Little House on the Prairie Books

Read the nine core books in their established series order, beginning with Little House in the Big Woods. Farmer Boy shifts to Almanzo's childhood before the sequence returns to Laura; The First Four Years is a posthumously published continuation of Laura and Almanzo's marriage.

The related Little House section contains samplers, treasuries, picture books, and later companion material. Those books are optional and do not create an alternate reading order for the nine core titles.

Sources: Penguin Random House's Laura Ingalls Wilder overview, Library of America's complete Little House contents.

The books portray close family life, ingenuity, and persistence, but also hunger, illness, dangerous weather, animal slaughter, fire, crop failure, and the death of a baby. The Long Winter is especially sustained in its depiction of isolation and near-starvation.

They also contain dated and harmful descriptions of Native people, Black people, and other groups, reflecting both their historical setting and the era in which Wilder wrote. Parents may want to read alongside children, add Indigenous perspectives, and discuss whose experiences the books center or leave out.