That was the greatest Little House book I had ever read, and now I have it, to take with me to that country in Asia to show all my friends. I'd bet they'd like to read it too! And in honor of them, I will do two things-build a "Little House" fan club for my friends, and buy the Little House books for my friends! Especially "Little Farm in the Ozarks"!!!

Only Laura Ingalls Wilder will ever write the way Laura did, and Little House fans who understand this will love this book and the rest of this new series. This book could stand alone as a portrait of a farm family driven off their land by greedy speculators in South Dakota and searching for a new home where the rain is plentiful. But it also works as a fascinating answer to the question many Little House fans have had: what happened to Laura, Almanzo and Rose after Laura's books ended? Mr. MacBride does an admirable job of following Laura's style as the family treks by covered wagon to Missouri where they must start life anew, with their old friends, the Cooleys. For those who don't know, this is a true story told in novel fashion. Rose is seven, and the book sees the world through her eyes. But the payoff comes from reading the whole series, through Bachelor Girl, when Rose is a grown woman making hard decisions to go out on her own when women were expected to marry or stay at home and become old maids. Aside from the portrait of Laura and Almanzo as mother and father, and Rose's point of view, these books tell the story of America at a time of tremendous technological change, just as today. Only instead of the Internet, it is the telegraph, telephone, and the like. Rose is a believable character, strong-willed like her mother, independent, and smart. Taken together, this series of eight books make a powerful impression on adults as well as children.

I was extremely pleasently surprised by the quality of the writing in this book and this entire series. It was very, very close to the quality of the originals. Rose is a character with her own thoughts and ideas and personality---very rounded out and not a generic American girl of the past with a few built in character traits. This is very likely because the author actually knew her so well. I loved the chance to get to know more about the rest of the story of Laura and Manly and Rose. If you are like me and are reluctant to dive into this series as you see it as perhaps a pale copy of the original, don't be! It mirrors the style, but in a good way, and it's a worthy adjunct to the original series. I really loved it.

This is a wonderful story about a young girl, Rose Wilder, and her parents, Laura and Almanzo Wilder, who move from De Smet, South Dakota to Mansfield, Missouri in the "Land of the Big Red Apple" with their friends, the Cooleys. A wonderful beginning for a wonderful series that ends in "On the Banks of the Bayou". Rose is a wonderful person with a strong spirit. But hey, what would you expect from a little house girl?