Too Good to Be Altogether Lost: Rediscovering Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House Books - Hardcover

by Pamela Smith Hill (Author)

Named a 2025 Choice Outstanding Academic Title

Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of the well-known Little House series, wrote stories from her childhood because they were "too good to be altogether lost." And those stories seemed far from being lost during the remainder of her lifetime and through most of the twentieth century. They were translated into dozens of languages; generations of children read them at school; and dedicated readers made pilgrimages to the settings of the Little House books. With the release of NBC's Little House on the Prairie series in 1974, Wilder was well on her way to becoming an international literary superstar. Simultaneously, however, the novels themselves began to slip from view, replaced by an onslaught of assumptions and questions about Wilder's values and politics and even about the books' authenticity. From the 1980s, a slow but steady critical crescendo began to erode Wilder's literary reputation.

Author Biography

Pamela Smith Hill is a New York Times best-selling editor, author, educator, and expert on Laura Ingalls Wilder. She has taught young adult literature and creative and professional writing at universities in Washington, Oregon, and Colorado, as well as classes on Laura Ingalls Wilder through Missouri State University. Hill has been interviewed for multiple documentaries on Wilder and has appeared on C-SPAN, NPR, PBS, and the BBC for her expertise. As well as three novels for young adults, her books include Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography and Laura Ingalls Wilder: A Writer's Life.