This book sees Mary and Laura in particular growing up and orienting themselves to the realities of young adult life. However, Laura retains the same storytelling style as in the previous books with language geared at younger children, which I found surprising at first but overwhelmingly sensible; as an author, she displays skill in framing her life as a story for a particular audience rather than as a pure autobiography. Laura continues to struggle with her desires to be young and have fun though more maturity is demanded of her, and shows insights into her growing wisdom by reflecting more strongly in this book on theological truths of her human nature and what it means to be truly good. She is not trying to impress anybody with her story, but simply to recount for young readers what her life as a teenager was like, and the blend of adult worries, childish hurts, and naive stumbling towards romance evident in this period of her life provide a refreshing alternative to angst-ridden modern-day young adult literature. ( )

At the start of Little Town on the Prairie, there seems to be a shift from the other Little House books. Where previously in the stories, Laura has been a little girl, suddenly she is taking on real work, has an interest in what her clothes and figure look like and is taking notice of the things going on in town for purely social reasons rather than what seems fun to a little girl. A lot of this story focuses around the family's intent to get Mary to a college for the blind and then about Laura's school times and the social 'whirl' of town. The stories are sweet and quaint in a way that is classic and comforting. The things that were important to girls then is so different than now, and the stories told in this book highlight that while still making it interesting for the reader who may not understand the conventions of the time. ( )

Again, not one of my favorites, but still good. ( )

Laura's family is finally settling down a bit, and Laura is a teenager. ( )

Laura does a lot of growing up in this book - she's pinning up her hair, wearing hoopskirts and Almanzo is walking her home from Church. When I was growing up, this was one of my favourite books in the series and I'm pleased to say that it still is. Laura writes so honestly and simply of events big and small that I don't want me re-reading of the series to end. ( )