This is the story of Elsa Wolcott Martinelli, born in Texas in 1896 and died in California in 1936. She was raised by her upper middle class family to believe she was ugly and sickly. When they disowned her, Elsa married Raf and moved in with his parents, helping with the house and farm and raising her two surviving children. When the Dust Bowl ruined farming for the Martinelli’s, she took her children to California hoping for a better life.

Once we are able to travel again, The Four Winds is the perfect book to have with you on a long flight. It has a good main character (although too perfect for me) and a plot full of hardship and love. However, it is not a very complex novel and neither are its characters.