From School Library Journal
Grade 3-6-As Little Town at the Crossroads ended, Caroline Quiner (Laura Ingalls Wilder's mother) and her family were facing a move to a new home in Concord, WI. Here, they set off for the small cabin in the woods that is barely habitable. With help from an uncle and neighbors, they fix up their new home and begin to clear the land. The undertaking is difficult, but Caroline's mother is strong and resourceful. Unfortunately, weeks of summer drought are followed by a severe rainstorm that ruins their crops. The widowed Mrs. Quiner is employed by the neighborhood rich man to provide meals for his laborers. The work is tedious and often unacknowledged, but all of the children help out. One of the workers is very kind, though, and as the story ends, he has proposed marriage to Mrs. Quiner. Fans of the two previous titles will enjoy reading about this year in her life. The tone is gentle and the scenes of pioneering hardship are balanced by scenes of good times. Through it all, the family maintains its closeness and resilience.
Susan Pine, New York Public LibraryCopyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Kirkus Reviews
paper 0-06-026998-7 The family of Laura Ingalls Wilder is marketed practically to death with the appearance of another entry in the Little House/The Caroline Years series: Caroline, Laura's mother, is a child moving with her family to the Wisconsin woods. Wilkes is less concerned with characterization than in getting the family from one place to another, and settled in their new home. A description of their disastrous first crop is quickly followed by a solution to their threat of hunger. Hints of the characters' qualities peek through, as when Caroline wonders if ``some new person'' is ``stuck inside'' her increasingly fastidious sister. A flash of an argument between them brings the book temporarily to life, but it quickly settles back into a carefully planned script, charting a path from the move until the courtship of Caroline's mother, a widow. It's a genial volume, but can't hold a candle to Wilder's vividly evoked pioneer days, nor even to Roger Lea MacBride's Little House episodes about Rose Wilder (Little Farm in the Ozarks, 1994, etc.). (Fiction. 8-12) --
Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
