#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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The Four Winds was a great read by Kristin Hannah. In Texas, 1934, millions of people are out of work from a drought in the Great Plains. Farmers are losing their livelihoods as the crops are falling, water’s drying up and the dust threatens to bury them. During this dangerous time, Elsa Martinelli has had to make an agonizing choice; fight for the land she loves or to go west to California. I absolutely loved reading this book and felt completely invested in Elsa and her families story. I can’t wait to read more by the author.
This book was so depressing. I know this was a tough time in our history. I just did not enjoy it.
Oh the hardships and heartbreaks of the dust bowl era and the migration of those Americans. This story of Elsa, turned out by her own family, taken in by the family who provided love and the journey for survival of her children will make you weep and rejoice throughout. Wonderfully written story.
My Review of The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah; published by St. Martin’s Publishing
I have endured silent tears and moments of what my kids have called “mom’s getting soft!” Yet, it’s been ages since a book has evoked such incredible emotions causing me to bawl for countless hours. My family did not grow up during the era of the Great Depression or the Dust Bowl. However; the delineation of the Martenelli family to my own family was uncanny. (I can tell you, as an adult, Elsa’s life made me understand my mother’s so much more.) The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah is an exceptional story of perseverance, resilience, empathy, strife, love, and the ever-powerful meaning of courageousness. Kristins’ words painted pictures of a life full of unbelievable circumstances, and yet she was able to encapsulate the very essence of survival. I highly recommend The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah as it’s truly an amazing story of how we overcome the most heart wrenching odds life often sends our way.
#kristinhannah
#stmartinspublishing
Well-written story. When I started reading it, I wasn’t sure I would enjoy/finish it because the beginning was so depressing, but am I glad I kept reading! It’s appropriate that this Depression Era/Dust Bowl story begins on a low note because it sets the correct mood for this time in history. It painted a vivid picture of what those days were like, and I developed a deeper appreciation for what our forefathers endured. I may shed a few tears while watching a movie, but I rarely cry when reading a book. There were a couple spots in this story where I flat-out sobbed. Any work that elicits that response from me constitutes a well-penned novel.
I received a complimentary digital copy of this book from St Martin’s Press and Net Galley in exchange for unbiased review.
In the 1920’s during the Age of Innocence, a woman was considered a spinster of not married by age of 25. Such was the case for Elsa Wolcott but not from lack of trying to escape the enforced solitude by her parents. She had developed rheumatic fever at age 14 and became frail and weak in her parents opinion. She was also nearly 6 feet tall and just felt like she didn’t fit in which was reinforced constantly by her mother who felt her “plainly.”
Elsa lived and experienced life through her books and the short walks she was allowed to take to the library. She often found pleasure reading a scandalous story, “Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure.” Having attended both her sister, Charlotte and Suzanna’s weddings she resigned her to never marrying. Instead, she began to dream about going to college in Chicago only to be refused by her parents.
Ultimately, this leads Elsa to decide to take control of her life in ways her parents were not prepared.
She cuts off her long blonde hair, makes a red silk dress and slips out one night to experience life. She meets a young man of 18, Raffaelo Martinelli when she is unable to enter a speakeasy. She agrees to go for a drive with him in his truck. Little does she realize that her nativité would change her life forever.
When she discovers that she is pregnant, her father leaves her at the Martinelli farm disowning her for bringing disgrace upon the family. Anthony and Rosalba teach her how to work, cook and clean on the farm, tasks which she was never allowed to perform. Rafe doesn’t go to college so he can marry Elsa and raise their baby while living with his parents.
It was the Texas Panhandle in a town of Dalhart, during the Great War when people were led to believe that the farmers wheat crops would save them from poverty and starvation. Unfortunately, the drought in the Great Plains would last 4 years causing devastation, illness and death. Many people tried to save themselves by migrating to CA and WA to escape the dramatic dust storms. Living under such extreme circumstances changes ones outlook on life. Elsa learns to follow the lead of Rosalba in being a strong, unemotional figure trying to hold the family together.
Families are faced with unthinkable choices during this time era. Do they “wait out” the storms which seem to be lasting for years with continued destruction and devastation? What happens when people develop the courage or desperation to move and leave their land and life behind? They are not prepared for the discrimination and continued poverty and unlivable conditions in CA. The migrants are forced into squatters land where their fear defiance to claim the freedom and liberty due to to them as Americans.
I had conflicting emotional feelings about Elsa who serves as the symbol of the atrocities of the Dust Bowl. At what point do people defy authorities and fight for justice? How long can people continue to passively follow dishonorable leaders for the sake of dignity? Although this is an extremely lengthy novel, it tells a very powerful story about the past which never be forgotten.
I cannot possibly do this book justice in a book review, but I do want to shout its praises in hopes that others will pick up this sweeping saga and be carried away to the time of the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. I confess that I knew little about the era and learned a great deal from the book via the author’s research. I thoroughly enjoyed the story of Elsa, the girl who was never accepted and loved and the woman who loved her family with all of her heart. The characterization was totally realistic, with a portrayal of grit in the midst of hardship and a teenager who was angry at the circumstances that she found herself in and took out her frustrations on her mother. Loreda, the teen, was strong-willed herself, but she met her match in her mother who loved her regardless of how she was treated. This book spoke to my heart and mind and I loved it, but I was not completely in love with all of the parts of it. Some parts were hard to read because of the difficult situations that the family encountered. I have no doubt that these things like work camps happened; it was just hard to read about during this time of Pandemic. I did like how the family took care of themselves and then reached out to help others who were even less fortunate than themselves. I really liked the character of Jack, a Communist who was trying to organize the workers to fight against the big farm owners who were enslaving them with low wages and a company store. This was my first book that I have read by this author, but I will look for others to read because this was an excellent journey to a time and place in our history from which we can learn.
Disclaimer
I own a copy of this book, purchased via a book group. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions expressed are my own.
You are of me, Loreda, in a way that can never be broken. You taught me love. You, first in the whole world, and my love for you will outlive me.
——
The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah took me on a journey that I didn’t know I needed to take. It shredded my heart, over and over again, in a beautifully tragic way. I cannot count the times I cried. Or the times I felt emboldened. As a mother, a wife, a daughter, a woman…I needed every word of this story. When I finished, with tears in my eyes, I reread the ending again, letting it all wash over me. Then I closed the book, held it close, and cried. This is a story that will never leave me.
*****5 big, beautiful stars*****
Be brave.
I checked this book out of the library to read for an online book club. I am voluntarily sharing my honest review and it is not influenced in any way.
One of my favorite books I’ve read in a long time.
I picked up The Four Winds without having read much about the Great Depression. I was intrigued by the dust bowls in Texas. The Four Winds covers all that. It also tells the story of Elsa. Elsa is a strong, determined woman who was not loved enough by her family or her husband but when things got tough, she got tougher.
The Four Winds is a story about working against the odds, making a difference in the world, and helping strangers. Elsa moves her children across the country to find a better life and does not find exactly what she expects. She finds a community of people living together in poverty, she makes friends, she works alongside her friends, and she makes a difference to her community.
Kristin Hannah is a must-read author. If the Great Depression is not your thing find another of her books to read. I recommend them all!
I love Kristin Hannah’s books and rushed to buy The Four Winds when it came out. I was surprised that it was historically based, but I pressed on because I love her writing. Wow. It was mesmerizing and I learned so much about an important time in our history. It was tragic and moving and resonates with struggles we face today. It’s a MUST READ!
Wonderful book! I learned a great deal about how farmers dealt w/ the Great Depression. I became one of them and traveled w/them away from their land that was simply blowing away. Looking for a better place…. I learned more actual history thru this book than many textbooks!!! READ IT
“Love is what remains when everything else is gone.”
A wonderful, epic novel about a woman and her children that heads to California in search for a better life. This is set during the Great Depression where millions lost their jobs and homes. It’s a story of survival, sacrifice, courage, love, hope, and finding ones worth. This story brought home the horrors of the Dust Bowl and The Great Depression. I read about it in school but The Four Winds made it real. The story grabbed me and kept until the final page. A heartbreaking, powerful book.
Let me begin by saying this is my first Kristin Hannah book. I have heard of her, of course, and her books are on my TBR, but I never have gotten around to reading one of her books. My book club chose this book from @bookofthemonth this month and honestly it wasn’t my first choice. BUT I figured, okay, we will see what all this “Kristin Hannah” hype is about and this book is out of my normal comfort zone of cutesy romances and thrillers……..
Well, needless to say, it did not disappoint. The Four Winds is my first five star book of 2021. When I finished it (as I was sobbing) all I could think was wow. WOW! First off the writing is beautiful. Kristin Hannah can make you feel like you are living in the Dust Bowl. I could swear I could taste the dust at times. The struggles that Elsa goes through made me ashamed of things that I thought were “hard” in my life. Granted we are from two very different times.
Overall though I found this story to be a love story. A love story between a mother and her children. What a mother sacrifice in order to make her children happy, keep them safe, and worse of all, alive. Elsa is a warrior, who clawed her way through life from the beginning.
I leave you with this: “A warrior believes in an end she can’t see and fights for it. A warrior never gives up. A warrior fight for those weaker than herself. It sounds like motherhood to me.”
I hope someday I can be a warrior like Elsa.
It’s hard to know what to say about this book… It took me over 150 pages to feel into it, and I rarely give a book more than 100 pages to grip me. But it’s Kristin Hannah, so of course I kept reading. And then it was only really in the last 100 pages or so that I was really enthralled.
It’s undeniably a well-written book, with an incredibly informative and heart-wrenching story. I think the big issue for me was the main character’s consistent self-defeating attitude. She shifted in the end, and made it worth the read for me – it was just a long time coming, with not a whole lot else in her character to root for before that point.
Still, all in all a wonderful read, and one I think will stay with me for a long time.
This is one of the best books I have read in a very long time. I highly recommend it!!
I just paid twenty five dollars to cry during a pandemic… I’m not sure if that makes me stupid or a sadist. Interesting cover and blurb said this was out of my comfort zone but when you join a book club it’s commitment.
What did I like? This book really pulls you into history and it’s really my first book involving the Great Depression and the dust bowl. I’m not a huge history buff and this is definitely not a romance. While the author really makes you feel the atrocities basically it makes you feel like history just repeats itself. If you’ve ever heard your grandparents talk about the Great Depression then you know it was a hard ordeal. I just don’t understand why we couldn’t get a HEA. I’m depressed after reading this.
Would I recommend or buy? I bought a autographed copy so covered that. I’d recommend to people who love historical fiction without a HEA. I’ve never read anything by this author and it was a five star book but that ending gave me zero pleasure.
I received a complimentary ebook copy to read and voluntarily left a review!
Kristin Hannah’s new novel, The Four Winds, begins in the Texas Panhandle in 1921, a time of prosperity and optimism. Farmers are raising bumper crops; the Great War is behind them and somehow the country has moved on from the flu epidemic of 1917 and 1918. Unmarried, 25-year-old, Elsa Wolcott wants to be a mother more than anything in the world, but she’s considered too old to be a desirable wife by her upper crust family and their social peers. Elsa loves to read and after consuming another Jane Austin novel, decides to finally go out on the town, despite her parent’s strong objections.
Her life changes that night when she meets happy, carefree and charming Rafe Martinelli. They marry a few weeks later, she’s completely shunned by her family while at the same time welcomed and offered unconditional love by the Martinelli family. Elsa has a daughter and a son, plus a stillborn daughter, she bonds with her in-laws who love her like as a daughter. Rafe is despondent and takes to drinking, their marriage suffers irreparably.
The 1930s ushered in the Great Depression. Life became a struggle to survive is a thread throughout this well- researched novel. Drought, the dust storms, crop failures, the Texas earth cracks open without any water – hope and faith become harder to hang onto with each new catastrophe that hits them. Plot twists and well-developed characters. Elsa is a wonderful character and the reader can’t help cheering her on, her daughter Loreda, after some growing pains as a young teenager, becomes a character to reckon with. As are so many others we meet throughout this wonderful novel. I highly recommend The Four Winds.
I just finished the most spectacular book that I have read in a very long time. Its no surprise that it has been on all the bestseller’s lists. The trials that our ancestors had to go through in the 20s to the 40s never ceases to amaze me. I know this book is fiction but there are some historical facts in it and the just break your heart. If you don’t read another book this year make sure you read this one! Thank you Kristin for such a fantastic book!
An amazing , informative exploration of the dust bowl period of US history. Characters were strong & believable!