I can think of no better author than Cynthia Rylant to take on this daunting task: to write the story that is missing from Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House Series. There is some part of her life that Wilder never wrote about and Rylant tackles it here, fitting this story between On the Banks of Plum Creek and By the Shores of Silver Lake. Rylant and Wilder have such similar writing styles that it felt as if I were reading Wilder again, visiting a long lost, but reclaimed, old friend.

The story concerns the missing years when the Ingalls family lost their farm and had to move around, finally landing in a town at a hotel as workers. It was a dark time for the family, a time they all hated, which is perhaps by Wilder never chose to write about it. The story also covers the death of Wilder's only brother, Micheal, who died as a baby and is scarcely mentioned elsewhere.

It was a bittersweet read for me. So sweet because it called to mind reading that favorite series as a girl, and yet sad, too, to know this wasn't my familiar friend. Sad, also, to see how the Ingalls family suffered so. Reading this book was really like pulling a favorite old sweater around me, wrapping up and snuggling down for a quick, warm read. It is wonderful, but short, and fully deserving to sit on the bookshelf between the other Little House classics.

This book fills in the "missing years" of Laura Ingalls Wilder. The events take place between On the Banks of Plum Creek and By the Shores of Silver Lake, telling the story of when the Ingallses moved east to Burr Oak, Iowa, to run a hotel. The events are all real, but these are the parts of her childhood that Laura deliberately excluded from her series because they were too sad and tragic, and because they didn't fit in with the overall narrative of the pioneering story she wanted to tell.

I wouldn't consider this a necessary read, and certainly don't think it should be a chronological part of the series for a child reading the series for the first time. The series stands better on its own without this book. The writing level is for a child younger than the way Laura wrote On the Banks of Plum Creek, so this book doesn't fit in stylistically.

Also, I had a few peeves with this story. The family is sometimes referred to in the third person, which never happens in the series--"The Ingallses' wagon came to a stop." Pa has nicknames for Mary and Carrie--Pumpkin Pie and Apple Pie--which seems too big a liberty for the author/editor to take. And Ma is much sweeter to Laura in this book than in the books that Laura wrote herself.

I have never read the book before now, although I have reread the Little House books many times. Laura did not actually publish this part of her life because in this book a lot more serious stuff happens. Because the grasshopper came back again this year, Pa cannot pay off his debt and because of that Pa and Ma has to move to the town of Burr Oak to manage a hotel. From having a big farm to living in one room, it's not a happy time for them. There's also the loss of Laura's only brother that I have never known existed since Laura never talked about him in her books. The writing is similar but not quite the same, but I still enjoyed it nonetheless.

Who else but Cynthia Rylant could add to the Laura Ingalls Wilder series

I wish this book had been around when I was first read the Little House books, but I'd like to add it my collection now and look forward to being able to read all these books to my own children one day.

I really liked this book. A lot of people don't wanna read it because it wasn't written by Laura IngallsWilder but I think that the author does a great job!! Short book so it only took my two days to read. This is a great book in the Little House series.

I've read this before - just once, not the countless times I've read the original series - but our camping trip is in the process of getting rained out, so when I realized our campground was only about 8 miles from Burr Oak, you know I was going to stop by the LIW museum there, and of course I had to pick up a copy of the book and re-read.

The story follows the facts of the Ingalls family as far as they are known during the gap between the events of On The Banks of Plum Creek and By the Shores of Silver Lake. It was a difficult and often unhappy time for the family, including more lost crops, illness, and the death of Laura's baby brother, Freddie, (likely part of the reason Laura skipped those years in the first place). The book does a good job of not shying away from difficult subjects, although at times it did seem almost emotionless - surely they would have been a little more affected by some of these events? But then again, in The Long Winter, they spend all of one page actually upset about near-starvation, so maybe that's in keeping with the original books.

The writing was not bad, by any means, but it was noticeably different than the original series. Some of this is surely due to the fact that it was written by two very different people some 70 years apart, but there were also some significant stylistic differences that felt jarring to me. For example, a lot of Pa's dialogue felt wrong - the way he regularly called each girl by pet names (in the original series, only Laura ever had pet names, which helped to emphasize that she was Pa's special helper), or when he multiple times described things as "blasted" (and Ma didn't step in to say "Language, Charles," as she aways did in the original series.

Judging the book solely on its own merits, I'd give it four stars - it's a solid piece of MG historical fiction. But it was explicitly written and marketed as a new addition to the Little House series, and on that basis, I have to bump it down to three. It just doesn't fit terribly well, writing-wise, with the original series. Cynthia Rylant is a very good author, no question, but she admits herself in the afterword that she didn't read the books until she was an adult - it seems a lifetime fan with a thorough knowledge of the books and an intuitive feel for Laura's prose style might have been a better choice for this project.

I found this to be a perfectly charming read. It was refreshing to be able to visit the Ingalls family in never-before-read adventures (at least, not included in the original Little House books). This volume is intended to cover the two missing years that transpire between 'On the Banks of Plum Creek' and 'By the Shores of Silver Lake'. Much takes place that young readers (and adult readers alike) would miss out on by reading only Laura's original books.

New life comes into the family, sweet new little baby faces. And tragic death comes too. The Ingalls family has new roads to travel down, and new trials to bear. (On a more humorous note, Laura and her siblings have to bear the annoying Steadam boys... but we rejoice with the little Ingalls when the Steadams receive their due!)

My favorite scene may just be when Pa sends Laura out for a doctor to help Ma during a time of illness. But Pa has forgotten, in the midst of his worries concerning Ma's health, that the creek is overflowing and there's no way for Laura to cross safely. But she accomplishes the task anyways. I could almost see the surprise showing on Pa's face when Laura returned home!

Overall, this book turned out to be an informative and enjoyable read for me. (Assuming that everything written in the story is based on true facts, I ended up learning quite a bit more about young Laura Ingalls Wilder.)

Did not seem like Laura, poorly written, compared to other little house books.

The story itself is nice, the writing was nice but sometimes 'choppy' as I think she 'hurried' the story along (guess she didn't want to have a very long book since it was made for children) I was pleasantly surprised to read some of the story was 'true to fact' like the preacher's wife asking to adopt Laura because the Ingalls family was struggling so much. "Pa" calling all three girls by nicknames over and over again got kind of old at the beginning; and they said that Freddie had a headstone buried alone...but from the few biographies I've read that includes Freddie he was buried 'in Uncle Peters graveyard" which implies that he wasn't the first and only person buried there? And never had a stone? Anyhow... story I think I will give it a four star when I rate it for others to read.... however, if I compared it to the series in which it is a part of it would only get a meager 2 star. Doesn't flow like the series does, the girls have a different 'air' about them (for lack of better wording) almost like your watching a movie and you get seriously into the storyline and then you put the second movie in only to find they switched the main characters actresses to someone else then producers realized they did a 'goof' and brought the original actresses back. Stand alone the book is a good one...but in the series not so much....

But if you've never read it pick it up and read you won't be disappointed.

The missing "Little House" book is reconstructed by Cynthia Rylant on the basis of unpublished documents. During this two year period, Laura's family must move to Iowa to pay off debts. Moments of great tragedy (the death of a baby brother) are matched by moments of great peace. Some reviewers have complained that the style does not match that of Laura Ingalls Wilder, but I feel that Cynthia Rylant has done a good job.

Old Town in the Green Groves by Cynthia Rylant is a historical fiction companion novel to The Little House on the Prairie series. This story covers the “lost years” in Laura Ingalls Wilder’s life which took place between “the winter of 1875 and the fall of 1877.” Grasshoppers ruin the family’s crops, so they are forced to leave their home from Plum Creek and move to the town of Burr Oak located in Iowa where Pa and Ma work at a hotel.

I enjoyed reading Old Town in the Green Groves and learning more about Laura’s life between her adventures in On the Banks of Plum Creek and By the Shores of Silver Lake. I think Cynthia Rylant did a terrific job writing in Laura’s voice and presenting it in a similar format like the books in the original series. This novel captures the Ingalls family experiencing some happy moments as well as some dark ones during this interim. Every time I read one of Laura’s stories, I admire her and her family for all they had to endure. The frequent moving, harsh environmental conditions, and disappointments due to unforeseen circumstances never seemed to stop Pa and Ma from providing for their family and each other. Laura’s family faced everything head on with determination, faith, and grace. It’s a heartwarming and humorous story wrapped around some heartbreak. Charming companion for fans of the Little House series!