Review: "The Wilder Life" by Wendy McClure

From Goodreads:  Wendy McClure is on a quest to find the world of beloved Little House on the Prairie author Laura Ingalls Wilder-a fantastic realm of fiction, history, and places she's never been to, yet somehow knows by heart. She retraces the pioneer journey of the Ingalls family- looking for the Big Woods among the medium trees in Wisconsin, wading in Plum Creek, and enduring a prairie hailstorm in South Dakota. She immerses herself in all things Little House, and explores the story from fact to fiction, and from the TV shows to the annual summer pageants in Laura's hometowns. Whether she's churning butter in her apartment or sitting in a replica log cabin, McClure is always in pursuit of "the Laura experience." Along the way she comes to understand how Wilder's life and work have shaped our ideas about girlhood and the American West.

The Wilder Life is a loving, irreverent, spirited tribute to a series of books that have inspired generations of American women. It is also an incredibly funny first-person account of obsessive reading, and a story about what happens when we reconnect with our childhood touchstones-and find that our old love has only deepened.
My Thoughts:  This book was adorable.  I was a huge a Little House fan when I was a kid and have read all of the books in the series multiple times.  I, even, had Mary and Laura dolls, the Little House cookbook and one of Laura's biographies.  This book made me remember how much I loved all things Little House.  It was great to follow the author as she traveled to all of the historical sites and tried to do things like make vanity cakes and churn butter.  It was also interesting to to read about the real Laura Ingalls Wilder and her family and the differences between the real family, the books and the television show.  I do think that the author built up her 'Laura World' a little too much; it seemed like every time she visited a different site, she was disappointed because it wasn't as awesome as she had hoped it would be.  Overall, this was a light, fun read that took me back to my childhood.  I only live a few hours from one of the Little House sites and upon finishing the book, I told the hubs that we are definitely going to visit it this year.  If you were a Little House fan, I think you will enjoy this book.  3 stars.