#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER #1 USA TODAY BESTSELLER#1 WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER#1 INDIE BESTSELLER”The Four Winds seems eerily prescient in 2021 . . . Its message is galvanizing and hopeful: We are a nation of scrappy survivors. We’ve been in dire straits before; we will be again. Hold your people close.”—The New York Times“A spectacular tour de force that shines a spotlight on the … close.”—The New York Times
“A spectacular tour de force that shines a spotlight on the indispensable but often overlooked role of Greatest Generation women.”—People
“Through one woman’s survival during the harsh and haunting Dust Bowl, master storyteller, Kristin Hannah, reminds us that the human heart and our Earth are as tough, yet as fragile, as a change in the wind.” —Delia Owens, author of Where the Crawdads Sing
From the number-one bestselling author of The Nightingale and The Great Alone comes a powerful American epic about love and heroism and hope, set during the Great Depression, a time when the country was in crisis and at war with itself, when millions were out of work and even the land seemed to have turned against them.
“My land tells its story if you listen. The story of our family.”
Texas, 1921. A time of abundance. The Great War is over, the bounty of the land is plentiful, and America is on the brink of a new and optimistic era. But for Elsa Wolcott, deemed too old to marry in a time when marriage is a woman’s only option, the future seems bleak. Until the night she meets Rafe Martinelli and decides to change the direction of her life. With her reputation in ruin, there is only one respectable choice: marriage to a man she barely knows.
By 1934, the world has changed; millions are out of work and drought has devastated the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as crops fail and water dries up and the earth cracks open. Dust storms roll relentlessly across the plains. Everything on the Martinelli farm is dying, including Elsa’s tenuous marriage; each day is a desperate battle against nature and a fight to keep her children alive.
In this uncertain and perilous time, Elsa—like so many of her neighbors—must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or leave it behind and go west, to California, in search of a better life for her family.
The Four Winds is a rich, sweeping novel that stunningly brings to life the Great Depression and the people who lived through it—the harsh realities that divided us as a nation and the enduring battle between the haves and the have-nots. A testament to hope, resilience, and the strength of the human spirit to survive adversity, The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation.
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Kristin Hannah is one of the best authors alive. My review could probably stop there, but good golly, what a book! What a book! As with what is perhaps my favorite book of all time—The Nightingale—The Four Winds is a story of survival against the odds. Starting in 1930, Elsa Martinelli was doing well enough, despite a marriage she didn’t particularly want. But she finds a sense of family with her in-laws. Then comes the Dust Bowl, the stock market crash and the Depression come crashing into her world, and Elsa must choose between staying and striking out for California to carve a better life for her children, facing incredible hardship, bleak poverty and sickness.
The Four Winds, which came out this past spring, is also oddly prescient of today’s struggles in America. A pandemic in the form of “dust pneumonia,” a divided nation suspicious of outsiders, unemployment, poverty…this is not an easy read. But it’s a magnificent read, a story of resilience, endurance and friendship and the amazing, indomitable power of a woman on a mission.
Set during the Great Depression (like my own novel “This Tender Land”), “The Four Winds” follows a family driven from Texas by the devastating dust bowl conditions of the early 1930s. For anyone who has read “The Grapes of Wrath”—and if you haven’t, you should—this will strike a familiar chord. It’s a story of perseverance in the face of overwhelming odds, of both the cruelty and the generosity of the human heart, and of the things that matter to our spirits in the end. It’s a great pleasure to put yourself in the hands of a consummate storyteller, and Kristin Hannah is that and more.
Through one woman’s survival during the harsh and haunting Dust Bowl, master storyteller, Kristin Hannah, reminds us that the human heart and our Earth are as tough, yet as fragile, as a change in the wind. This mother’s soul, suffering the same drought as the land, attempts to cross deserts and beat starvation to save her children with a fierce inner strength called motherhood. A timely novel highlighting the worth and delicate nature of Nature itself.
THE FOUR WINDS, by Kristin Hannah, is a book we’ve all been waiting for. It gives you the intensity and emotional punch that only Hannah can deliver. Have lots of tissues nearby. Kristin has taken the story of the Great Migration of the Dust Bowl and, unlike The Grapes of Wrath, put women at its very heart. This is a book of its time, and one you’ll remember long after.
Another gem from Kristin Hannah. I fell in love with the main character, Elsa–and her wonderful in-laws, The book really captures the time of the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression, At the same time, it’s an entertaining page-turner. Brilliant!
Kristin’s books are always 10-star reads! The Four Winds at times felt like an ordeal, as if I were living through all the same horrible trials of the Dust Bowl as Elsa and her family. Yet I was so invested in the characters, so immersed in the story, that I had to stick with them just like they were sticking with life. Along the way, I learned so much about a part of history that no one wants to talk about very much. I’ll never forget this book…or the wonderful narration by Julia Whelan.
This amazing book is set in Texas during the 1930’s. The Great Depression after the stock market crash takes down everyone in its path. This story follows Elsa, a young woman who is unloved and not even liked by her parents just wishing for someone to actually love her. When she meets Rafe Martinelli, she feels her life has changed. They marry and move in with his parents on their farm. Elsa loves working on the farm with her in-laws and her children, Ant and Loreda. The Martinelli’s live in Texas and are hit extremely hard by the Dust Bowl Era. Should they stay and try and save the farm or should they go to California where there are supposed to be jobs and prosperity? This story is hard to read and will make you cry. What the people of this time period went through is absolutely heartbreaking. Elsa is such a strong woman and lives for her family. I loved this book and its amazing characters. This is a story that will stay with me in my heart forever. I received an advanced readers copy and all opinions are my own.
Another powerful historical novel by Kristin Hannah. Like the best historicals do, the author has allowed us to experience and inhabit a time and place we never would have had the chance to otherwise. Hannah has also given us characters that will stay with us a very long time as well as life lessons that are as applicable now as they were during the Dust Bowl days. A masterpiece of a novel. Highly recommend.
*Fyi, this is a general market book and includes a few sexual situations which can be easily skimmed over if, like me, you don’t prefer those in your reading material.
What an extraordinary book!! Simply extraordinary. And that ending… gosh, my heart.
*listened to the audiobook and can’t recommend it enough!
Loved this book. It took me to another place and time, the Texas Panhandle in the middle of the Dust Bowl entrenched in the misery of the Great Depression. Character driven, the book reeled me in because I cared about Elsa and Lareda, little Ant. At first, I hoped for rain. Then for safety on the road. Finally for fairness and justice.
As usual, Ms. Hannah does not disappoint. The Four Winds is a beautifully woven tale of love, sacrifice, and the getting on of life. Despite long lasting and life altering hardships suffered during the Great Depression, this story felt anything but depressing. Filled with hope and the boundless love that binds a family, The Four Winds delivers immense insight into a time, place, and mindset not often examined. Heartbreaking, hopeful, inspiring, and nearly impossible to put down.
Kristin Hannah’s one of my favorite authors and this book did not disappoint. Beautifully written, this historical story echoed of many of the struggles we face today. An emotional novel about finding our voice, making hard choices, and owning the courage to carry those choices out. Highly recommend.
I have enjoyed Kristin Hannah’s books in the past and just had to buy her new book. I started it as soon as UPS dropped it at my door and didn’t do much else until I finished it. It’s one of the best books that I’ve read in a long long time. It’s a story about poverty, love and family that I will long remember.
It’s 1934 in Texas and the recession and drought have drastically changed the lives of the farmers. Instead of the crops they had in the past, they now have dry fields that don’t yield anything and dust storms that make their lives and their farms even more brutal. Many farmers are losing their farms and equipment to the banks and the federal government is doing nothing to help their plight. They’ve heard that California has jobs and life will be good for them there. Many of them pack up their household goods and start the trek to California. When they got there, they find a way of life much worse than what they left. They are forced to live in unsafe conditions and paid a pittance for helping the rich farmers pick their crops.
Elsa has to decide whether to take her children to California for a better life or stay in Texas on the family farm. Her husband has left her and his parents are struggling to keep the farm profitable. When her son gets sick from the dust, she feels that she has no choice and leaves to find a better life. What she finds is a camp full of people who can barely earn the money to feed their children. She also finds prejudice and dislike from the Californians. Elsa never gives up in trying to keep her children healthy and fed. She’d never felt strong or brave in her entire life but she showed bravery and love every day to try to find a better life for her family.
This novel is so well researched and written that I could feel the pain of Elsa and her children. I admired Elsa and all of the other parents who did back- breaking work to help their families in this terrible time in American history. I’ll warn you that this is not an easy book to read. I cried more reading this book than any other book that I’ve read recently. At the end the overwhelming feeling is one of admiration of Elsa as a strong and brave woman and strong hope for the future.
This is a novel that I will keep and re-read sometime in the future. It’s a book that I am so glad the Kristin Hannah wrote full of characters that I won’t ever forget.
The Four Winds will take you on a journey so vivid and emotionally compelling that you cannot help being immersed in this world. It’s the era of the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression and aside from the expected hardship and heartache Kristin Hannah brings us a story of love, hope, and survival. I felt overwhelming sadness, anger, outrage, and fear while also being overcome by great joy, compassion, and adoration. We live in a world today where we are so quick to judge another’s appearance and actions; not so different from the world in this book and the parallels are staggering and life changing. In a world full of Mr. Walcott’s, Rafe’s and Mr. Welty’s; be an Elsa, a Tony, or a Loreda. If you’re looking for something meaningful that will shake you to the core, look no further than The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah.
Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for this advanced reader copy in exchange for my honest review.
I had a tough time with this one. Had to take a break in the middle and come back to it. Reading about people and times so vivid and real, struggling with them and feeling everything is how Kristin Hannah’s books hit you. Hand your heart over as you turn the first page.
This has the same effect as her other book. So much sad and struggle and heartbreak. Given the times we are living in in 2020, it was too much for me. I think it could have been 100 pages shorter. BUT, her characters! The research you know she put into this book! The specific time in our history she chronicles! It’s like a history lesson in fiction.
Glad to have been asked to read a pre-publication copy of this book.
Riveting from beginning to end. I am a huge Hannah fan, and Four Winds may be her best yet. I knew little about the Dust Bowl, but Hannah brings it to life in a manner I won’t soon forget. Elsa ranks at the top of my all-time favorite characters list. Kudos Kristin Hannah. The wait was well worth it.
464 pages
5 stars
Elsa is a unique character. She is the product of a racist and unbending family and the trauma of her childhood gave Elsa a skewed sense of what love is. Told she was unattractive and too tall, too thin, etc she had very low self-esteem and expectations looking forward. Thinking she was unloveable, she had no expectations and only knew hard work. Steely determination carried her through the hardships. She hardly thought of herself as courageous, but she was.
She falls wildly in “love” with a younger man (I put that in quotes, because she doesn’t know what love really is until later in her life.) For her trouble, she is shunned and driven out of the family.
She, however, finds a true family in her husband Rafe’s mother and father Rosa and Tony. They live on a huge farm in Texas and mainly grow wheat. The land is everything to them and it becomes so for Elsa. Rafe doesn’t agree. He is a dreamer and he teaches their daughter to dream as well. This causes problems with Elsa and she becomes a teenager.
The draught begins. For several years there is very little or no rain. The crops die, the dirt blows ceaselessly. The animals die, the land dies. Hope is lost. People begin to move West.
Elsa and her children join the trek to California but it is not the paradise they expected. They find homelessness and hardship. Living in a tent city, begging for scraps, they inhabitants treat them badly. They can’t even get help at a hospital in times of emergency.
This book is remarkably well written and plotted. The characters are very real. I can see the conditions for myself as Ms. Hannah’s descriptions are so vivid and colorful. Elsa was difficult to like in some ways. I felt compassion at her upbringing and extreme anger at her birth family. What horrible people! But she was fiercely loyal. For someone who never finished high school, she was very intelligent and determined to do right by her children. I decided in the end that I liked her.
I want to thank NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for forwarding to me a copy of this wonderful book for me to read, enjoy and review.
I’m in the middle, so I will finish to give a review.
I’ve read two other novels by author Kristin Hannah, both of them very intense and compelling.
“The Four Winds” continues her storytelling mastery with another challenging set of circumstances and another extremely strong female protagonist, this one a true underdog.
Feeling as though her entire life will be spent in the protective, suffocating prison of her parents’ home, Elsa is seized by the urgent desire to sneak out at night to go to the speakeasy, a place her family would never patronize, let alone allow her to visit. Not having any interaction with folks outside her household, Elsa is unprepared to fend off the overtures of a handsome young man, a man who calls her beautiful, words she’s never heard before.
Elsa’s feeling of triumph is fleeting; her “condition” gives her indiscretion away, infuriating her parents. She is bundled up and summarily dumped at her lover’s family farm, where no one is happy with the inconvenient discovery that Elsa is pregnant with the only son’s child.
Even though Rafe Martinelli resents Elsa’s intrusion into his life and his plans for a higher education, his parents show Elsa the only love and kindness she’s ever known. She thinks of her in-laws as the family she never had, and her two children further endear them to her.
Elsa’s life is richer and fuller than she ever dreamed it could be when the catastrophic draught that arrived on the heels of the Great Depression, bringing on hardships so harsh, it’s impossible to imagine living through such times. As the desperation gets worse, Rafe flees to California, without a word to his family. When their very lives depend on getting out of Texas, Elsa makes a journey to the West, hope being the only thing they own.
This is another engrossing story set in historic times with historic clashes―man against man, man against nature, woman against ever obstacle life can throw at her. Elsa is another indelible portrait of strength, courage and love that towers above everything else. It’s so full and intense, I had to read the last two chapters twice, just to process it all and commit it to memory. As in the past, the author has carefully gathered historical facts and woven a tale of resiliency and faith that is as inspiring as it is informative about that desperate era.
This book really picks up as the story unfolds. It explores concepts that got me thinking long after I finished the story.