A Thousand Acres, by Jane Smiley is a story about a family living in a piece of land of 1000 acres for three generations. At one level, it tells us how the Cook's family came to the farm and how they finally all left the farm. At another level, it is also a "sisters' " book. It is about how the three sisters tried to live with each other and their tyrannical father, but their broken relationship with each other shows the fragility of relationships between people, even between sisters. The relationship between the three sisters kept changing all through the book. The relationship began to be very intimate, later changed to be hostile, and finally became remote.

The relationship between the sisters was very intimate at the beginning of the book. The three sisters loved and trusted each other, especially for the love of Rose and Ginny to Caroline...