ohmygosh! Readers of She is Too Fond of Books know that I’m a HUGE fan of Louisa May Alcott (the quote in the title of my blog is a big hint) and, in fact, all Concord-centric authors.
Kelly O’Connor McNees has written a wonderful debut novel in The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott. This is an imagining of several months in Louisa’s 23rd year; a summer in which she may find romantic love …
I can’t tell you more, you’ll have to wait for my full review at the end of the month.
Or, you may get lucky and win an Advance Reader Copy, provided by the publisher; Penguin Books has offered an ARC to be given before the official publication date.
This advance copy of the book will be personally inscribed to the winner and signed by the author!
To enter the giveaway, leave a comment below, telling me something about Louisa May Alcott, her writing, or her contemporaries in Concord. I’m not asking for a thesis, it could be as simple as sharing why you’d like to read this book (you know why I ask, right? To eliminate the simple “I want to win!” entries 
)
Giveaway (open to US mailing addresses only) is open until midnight ET on Friday, March 26. Winner will be drawn randomly, and announced on March 27.
Update: The winner has been selected; thanks to all who entered the giveaway. This post is now closed to comments.
I want to win this giveaway book !
I would love to read this book because I love Louisa May Alcott and I love books about real people/events that are made up! This looks great! Thanks!
a long fatal love chase is one of my favorite books. little women is a book i remember reading over and over as a child.
this book sounds great!
I love Little Women, but I also love the movie version with Winona Ryder (where Jo is basically depicted as Alcott herself), and I think the possibilities for a fictional romance are intriguing! Please enter me in the contest!
Like her character, Jo March in Little Women, young Louisa was a tomboy: “No boy could be my friend till I had beaten him in a race,” she claimed, ” and no girl if she refused to climb trees, leap fences….”
I love Little Women and would be thrilled to win this book!
I did go through a phase of reading Little Women over and over and over when I was about 12. But my real favorite has always been Little Men. The idea of an extended family/boarding school was so charming!
I would love to read this book…I have heard so much about it.
I would love to win this book because Little Women is one of my favorite books.
Regular visitors and family friends to the Alcott home included Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Great giveaway! Thanks so much.
fitz12383(at)hotmail(dot)com
Louisa May alcott never really had a romance yet she wrote a very convincing detail regarding romance of the ear she was in.
I grew up reading all of the Little Women books. As a young girl I spent many summers on the front porch of our old Victorian home reading all of them. I had Madame Alexander Little Women dolls that my great aunt sewed beautiful period clothes and we dressed them for all kinds of occassions. It is a very happy memory. This book would surely complete my collection.
I just read the book March about her father; so now would like to read about her lost summer.
I want it from the title alone! I loved Little Women as a girl. One of my own manuscripts has a playing Little Women scene.
Little Women was one of my favourite books as a wee girl. Hopefully my daughter will love it just as much.
i think that her books are classics…that’s why i enjoy reading them
I’ve read most of Louisa May Alcott’s books, and watched the movies made of Little Women. I read this book as a child and loved it. Each of the girls had their own personality, and thats what I most remember and liked, as well as the storyline itself. I’d love to read this book, and would like to be entered in your giveaway. Thank you!
Sandee61
Muzzley56[at]aol[dot]com
well — you know I’m restraining myself from a thesis here! — I noticed someone mentioned Little Men. Louisa wrote Little Men to support her sister Anna’s (Meg in LW) two little boys (Freddie and Johnny) after Anna’s husband John passed away in 1870.
Glad you liked it! -beth
I can’t wait to read this new book!
I would be very happy to win this book because my 27 year old daughter loves Louisa May Alcott as does my 12 year old daughter. Soooo, not only would I get to enjoy it, but so would they
Not only did I read Little Women over and over again as a kid (it was second only to Last of the Mohicans), but I’ve heard great things about this book and really want to read it!
I’ve been intrigued by Louisa May Alcott since I actually read Geraldine Brooks’ March, another take on the father of the ladies in Little Women. I don’t know why I felt the need to explain that, since I’m sure you know who Mr. March is, haha! But all the same, sounds like a story I would love to read. Thanks for the chance!
Little Women was one of my favorite books as a girl. It’s one of those books that I credit with making me a book lover. I’d love to win and read this book. Sounds great.
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Jo is a kindred spirit; ready for adventure but a little shy when it comes to her door.
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I’ve got this posted at Win a Book for you Dawn
Her books can be read again and again. I read Little Women as a child, and I’d like to read it one more time. Her books are truly classics.
Louisa May Alcott is the main reason that I fell in love with books and reading. Little Women, is still to this day, my favorite book. It was the first book that made me cry while reading. (And not the last!)
I remember reading Little Women several times when I was a child. Seeing this post has reminded me that I need to introduce my daughter to Little Women! That book is a classic that will span the generations in my family.
It’s so simple, what little girl didn’t read Little Women and imagine herself as Jo? Cried tears of heartbreak when Beth died? Was furious with Amy for marrying Laurie? It’s the book of every girls childhood.
Please count me in. Thank you.
Little Women was my favorite book as a girl and is still one of my favorites. I would be very interested in reading this book.
Growing up my mother read me many of Louisas’ books in the hammock in our yard. They’re some of my fondest summer memories.
I always felt that something was wrong with me when I read Little Women growing up and didn’t cry when Beth died. I was really glad when I found out in college about Ms. Alcott’s “other” more adult books. Sounds like “Summer” may be a good blend of both sides of Ms. Alcott.
I love Little Women and I took my two daughters to see the play not too long ago. I would love, love, love to read this book!! Thanks for the chance!
Louis May Alcott was one of the first authors I really fell in love with -as a child, I read primarily sci-fi and fantasy. I thought normal fiction was boring, since I was a normal person and nothing exciting had really happened to me; why would I read about other normal people? On a whim, I picked up “Little Women” and it was the book that really opened me up to reading anything I can get my hands on. I would be delighted to have a chance to read “The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott”
baileythebookworm at gmail dot com
Oh, I would love to win! Little Women is my “go-to” comfort book. I read it when I’m sick, when I’m snowed in, or when I want to settle into a story that takes me to an unfamiliar time but with familiar emotions. Now that I am thinking about it, I want to put down my current books and read Little Women for the 917th time!
I love Little Women. I have read it so many times. I would love to read this book too.
Louisa May Alcott’s father, Amos Bronson Alcott, founded a utopian community called Fruitlands which eventually failed.
I love Little Women and I love imaginings of people’s (peoples’?) happily ever afters – or that’s what I’m hoping…
I have been reading “Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women” this week – it’s a biography. It would be fun to tie that in with another Louisa May Alcott book.
I have not read much on Louisa May Alcott but it sounds intriguing that someone created a few months of her 23rd year.
Wow, Ok, I have a confession…I have never read Louisa May Alcott, but she’s a staple around Concord…so sad that I am admitting this in public…but that’s why I want to read this book because I know practically nothing about her or her writing. This might just be a great introduction for me.
I’ll post this giveaway in my sidebar.
I’m very eager to read Kelly’s book. I still remember visiting the Alcott’s house in Concord, including the tiny desk on which Louisa wrote “Little Women”. And Nathaniel Hawthorne’s house is right next door.
I’ve heard about this one. It makes me think because I don’t see what the big deal is. I mean, I write romance novels and I’ve never been in love, same as her. or supposedly. I’m curious.
haleymathiot@yahoo.com
I found out that as an adult, Alcott was an abolitionist and a feminist. In 1847, the family housed a fugitive slave for one week
I can’t wait to read this book! Louisa May Alcott was second of four daughters, just like Jo in Little Women. Also, many of the Transcendentalists like Thoreau and Emerson were her teachers and family friends.
I loved the book Little women – although I didn’t know much about the author until now – and my interest is peaked! Thanks for the chance!
Besides Little Women for which she is best known, she wrote tons of other books and short stories, like Roses and Forget-Me-Nots
lkish77123 at gmail dot com
I need to re-read Little Women. Been so many yrs ago that I read. I do remember it made an impression on me and I realized you can be nice and popular at the same time. I would love to win this book.
Pls add my name to the giveaway.
Thanks for the opportunity to enter.
I find it interesting how she was a nurse to injured soldiers
during the Civil War.
Many thanks, Cindi