The trouble with this book was that it didn’t seem to know what it wanted to be. Part memoir, part road-trip, part family history, part biography of the author’s great-grandmother, part environmental tract, part climate change exploration, and part examination of the oil industry; too many themes unsuccessfully knitted together. The wide focus meant that I got fed up with going from one subject to another. A bit of healthy editing wouldn’t have come amiss. Anna, the great-grandmother, left an uneasy inheritance – mineral rights on her land. So what should the family now do? Cash in and add to the destruction of the planet? Sell to the oil companies? Each individual thread was interesting in itself but overall the book seemed a bit of a hodge-podge. And although I sympathise deeply with the author’s infertility, I’m not sure this added to the narrative in any way. I would have loved to know more about Anna, although I accept that actually finding our anything at all was difficult, but the book is marketed as a search for Anna, which is a bit misleading. So - too unfocussed, too meandering and only occasionally interesting.

This was a very interesting read. I learned a lot of historical information that is still applicable today.

A very interesting dive into the history of the author and of the legacy that her family left behind.

Thank you Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review this.

After reading the synopsis of this book I was intrigued by the story of the author's great-grandmother, as the description made it sound like the story was about her. However, this was split between the great-grandmother's story and the author's own story with her struggle with infertility as well as the history and present state of the oil industry in America.

Overall, this was not quite what I expected, but still found this to be an interesting read.

Windfall was advertised as the account of a woman tracking down her great-grandmother, which instantly drew me in. Bolstad’s writing is excellent. She is clearly a top-notch journalist and writer. However, this book was not about her great-grandmother but about Bolstad’s journey while she researched her ancestor. Along the way, she discusses fertility issues, which I appreciated as someone who had problems in the past. We need more voices on women’s health and men’s and women’s fertility. Much of the book is about oil companies in North Dakota, which is not why I wanted to read the book. Needless to say, this book is not what I expected. One thing that would have made this book better was properly advertising it. I imagine many people will expect this to be like The Woman They Could Not Silence by Kate Moore, which was phenomenal. The second thing is that Bolstad should have bracketed her beliefs and biases at the beginning of the book. Knowing her beliefs early on would have made her research easier to understand. As it was, I struggled to understand Bolstad’s intentions and how she respected (or didn’t respect) the people of North Dakota and their beliefs.

Thank you to NetGalley and Sourcebooks for the ARC.

⭐⭐⭐ -- Pretty cover on this book.

Beneath the windswept North Dakota plains, riches await, but at what cost? This is one of the central questions that Erika Bolstad probes into in Windfall. The author weaves together a story that is both sad and captivating, taking readers on a journey through time as she uncovers more about her great-grandmother Anna, who was committed to an asylum under mysterious circumstances, never to walk free again.

The author has a very engaging voice that makes it easy for readers to get lost in this memoir. While heavy on facts relating to climate change and the oil industry, Windfall never feels preachy or overly academic. The author spent eight years researching and talking to experts - all of which is evident in the book's depth and attention to detail.

Overall, Windfall is an eye-opening read for anyone interested in American history or environmental issues. However, be prepared for a sobering reminder of how greed can have devastating consequences for both individuals and communities.

**ARC Via NetGalley**

I couldn't really get into this book. If I had stuck with it more I could give a better review. The writing is fine but it is a slow start.

Thank you to NetGalley for and ARC of this book.

This was an intriguing book. Bolstad begins with the premise of exploring her great grandmother's mineral rights claim as a homesteader and her history and then turns it into a wide-ranging family saga from her own fertility battle back through generations to her great grandparents to a treatise on fracking and the energy industry and the various people involved in it. I really liked that Anna was mentioned in every chapter, tying the various pieces of the story back to the subject at the beginning of her hunt and tying the narrative together. This being said, there was a lot packed into this book to have to tie together and at some points it didn't tie very well. Thank you to Sourcebooks and NetGalley for the early read in exchange for my honest opinion. 3.5 stars.

Erika Bolstad knew her great-grandmother Anna had been a homesteader in North Dakota in the early 20th century, but beyond that, really didn't know much about her at all. After her mother's death, Erika learned that the family still owned the mineral rights to Anna's land. But other than the fact that Anna's husband had her committed to an asylum, little was known about her life, since no letters or diaries survived. Erika set out for North Dakota to learn what she could about Anna and the history of the place where she lived, as well as the current state of oil drilling and what it is doing to the environment.

This memoir was just okay for me. From the description, it sounded like an interesting search for the author'[s family history. It started out strong but both the writing and the story became very dry. There was a lot more about climate change and the evils of the oil industry than there was about the author's great-grandmother. While I sympathize with the author's infertility issues, it seemed oddly out of place with the rest of the book.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an eARC for review..

I was excited to read this book, given that it sounded like a woman exploring her family history, and in particular her great-grandmother, a mysterious figure who disappeared after earning her own homestead. In the end, very little of the book is about family history or her ancestor Anna, and much more is given over to the author's own life and career, struggles to get pregnant, and her reporting on today's oil industry. I was fine with those parts, but wish the book had been much more focused on Anna, who seems to fall through the cracks here just like she did so many years ago. Another case of marketing not matching the book itself.

We could be rich.

We ARE rich. Our present moments have always been blessed by the random acts of those who have gone before us. Erika Bolstad's book reminds us of this as she documents her eight years of researching her ancestor's life and tie to a particular piece of land in North Dakota. Her narrative pulls a reader in a variety of directions: women homesteading, consequences for women in difficult situations in the 19th century (asylums), legal rights related to owning minerals of a certain piece of land - but not owing the land, extracting those resources in the past and currently, the heartbreaking effort of trying to get pregnant when you are ready - but which prove unsuccessful, and the on-again, off-again particulars of employment in a journalist's life. There was a lot of ground covered, literally and figuratively, in producing the pages of this book.

While it covered all that ground, and my interest in drilling, fracking and pulling out minerals was the least of my personal interests stirred by the read, when the author came to her final, last conclusion I was captivated and thoroughly on board. It was a resolution bridging generations and cultures. "YES!" I whisper-gasped.

I meant it. Turning my face to the sky, eyes closed, I repeated it, a prayer or an arrow aimed heavenward, hoping both g-granddaughter and the Prairie Woman could hear it.

A Sincere Thank You to Erika Bolstad, Sourcebooks, and NetGalley for an ARC to read and review.

I reluctantly finished this book. I wasn't sure at times whether it was a personal or historical account. I thoroughly enjoyed the parts that followed the life of the author's family, what she discovered and the mysteries left unsolved. I didn't enjoy the political statements about the oil and windmills, or the personal journey. It will be a good read for those from the areas the author describes and hopefully, they will identify with the setting, the use or misuse of the land, and the energy journey of the area. I did learn a few things from the book about the misuses and burnouts of gas and oil and hope the author will continue to write of those types of issues separately from personal and historical information that to me did not mesh well together. Thanks to #NetGalley#Windfall for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Erika Bolstad begins her eight-year memoir with curiosity about her great-grandmother. “Her name was Anna Josephine Sletvold. That’s about all I knew when all of this began during the darkest days of the Great Recession.” She begins with family lore that Anna was a plucky woman who settled a homestead in North Dakota. Periodic checks from an oil company for mineral rights on that land add to her interest, and she begins a journey to find Anna’s story and learn about the lease money that had sent her mother to college.

Each chapter begins with the date of her entry accompanied by the price of oil per barrel. She is not far into her account when she discovers why so little is known of her great-grandmother. Legal records reveal that Anna filed a homestead claim in 1905 before getting married late that year. The author’s grandfather Ed was born in 1906 and the next year, Anna “took sick.” With only that explanation, Anna was committed to an insane asylum. In 1912, her husband Andrew filed to claim guardianship of Anna’s property and finished proving the homestead claim.
As an environmental journalist, Erika’s interest extended beyond her grandmother to the land itself and what the search for that oil had done. Her eight-year search that spans the coronavirus pandemic will turn up more than the answers to her curiosity about Anna and the lease money. She will follow the historical environmental changes to the land and examine the possibilities for the future. An aside to the bigger story are her own experiences of coping with infertility as she makes this journey.

The blurb on the cover reads, “The Prairie Woman Who Lost Her Way and the Great-Granddaughter Who Found Her.” I would say the great-granddaughter also learned quite a bit about her own values and will leave her readers thinking about theirs.

I picked up this book because I was intrigued by the story of the author's great-grandmother, and the subtitle and description make it sound like the story is mainly about her. It is actually a pretty even split between the great-grandmother's story, the story of the author's struggle with infertility, and the history and present state of the oil industry in the American West.

WINDFALL is an intriguing history of Erika Bolstad's family. When Erika discovers information about her great-grandmother's (Anna) homestead in the prairies of North Dakota, she goes on a personal journey to find information about the land for which she and her family have learned they still own the mineral rights.
As a journalist, Bolstad has a unique way of researching the data needed to learn more about this land. As she is exploring the historical documents, she discovers how her grandmother was institutionalized soon after giving birth to her last child. Little else is known about Anna, however, the land is referred to as "Anna's land". Her legacy is prominent in the telling of her story by her great-granddaughter.

The telling of the story alternates between the writer's current life: her desire to start a family and the many trips she makes to North Dakota to learn about mineral rights and what it means to "own" them. Through the minuscule checks her family receives, her family feels they could be rich one day. As Bolstad learns more about the rights, she discovers how the fracking industry affects global warming.

I finished this late last night and needed time to try and write a review. Apparently, I didn't take enough time [this book gave me massive book hangover and I am still feeling the effects of what I read/listened to] as I am still struggling. As there are plenty of excellent reviews out there, I will just try and sum up how this book made me feel.

First, I wasn't sure what to really expect; was this going to be like a modern Little House on the Prairie? Was it going to break open the world of homesteading [something that has intrigued me since my introduction into said Little House books] and give me more information [Not really unfortunately]? Or was it going to be some sappy memoir that would just make me roll my eyes [thankfully, this was not the case. Not one eye-roll to be found].

So, what did I get?

An absolutely gorgeous story about family. And loss [both in death and by Alzheimer's <--these parts, at the end of the book, were extremely difficult for me to listen to. Life is about to get super hard here and this was just a reminder of what is to come and while my heart was breaking for the author, it was also breaking for myself and my family]. And hopes and dreams and the loss of those [Y'all. There was some seriously UGLY crying at times in this book. I mean the kind of ugly crying that makes it hard to breathe and left me not only with a hideous headache but bereft all over again from the very personal hopes and dreams that were also dashed in my life. I felt her pain like it was my very own and now that it has been brought up all over again, I am NOT quite sure how to deal with it].

And this book [while filled with information about drilling and oil and mineral rights and fracking {I was glad to learn a little more about that as I knew the word, but not what it really was} that was both informative AND so so so confusing] was truly a labor of love to Anna, the great-grandmother who defied tradition and homesteaded and in turn, due to something beyond her very control, was paid back by being put in an Asylum to die alone. The author learns as much as she can about the woman who did so much and some of the women who came before her and learns just where the strength both she and her sister have came from. It was a fantastic read that I could barely put down, thought about when I DID put it down and will think about for many days ahead.

I was lucky enough to get an audiobook for this read and wow. just wow. The narrator did an excellent job narrating the whole book, but the sections that were particularly heartbreaking, you'd have thought it was the narrators personal experience [and perhaps it was] and the way she reads these sections, all the emotion and heartbreak in her voice...well, I can only say that I would have cried if I had been read reading it, but the ugly crying that I experienced came simply from both the story and how it was delivered. You feel all the feels you are supposed to and there is no higher compliment you can give an audiobook narrator.

Thank you to NetGalley, Erika Bolstad, Marni Penning - Narrator, SOURCEBOOKS [nonfiction], and Dreamscape Media for providing both the ARC and the audiobook ARC in exchange for an honest review.

There were a couple of reasons I was interested in this title. I'm a genealogist so was interested in that aspect, and my grandmother's father was an oil wildcatter in Oklahoma and Wyoming in the 1910s-1920s so the oil industry piqued my interest, too.. Sadly, I didn't think this book melded those two topics well. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Not much of this book actually focused on the author's search for her relative and family history. Most of it focused instead on fracking, environmental issues, politics, etc. It seems well-researched and is well-written. I enjoyed the scientific parts of the book, but it was not what I expected when I decided to read this book.
Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I knew that when this book mentioned North Dakota (my home state) that I needed to read it. What a beautiful, well written book. I loved getting to go on the journey with the characters in this book and seeing how it all played out. Thank you for the opportunity to read this one.

Oh this book was a bit of a mess! Not very well organized and needs a good bit of editing. Honestly if I wasn't worried about my Netgalley score I would have DNF. But I did finish it!
Some parts of this book could be reminiscent of early Barbara Kingsolver. But I'm not going to give the writer that level of praise just yet, notice I said reminiscent.
The reading group guide, A Conversation with the Author, and index were not complete in my copy but I hope they will be complete in the final release.