The Four Winds is a historical fiction story about one family's experience of living through the great depression in the United States. I found the story to be quite sad, which of course, any story about this period of time generally is, but I also found it to be a bit dry in comparison to Hannah's other books. The Four Winds gets 3 stars from me, not because it was awful, but because it was only okay.

I couldn’t help but think of The Grapes of Wrath as I was reading this new book from the talented Kristin Hannah. The book started a little slow for me but maybe that just was the author portraying the long struggles this family battled to survive the brutal times of the Dust Bowl and the Depression. The wind, the heat, the dirt and the poverty and hunger were never ending. I loved the connections Elsa made with her adopted family and oh the ending was just so touching and a little surprising. I literally can’t wait for the movie! People should read this book now more than ever because the author really captures the difficult times that families go through to survive in our beautiful country.

The Four Winds is about America during the Great Depression In Texas 1934. Millions are out of work. Elsa and her family live with her husband’s parents. Rafe wants to go to California because of the drought He leaves his wife, daughter and son. As time goes on And the dust bowl get Elsa takes the kids to California. Here she is fighting for her families survival . Great book. #netgalley #goodreads

This is one of the best books I have read in years! Amazing throughout. We meet Elsa, who for some reason has been deemed inferior, useless, and unloveable to her family. At age 25, well beyond marrying years in those days, Elsa becomes pregnant by the first man who ever noticed her. Due to this scandalous predicament, Elsa is kicked out of her family's home and dropped off at Rafe's home to "deal with it". Rafe and Elsa marry., but Rafe never truly loves her. But beautifully, Elsa's inlaws tenderly love her and become her true family, even when Rafe walks out on them in the midst of the very difficult dust bowl days.

Kristin Hannah always shines as an author in the research. The details of life in Texas during the dust bowl years were thoroughly researched and gave great feels to what it must have been like during those years. Eventually, Elsa has to make the difficult decision to head to California where they say there are jobs and a better life in order for her to keep her kids from starving. And just when you think life couldn't be harder, the conditions in California were heartbreaking. I had to keep taking breaks in the reading to google the history of this time because it is almost unbelievable what these American migrants had to live through.

While my heart was breaking into a million pieces while reading this, I also stood in awe of the grit, strength, and courage of Elsa and her children, which makes this novel one that will be remembered for a long time. The character development is rich and the relationships tender. Beautiful story, don't' miss this one!

My favorite Kristin Hannah book yet - I cannot wait for this to book to be released and be able to recommend it to our readers.

A story of dust bowl in the Texas panhandle during the Great Depression. The descriptions make feel the dust in your hair and mouth. Elsa has an agonizing choice of watching her family slowly die due to hunger or move to California. With courage Elsa moves her two children to California to find a better life. However, California and farmers are not kind or understanding to single mothers. Elsa works as cotton picker at different farms and is given company at a high price. The system seems to keep the workers poor with no opportunities to change the situation. Elsa’s teenage daughter hears communists rant and organize a strike of the pickers. Elsa plans to avoid the communists and the strike, until circumstances leave her no choice but to join the strike. Elsa becomes the face of the strike at the high price of getting shot. The story of a courageous, daring story of a mother fighting for a better for her children is gripping and spellbinding; it will bring you to tears. A must read!

“If I close my eyes sometimes, I swear I can still taste the dust. . .” This is the story of Elsa Martinelli and her family. Elsa was the ugly duckling of her family, “too tall and unmarriageable” according to her mother. She meets Rafe, and falls hard for him, ending up pregnant. Luckily for her, Raft does the honorable thing and marries her, moving her into his family home, where she discovers a whole new way of life. Rafe’s parents love Elsa! Rafe does the best he can for his family, but then the great depression hits. Elsa can stay and fight for her home or follow everyone to California for “great opportunities”. You have to love Elsa and feel all her emotions. She is one tough lady trying to survive. This is a very sad, somewhat depressing novel, but it’s the message is clear – we can endure anything. Beautifully written as always by Hannan, a very tough, but worthwhile read.

Let me just start off by saying history was my least favorite class in high school. I slid through by the seat of my pants, doing the least I could. Fast forward a few years, when I’m introduced to my first Kristin Hannah book...each book has shown me parts of history in a way that I enjoy. This is no exception. From the first page I was drawn into the story, following this strong female character through each and every hardship, silently rooting for her and her children as I continued to read each page. The detail and descriptive writing makes you feel as if you are right there, a part of the story and I love this about Ms Hannah. Another great book, with a beautiful story.

I didn’t know what expect with this book. This is the story of Elsinore who is one of the daughters of a wealthy family....she is not as pretty Asher sisters and as a result of rheumatic fever she is treated like an invalid by her mother. Naturally she yearns to be normal and this leads her to become secretly involved with a young man. Predictably this leads to disaster. I have to admit that I found this first part to be well worn ground and I was disappointed.
As I kept reading I soon learned that the story was so much more. Elsinore faces hardship and loss but she perseveres through challenges to find a better life. She is a courageous woman raising a son and daughter in a dangerous, violent situation but she doesn’t lose hope.
As always, Kristin Hannah’s writing transport the reader to a place of wonder...I was captivated and loved the ending.

The best book I’ve read in a long, long time. Despite it being fiction, this book informed me about an era/topic I knew little about. I fell in love with each of the characters, and Kristin Hannah’s writing transported me to this time period. Highly recommend!

As a US History teacher, this book was a fascinating inside look at the Great Depression/Dust Bowl. It was like a Dorothea Lange photo come to life. The story itself was dismal and heartbreaking. Sadly, there are so many parallels with our society today - the greed of major corporations sucking the souls of their laborers. This book did not have the ending I was hoping for but I’m still glad I read it. I came away with a better understanding of that time period and the reminder that sometimes a book that makes you think is better than a book that makes you smile.

Like many of Kristin Hannah's other novels, The Four Winds examines an interesting cross-section of history-- the Dust Bowl-- and one farming family's attempts to survive the Great Depression. When they can longer endure the drought and resultant ill health and poverty, Elsa Martinelli and her two children flee from the Texas Panhandle to California, where they struggle as migrant workers in order to survive.

I enjoyed reading about a period that I'm not all that familiar with and learning more about the strikes and fight for worker's rights in California during that time. Readers will find a lot of parallels to many of the issues in headlines today. Similarly, the themes of longing to be loved and for a sense of home are ones that will resonate with many.

But I also found The Four Winds to be relentlessly bleak. I kept waiting for Elsa and her children to finally catch a break, but instead, the novel just piles on the suffering. Elsa finally seems to be coming into her own in the last quarter of the story, but just as she does, Hannah yanks the proverbial rug out from under the reader with a disheartening and depressing plot twist. Redemption and hope finally comes through Loreda, Elsa's daughter, but only in the last chapter of the novel, making it feel like too little, too late.

Some of my favorite parts of The Four Winds are where we get to read entries in Elsa's journal. These display some of the lovely writing that Kristin Hannah is known for and provide insight into Elsa's inner thoughts and motivations, her sacrificial love for her children.

Thanks for NetGalley for providing an ARC!

Kristin Hannah does it again. This time with an epic story told during the time of America’s Great Depression. Make sure to have the tissues ready for the heartbreak that abounds as you read Elsa’s beautiful story. The strength and perseverance she embodies really is one of the biggest take aways of the novels. Definitely one I won’t forget any time soon.

I finished this last night and needed a good nights sleep for recovery and soak it all in before I could write my review.
First, I want to thank NetGalley and Kristin Hannah for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
The Four Winds follows a family in the midst of the Dustbowl of the 30's. Through this tragic time in history, the southern states of the US was stricken with dust storms that wreaked havoc on families, land and lives.
In this story, Elsa is our main character and is a character that I adored. The dynamics of her life will touch you. I was so deeply touched with this novel and felt so many emotions.
This is a must read!

I am normally not a fan of Kristin Hannah. However, I could not put this book down. Read it in one sitting. These characters are amazing. I had to see what happened to them. This book made me cry a lot but the story line is so good. Characters are strong and well written. One of the best books I have read in a long time.

Kristin Hannah has done it again! She is so great at creating strong female protagonists. I was hooked from the beginning! This was thoroughly researched and well written, which most of her works are. Four Winds showed the strength, and the bravery, of the people during the Great Depression. It was so vivid, that I felt like I was there along with the characters.
I especially liked the relationship between Rosa and Elsa. Elsa herself I couldn't get enough of. Such a timely and thought provoking book.

Thank you NetGalley and publisher for this ARC!

This book was a journey for me. I saw it listed as requestable on NetGalley, but the blurb just didn't really interest me. I decided to request it anyway because I have enjoyed Kristin Hannah's other books like "The Nightengale" and "The Great Alone". Much to my surprise, my request was granted.

I just started reading it one day and I was sucked completely in. I wasn't aware of the Dustbowl of America in the 1930s. I loved the characters and the stories they were telling. About halfway through though a bit of the allure was lost, and I found that there were many chapters that were just more of the same - over and over again. When it came to the big ending, I didn't feel any emotion, I just rolled my eyes at the predictability.

There is a strong chance that it was just my mindset when I read the book, but I didn't enjoy the last half of the book. It started to drag for me and just didn't pick back up again.

That being said though, I feel that this is still going to be a very popular book. It is great for fans of historical fiction as well as fans of Kristin Hannah.

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This is another gut-wrenching, tragic, fantastic story on the determination and perseverance of the human spirit by Kristin Hannah!
We travel with Elsa and her daughter and son in the mid-1930s from the dust bowl farmlands of Texas where they've endured the Great Depression, drought, and Elsa's husband's desertion of his family to California, where they hope for a better life. They're forced to leave Elsa's in-laws on the farm, but have heard promising things about jobs in California.
When they arrive, the "migrants" or "Okies" are treated like animals, forced to work for less-than-poverty wages and to live in camps not fit for humans. It's a tragic, depressing, and, unfortunately, real-life part of American history.
Elsa, like others, does what she can to keep her family safe, and fed. I talked with my dad about this piece of Californian history that I hadn't heard of, since he was a 4th-generation-born Californian in the early 1930s. He remembers seeing the awful migrant camps, remembers that being called an "Okie" was the worst slander, and was lucky enough to be raised in a family that had enough money to survive the Great Depression.
It's such a haunting story of the human spirit and all they endured. A story of determination, perseverance, and kindness. Yes, kindness - shown in many ways through characters in the story. Those living in the camps who look out for each other, help each other, and people who are fighting for a Union to represent the farm workers for a wage that will keep them from starving to death.
It's another heartfelt and heartbreaking historical fiction must-read by this author!
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me a copy of this book.

I had been eagerly anticipating Kristin Hannah’s newest book and let me tell you it does not disappoint!

This is the first book I have read that uses the backdrop of the Great Plains, during the dust bowl time period. This time period was devastating! To say that it was dry is an understatement, which in turn made growing crops nearly impossible. Then there were the dust storms! They would come fast and furious making an already difficult time period just that much harder.

This book was so vivid and immersing I felt like I needed a shower when I would stop reading. I cannot even begin to imagine the daily struggles and sacrifices of those who lived in the Great Plains during this horrible time period. Their strength and endurance is incredibly admirable, each day hoping that the rain will come, so they can get back to work on the land that they love!

While the time period in this book is quite real, the story of Elsa Martinelli is fictionalized, but her story mirrors the heartbreak and scary choices made by those who lived through it. Some choose to stay on their land to wait it out for the rain to return, others packed up their belongings and moved west to California where rumor had it a good living could be made. No matter what choice was made they were taking a huge leap of faith!

When the publisher reached out to me offering a NetGalley of this book I could not be more excited! I emailed them back asking if I could publish my review of this book anytime or wait until closer to publication. They said anytime was fine and I am SO glad they did! Now I get to rave about how much I loved this story and strongly encourage you to add it to your TBR list!!

This is a beautifully written, amazing, eye-opening story that I will not soon forget!

Thank you to Net Galley for providing me this book for review. This was a historical novel about one Texas farming family’s struggles during the Great Depression. Through their lens, we learn about the thousand of Americans who migrated from the Dust Bowl part of our country to other states, primarily California.

With millions of people out of work, and thousands losing their land due to drought, tornados, dust storms, extremely hot weather, farming families from Oklahoma, Texas, etc. ultimately had no ability to grow crops and feed themselves. Many moved to California looking for work during one of the darkest periods of the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl era.

When this family (a mother and her two children) fails to be able to sustain themselves on their Texas farm, they see no other course of action than to migrate to California, in search of a better life. Unfortunately they discover that their lives are even worse there. As they try to survive as migrant workers picking cotton, they find themselves living in unimaginable conditions, preyed upon by wealthy land owners, and abhorred by Californians who don’t want their taxes to go towards helping their fellow Americans who have fallen on hard times.

This book reminded me of The Grapes of Wrath, when I first learned about this difficult time in our American history. Even though it was a sad story, I couldn’t put the book down.