Farmer Boy

BOOK NAME: Little House on the Prairie
AUTHOR: Laura Ingalls Wilder 

Hi guys. You know that book series of The Little House on the Prairie books? All of those books are about a real girl growing up in pioneer times with her family in the midwest. There’s one book in the series though that is about her husband when he was a boy. It’s called Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Farmer Boy is about Almanzo Wilder who is about 9 years old in the book. Though he’s just a kid in terms of age he is expected to work like a man most of the time. He plows fields, chops wood and drives a team oxen when he isn’t going to school, which he hates, by the way. What he really wants to do is work with his family’s horses, but his father who is pretty strict doesn’t think he is old enough.

I really liked this book even though I wasn’t sure about it at first. It gave me a clear picture of what it was like to grow up on a farm in the olden days–lots of work but lots of unstructured time also. I thought the author used great descriptions in the book and some humor too. Almanzo is an easy character to like because even though he lived so long ago he is pretty much like all kids I know. He’s pretty nice and hard-working overall but has some not so nice and lazy feelings also. I could really relate to Almanzo because he wants to grow up so badly but he’s treated like a little kid sometimes. In the end of the story, which I won’t give away, Almanzo realizes that his father understands him after all. I really recommend this book to anyone, but especially to boys ages 7-12. It’s totally worth it!

DogEared: Read Sheila’s review of Little House on the Prairie!