A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley

I recently finished the novel A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley. I read it over the span of two days; I couldn’t seem to put it down and constantly wanted to know how to lives of the characters in the book would end. Set in Iowa in the late 1970s, Ginny Cook Smith, whose point of view the book is told, must face the challenges of running a respected farm and prosperous life. She faces many challenges when her father’s large farm, a thousand acres, is given to her, her sister, and their husbands. Now she faces the challenge of living up to families name and the pressures in her marriage. It was interesting for me to read this because I do not know a lot about this time era, we don’t learn about it in school and it is too long ago for me to understand. I enjoyed reading about the challenges the characters faced on a farm when all around them the world is changing and new technology is becoming available to them. I appreciated how the author would tell a little about Ginny’s childhood in the beginning of each chapter and then connect it to the events happening in her life currently. I am glad that I read this book when it was recommend to me and would recommend it to others.