May 2021, we’re celebrating the beloved Louisa May Alcott! Below you’ll find a collection of books that honor her work (particularly Little Women) and give us a deeper look into her life and writing.
Marmee and Louisa: The Untold Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Mother
The March sisters’ relationship with Marmee is so special and inspiring. Have you ever wondered about Louisa’s relationship with her own mother? This insightful read gives us a look at their relationship.
Marmee and Louisa paints an exquisitely moving and utterly convincing portrait of Louisa May Alcott and her mother, the real “Marmee.” Award-winning biographer Eve LaPlante mines the Alcotts’ intimate diaries and other private papers, some recently discovered in a family attic and others thought to have been destroyed, to revive this remarkable daughter and mother. Abigail May Alcott—long dismissed as a quiet, self-effacing background figure—comes to life as a gifted writer and thinker. A politically active feminist firebrand, she fought for universal civil rights, an end to slavery, and women’s suffrage. This gorgeously written story of two extraordinary women is guaranteed to transform our view and deepen our understanding of one of America’s most beloved authors. [Synposis by Simon & Schuster]
The Journals of Louisa May Alcott
For a deeper look into Louisa’s life, inspirations, and similarities to Jo March, peek inside the journals she kept for over 40 years.
From her eleventh year to the month of her death at age fifty-five, Louisa May Alcott kept copious journals. She never intended them to be published, but the insights they provide into her remarkable life are invaluable.
Alcott grew up in a genteel but impoverished household, surrounded by the literary and philosophical elite of nineteenth-century New England, including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. Like her fictional alter ego, Jo March, she was a free spirit who longed for independence, yet she dutifully supported her parents and three sisters with her literary efforts. [Synposis by University of Georgia Press]
The Little Women Cookbook
This month, we are hosting an exciting event with the authors of this darling book! Be sure to register here.
Experience Louisa May Alcott’s classic novel in an entirely new and delightful way—as a cookbook.
You’ll learn to make ice cream with Meg, molasses candy with Jo, baked squash with Beth, pickled limes with Amy, and so much more. For a creative twist, these delicious step-by-step recipes are adapted from vintage Civil War-era cookbooks for the modern kitchen.
A perfect gift for Little Women fans everywhere, the book is packed with beautiful color photographs, timeless illustrations, favorite passages, historical trivia, and additional commentary. [Synposis by Simon & Schuster]
Women Who Wrote
Celebrate Louisa’s work alongside other beloved authors such as Jane Austen and Emily Dickinson in this delightful collection of stories. This is our May 2021 giveaway prize – enter to win here!
Meet the women who wrote. They wrote against all odds. Some wrote defiantly; some wrote desperately. Some wrote while trapped within the confines of status and wealth. Some wrote hand-to-mouth in abject poverty. Some wrote trapped in a room of their father’s house, and some went in search of a room of their own. They had lovers and families. They were sometimes lonely. Many wrote anonymously or under a pseudonym for a world not yet ready for their genius and talent. [Synopsis by Harper Collins]
The Annotated Little Women
Discover the connections between Little Women and Louisa May Alcott’s real life with the annotated edition of her beloved classic. It’s absolutely beautiful in person too!
Renowned Alcott scholar John Matteson brings his expertise to the book, to the March family it creates, and to the Alcott family who inspired it all. Through numerous photographs taken in the Alcott family home expressly for this edition—elder daughter Anna’s wedding dress, the Alcott sisters’ theater costumes, sister May’s art, and Abba Alcott’s recipe book—readers discover the extraordinary links between the real and the fictional family. [Synopsis by W.W. Norton]
The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott
With summer just around the corner, this would be a perfect title to add to your reading list! Part fact, part fiction, it tells Louisa May Alcott’s love story.
Deftly mixing fact and fiction, Kelly O’Connor McNees returns to the summer of 1855, when vivacious Louisa is twenty-two and bursting with a desire to free herself from family and societal constraints so she can do what she loves most. Stuck in small-town New Hampshire, she meets Joseph Singer, and as she opens her heart, Louisa finds herself torn between a love that takes her by surprise and her dream of independence as a writer in Boston. The choice she must make comes with a steep price that she will pay for the rest of her life. [Synopsis by Penguin Random House]
Louisa on the Front Lines
Did you know Louisa May Alcott was a Civil War nurse? Learn about the impact her war experience had on her writing and activism in this compelling read.
Louisa on the Frontlines is the first narrative nonfiction book focusing on the least-known aspect of Louisa May Alcott’s career — her time spent as a nurse during the Civil War. Though her service was brief, the dramatic experience was one that she considered pivotal in helping her write the beloved classic Little Women. It also deeply affected her tenuous relationship with her father, and inspired her commitment to abolitionism. [Synopsis by Barnes & Noble]
Stacy Stewart says
Thanks so much for these amazing book suggestions. I had no idea that there are so many interesting titles that give insights to Louisa May Alcott’s life. Several of them are now going on my reading list!