Elsa's search for a better life for her children takes them out west to California, where things turn out to be even worse. Though she finds some joy working the land, tending the animals, and learning her way around Mama Rose's kitchen, her marriage is never happy, the pleasures of early motherhood are brief, and soon the disastrous droughts of the 1930s drive all the farmers of the area to despair and starvation. Despised by her shallow parents and sisters for being sickly and unattractive-“too tall, too thin, too pale, too unsure of herself”-Elsa escapes their cruelty when a single night of abandon leads to pregnancy and forced marriage to the son of Italian immigrant farmers. There were times in my journey when I felt as if that penny and the hope it represented were the only things that kept me going.” We meet Elsa Wolcott in Dalhart, Texas, in 1921, on the eve of her 25th birthday, and wind up with her in California in 1936 in a saga of almost unrelieved woe. “Hope is a coin I carry: an American penny, given to me by a man I came to love. The other book I read by Kristin Hannah….brilliant….The miseries of the Depression and Dust Bowl years shape the destiny of a Texas family.

But….because it is so beautifully written the reader suffers right along with the characters. “The Four Winds” is a beautifully written novel about love, hate, fear, and most of all struggle. Oh, to find out what happens you will have to read the book. Years of intense struggle pass, Rafe leaves, and finally the pain and suffering (along with Ant’s sickness caused by the dust storms) force Elsa to take the kids to California, where…… People are leaving the midwest and heading to California where jobs are promised and there is no drought.

Their farm is struggling in the great depression and dust bowl.īut Elsa works hard, perseveres, and is brave (or makes believe she is). Loreda almost 13 and Anthony (Ant) about 8.Įlsa’s parents dis-owned her but Rafe’s parents accepted her into the family, and love her and the grandkids. She is not loved by her parents and the only words of encouragement she ever heard were from her grandpa: Be brave (and if you can’t be brave, make believe you are).Įlsa is brave….even though she does not think she is.īuying some beautiful red silk, Elsa made a dress, did herself up really nice (she is not pretty….her parents tell her that all the time), and headed out the door, against her fathers wishes, to a speakeasy, where she met a farmer from another town….Rafe.Įlsa and Rafe Martinelli have two kids. Elsa Wolcott is 25 years old, far past the time to marry.

Kristin hannah the four winds summary