Laura and Almanzo work hard at farming through their first four years of marriage. They can never seem to get ahead with their debts for farming equipment. Just when they think they will have a good crop of wheat, the weather turns nasty and ruins all their hopes. Their daughter Rose is born and brings them a lot joy, but they also have heartaches and disaster strikes their little farm. Still, they are unified in their love and in their determination to triumph over nature and make their farm a success.

I love how Laura uses Almanzo's nickname "Manly" in this book. So adorable! It's so sweet to see how they care for each other and work hard to support each other through illness and pain, through happy times of celebration, and through everything in between.

Almanzo is doing his best, but he's not very smart with money. I think he is used to having a prosperous farm like his parents did, and he wants to provide those riches for his new family. But Laura is used to living in squalid conditions on the prairie and being content with very little, so she is more careful with money. The debt seems to weigh more heavily on her mind than it does for Almanzo.

This book is my least favorite in the series, because it has so many disasters and heartaches one after another. The happy times seem to be few and far between. They are sick and people die and they lose part of their claim. There are fires and tornadoes and blizzards and drought. It's just so depressing.

This book is also different from the other books in the series because the author never finished revising and editing it. These are just her preliminary notes for the book, and so the book is not complete. The writing doesn't flow like the other books, and it's much shorter than the other books too.