First, I have to say how beautiful the cover of this book is. A spattering of wheat blows across the front. Gold metallic spots within the wheat and the dust sparkle in the sun. It’s elegant.
Now, on to the story. I have always been intrigued with the era of the Dust Bowl. So many years without rain. Dust covering everything. The government blaming the farmers. I’ve even written a short story based in that time and have started plotting a book set in the Dust Bowl years, so I was especially interested in reading about the ways they coped with all that dust.
In The Four Winds, protagonist Elsa Wolcott believes she is unloveable. She marries without her family’s blessing, and makes a new life with her husband’s family. Still, she never believes her husband truly loves her. She even worries her children don’t really love her. To be fair, her daughter, Loreda, is not the easiest child. Partial to her father, Loreda constantly blames Elsa for anything that goes wrong–including her father’s eventual abandonment.
That’s when Elsa takes the children and they move to California, hoping to find work. When she does find it, you get a good sense of what it would be like to live on a company farm. There’s an old song, “Sixteen Tons,” which states the singer “owes my soul to the company store” and you understand the lyrics now. Elsa also finds a man–a communist. I thought perhaps Hannah could use the communist twist in a future book about Loreda during the McCarthy era. We’ll see.
It’s written in two POVs–Elsa’s and Loreda’s. I didn’t care for Loreda much, but she does go through a transformation. The descriptions of the Dust Bowl were incredibly well done. It’s amazing what the people went through. Hannah says she wanted to write something to give people hope after living through the Covid pandemic. Although I can’t say it had a heartwarming ending, but if you are interested in the Dust Bowl era, this is a great read.
I was gifted the hardcover edition of this book by my daughter. I learned a lot about the Dust Bowl and how people were treated back then. It’s a long book–448 pages–and I thought it could have started a little later on in Elsa’s life, but overall, it was an enjoyable read and it fulfilled what historical fiction readers want–to learn more about a different time.
The Four Winds is published by St. Martin’s Press and has a 2021 copyright.
Kristin Hannah’s website is: https://kristinhannah.com.
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