The novel is about the months the Ingalls spent on the Kansas prairie around the town of Independence. Laura describes how her father built their one-room log house in Indian Territory, having heard that the government planned to open the territory to white settlers soon. The Ingalls face difficulty and danger in this book. They all fall ill from malaria, which was ascribed to breathing the night air or eating watermelon. American Indians are a common sight for them, as their house was built in Osage territory, and Ma's open prejudice about Indians contrasts with Laura's more childlike observations about those who live and ride nearby. They begin to congregate at the nearby river bottoms and their war cries unnerve the settlers, who worry they may be attacked. --Wikipedia.