Unto a Good Land: The Emigrant Novels: Book II

by Vilhelm Moberg

Book Overview

Considered one of Sweden's greatest 20th-century writers, Vilhelm Moberg created the characters Karl Oskar and Kristina Nilsson to portray the joys and tragedies of daily life for early Swedish immigrants in America. His consistently faithful depiction of these humble people's lives is a major strength of the Emigrant Novels.

Moberg's extensive research in the papers of Swedish emigrants in archival collections enabled him to incorporate many...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0873513207
• ISBN13: 9780873513203
• Release Date: September 1995
• Publisher: Borealis Books
• Length: 402 Pages
• Weight: 1.18 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 5.5" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

An excellent sequel

Karl Oskar Nilsson, his family, and a collection of other emigrants from Sweden now find themselves in New York harbor, ready to find their promised land in Minnesota. Traveling by steam train, riverboat, canal barge, and finally on foot, they reach Taylors Falls, Minnesota. Setting up as homesteaders, each family can claim 160 acres, and Karl Oskar is determined to pick the primest land. However, it is too late to plant crops, Karl Oskar has too little money to buy livestock, and winter is coming on fast. This is the story of the emigrants' first year in America. This book is the second in the Emigrants quadrilogy, and this book is every bit as wonderful as the first. The characters seem as alive to me reading this book, as if I was reading their own diaries. Vilhelm Moberg is considered one of Sweden's great authors, and it is easy to see why. As an aside, besides merely showing someone I would consider similar to my own Swedish ancestors, this book has made me understand more about life. I find myself haunted by the scene in which Karl Oskar walks twelve miles to purchase a 100-pound sack of flour so that his family can eat and survive the winter. Carrying the sack home on his back, he becomes lost in the forest, and nearly dies of exposure. But, realizing that he metaphorically carries his children in that sack, he continues on and when he finally finds his home, he delivers the flour to his wife without one word of complaint. So, this is a wonderful book, a fitting sequel to The Emigrants. I highly recommend both books to you. [For those of you with young children, I would like to recommend the Kirsten books in the American Girls series. Written for young readers (primarily girls), it tells the story of a Swedish family that immigrates to Minnesota in 1854.]

THE SWEDISH OCCUPATION OF MINNESOTA...

This is an epic work by its Swedish author. Translated from Swedish into English, this beautifully written book of historical fiction was first published in 1954 and met with excellent reviews at the time. It is the second part of a four part opus, the first of which is "The Emigrants". This book, "Unto a Good Land", is followed by two additional books, "The Settlers" and "Last Letter From Home". In the first volume, "The Emigrants", the author detailed the emigration of a Swedish family to the New World, grounding it in the reasons for the exodus of so many Swedes from their mother country in the middle of the 19th century. The focus of the first book in this four part opus is on the family, relatives, and friends of Karl Oscar Nilsson, a peasant farmer who unceasingly worked his farm, only to find that, no matter what he did, he could not progress and would continue to live on the cusp of total poverty. The focus of the first book is on their life in Sweden. Gathering up his family and friends of the family, the Nilsson family decides to take the monumental step of making a fresh start by emigrating to the new world, specifically the United States of America. The second volume, "Unto a Good Land", focuses on the arrival of the Nilsson family and friends in the United States of America. It details their journey from New York, a journey that was to take them across the Midwest by rail, steamer, and foot to arrive in the wilds of what would one day be the State of Minnesota. It is in this wilderness that the Nilsson family and friends would homestead and struggle to make a new home. The author regales the reader with the travails this hardy group of settlers would encounter in their efforts to create by the sweat of their brow a new home in the wilderness. The early struggles of the Nilsson family to succeed in what was an unknown frontier is engagingly chronicled. I have enjoyed the first and second volumes so much that I look forward to continuing their journey with them by reading the remaining two volumes. This is a book that those who love historical fiction will greatly enjoy.

THE SWEDISH OCCUPATION OF MINNESOTA...

This is an epic work by its Swedish author. Translated from Swedish into English, this beautifully written book of historical fiction was first published in 1954 and met with excellent reviews at the time. It is the second part of a four part opus, the first of which is "The Emigrants". This book, "Unto a Good Land", is followed by two additional books, "The Settlers" and "Last Letter From Home". In the first volume, "The Emigrants", the author detailed the emigration of a Swedish family to the New World, grounding it in the reasons for the exodus of so many Swedes from their mother country in the middle of the 19th century. The focus of the first book in this four part opus is on the family, relatives, and friends of Karl Oscar Nilsson, a peasant farmer who unceasingly worked his farm, only to find that, no matter what he did, he could not progress and would continue to live on the cusp of total poverty. The focus of the first book is on their life in Sweden. Gathering up his family and friends of the family, the Nilsson family decides to take the monumental step of making a fresh start by emigrating to the new world, specifically the United States of America. The second volume, "Unto a Good Land", focuses on the arrival of the Nilsson family and friends in the United States of America. It details their journey from New York, a journey that was to take them across the Midwest by rail, steamer, and foot to arrive in the wilds of what would one day be the State of Minnesota. It is in this wilderness that the Nilsson family and friends would homestead and struggle to make a new home. The author regales the reader with the travails this hardy group of settlers would encounter in their efforts to create by the sweat of their brow a new home in the wilderness. The early struggles of the Nilsson family to succeed in what was an unknown frontier is engagingly chronicled. I have enjoyed the first and second volumes so much that I look forward to continuing their journey with them by reading the remaining two volumes. This is a book that those who love historical fiction will greatly enjoy.

An excellent sequel

Karl Oskar Nilsson, his family, and a collection of other emigrants from Sweden now find themselves in New York harbor, ready to find their promised land in Minnesota. Traveling by steam train, riverboat, canal barge, and finally on foot, they reach Taylors Falls, Minnesota. Setting up as homesteaders, each family can claim 160 acres, and Karl Oskar is determined to pick the primest land. However, it is too late to plant crops, Karl Oskar has too little money to buy livestock, and winter is coming on fast. This is the story of the emigrants' first year in America.This book is the second in the Emigrants quadrilogy, and this book is every bit as wonderful as the first. The characters seem as alive to me reading this book, as if I was reading their own diaries. Vilhelm Moberg is considered one of Sweden's great authors, and it is easy to see why.As an aside, besides merely showing someone I would consider similar to my own Swedish ancestors, this book has made me understand more about life. I find myself haunted by the scene in which Karl Oskar walks twelve miles to purchase a 100-pound sack of flour so that his family can eat and survive the winter. Carrying the sack home on his back, he becomes lost in the forest, and nearly dies of exposure. But, realizing that he metaphorically carries his children in that sack, he continues on and when he finally finds his home, he delivers the flour to his wife without one word of complaint.So, this is a wonderful book, a fitting sequel to The Emigrants. I highly recommend both books to you.[For those of you with young children, I would like to recommend the Kirsten books in the American Girls series. Written for young readers (primarily girls), it tells the story of a Swedish family that immigrates to Minnesota in 1854.]

Immigrantion , only 800,000 per year is allowed.

Immirgrants come to the U.S. daily. Population in America has increased drastically since the 1950s. Other Modern day civilization begun in Europe and Asia have develope greatly, but the U.S.exsposes immigrants to much wider opportunities.