A Wilder Rose

by Susan Wittig Albert

[Whitney @ First Impressions Reviews]

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.