Short Synopsis
Based on newly uncovered family papers, this groundbreaking and intensely moving portrait of Louisa May Alcott's relationship with her mother will completely transform our understanding of one of America's most beloved authors.

Full Synopsis
Since its release nearly one hundred and fifty years ago, Louisa May Alcott's classic Little Women has been a mainstay in American literature, while passionate Jo March and her calm, beloved "Marmee" have shaped generations of young women. Biographers have consistently credited her father, Bronson Alcott, for Louisa's professional success, assuming that this outspoken idealist was the source of her progressive thinking and remarkable independence.

But in this riveting dual biography, Eve LaPlante explodes those myths, drawing on unknown and unexplored letters and journals to show that Louisa's "Marmee," Abigail May Alcott, was in fact the intellectual and emotional center of her daughter's world. It was Abigail who urged Louisa to write, who inspired many of her stories, and who gave her the support and courage she needed to pursue her unconventional path. Abigail, long dismissed as a quiet, self-effacing companion to her famous husband and daughter, is revealed here as a politically active feminist firebrand, a fascinating thinker in her own right. Examining family papers, archival documents, and diaries thought to have been destroyed, LaPlante paints an exquisitely moving and utterly convincing portrait of a woman decades ahead of her time—and the fiercely independent daughter who was both inspired and restricted by her mother's dreams of freedom.

A story guaranteed to turn all previous scholarship on its head, Marmee and Louisa is a gorgeously written and deeply felt biography of two extraordinary women as well as a key to our understanding of Louisa May Alcott's life and work.

"A most original love story, taut and tender." ---Stacy Schiff, author of Cleopatra: A Life

"Eve LaPlante's Marmee & Louisa is a heartwarming and thoroughly researched story of family interdependence." ---Megan Marshall, author of The Peabody Sisters

"Karen White vocalizes LaPlante's assiduous research into letters, diaries, and current events to reveal the nuanced and loving relationship between mother and daughter." ---Library Journal Audio Review

"White treats the words with respect, using appropriate emotive emphasis to highlight passages from letters and journals that convey the emotion behind the words, without overly dramatizing the moments. Frustration, concern, elation and love are clearly apparent, yet do not overshadow or distract." ---I Am, Indeed Blog

"Every previous biography of Louisa May Alcott . . . credits her father, Bronson Alcott, as her muse. However, Eve LaPlante, a descendant of the Alcotts, tells a different story. Using diaries, letters, and family papers, she argues that Abigail May Alcott, Louisa's mother, was the real inspiration and driving force in Louisa's life." ---AudioFile