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Little Women is a coming-of-age novel written by American novelist Louisa May Alcott, originally published in two volumes in 1868 and 1869. The story follows the lives of the four March sisters—Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy—and details their passage from childhood to womanhood. Loosely based on the lives of the author and her three sisters,: 202  it is classified as an autobiographical or semi-autobiographical novel.: 12  Little Women was an immediate commercial and critical success, and readers were eager for more about the characters. Alcott quickly completed a second volume (titled Good Wives in the United Kingdom, though the name originated with the publisher and not Alcott). It was also met with success. The two volumes were issued in 1880 as a single novel titled Little Women. Alcott subsequently wrote two sequels to her popular work, both also featuring the March sisters: Little Men (1871) and Jo's Boys (1886). The novel has been said to address three major themes: "domesticity, work, and true love, all of them interdependent and each necessary to the achievement of its heroine's individual identity.": 200  According to Sarah Elbert, Alcott created a new form of literature, one that took elements from romantic children's fiction and combined it with others from sentimental novels, resulting in a totally new genre. Elbert argues that within Little Women can be found the first vision of the "All-American girl" and that her various aspects are embodied in the differing March sisters.: 199  The book has been translated into numerous languages, and frequently adapted for stage and screen. Development history In 1868, Alcott's publisher, Thomas Niles, recommended that she write a novel about girls that would have widespread appeal.: 2  Alcott resisted, preferring to publish a collection of short stories. Niles pressed her to write the girls' book first, and he was aided by her father Amos Bronson Alcott, who also urged her to do so.: 207  Louisa confided to a friend, “I could not write a girls' story knowing little about any but my own sisters and always preferring boys”. In May 1868, Alcott wrote in her journal: "Niles, partner of Roberts, asked me to write a girl's book. I said I'd try.": 36  Alcott set her novel in an imaginary Orchard House modeled on her own residence of the same name, where she wrote the novel.: xiii  She later recalled that she did not think she could write a successful book for girls and did not enjoy writing it.: 335-  "I plod away," she wrote in her diary, "although I don't enjoy this sort of things.": 37  By June, Alcott had sent the first dozen chapters to Niles, and both agreed that they were dull. But Niles's niece, Lillie Almy, read them and said she enjoyed them.: 335–336  The completed manuscript was shown to several girls who agreed it was "splendid". Alcott wrote, "they are the best critics, so I should definitely be satisfied.": 37  She wrote Little Women "in record time for money",: 196x2  but the book's immediate success surprised both her and her publisher. Explanation of the novel's title According to literary critic Sarah Elbert, when using the term "little women" Alcott was drawing on its Dickensian meaning; it represented the period in a young woman's life where childhood and elder childhood are "overlapping" with young womanhood. Each of the March sister heroines has a harrowing experience that alerts them and the reader that "childhood innocence" is of the past, and that "the inescapable woman problem" is all that remains. Plot summary Part One Four sisters and their mother, whom they call Marmee, live in a new neighborhood (loosely based on Concord) in Massachusetts in genteel poverty. Having lost all his money, their father is serving as a chaplain for the Union Army in the American Civil War, far from home. The mother and daughters face their first Christmas without him. When Marmee asks her daughters to give their Christmas breakfast away to an impoverished family, the girls and their mother venture into town laden with baskets to feed the hungry children. When they return, they discover their wealthy, elderly neighbor Mr. Laurence has sent over a decadent surprise dinner to make up for their breakfast. The two families become acquainted following these acts of kindness. Meg and Jo must work to support the family: Meg tutors a nearby family of four children; Jo assists her aged great-aunt March, a wealthy widow living in a mansion in Plumfield. Beth, too timid for school, is content to stay at home and help with housework; and Amy is still at school. Meg is beautiful and traditional, Jo is a tomboy who writes, Beth is a peacemaker and a pianist, and Amy is an artist who longs for elegance and fine society. The sisters strive to help their family and improve their characters as Meg is vain, Jo is hotheaded, Beth is cripplingly shy, and Amy is materialistic. The neighbor boy Laurie, orphaned grandson of Mr. Laurence, becomes close friends with the sisters, particularly the tomboyish Jo. The girls keep busy as the war goes on. Jo writes a novel that gets published but is frustrated to have to edit it down and can't comprehend the conflicting critical response. Meg is invited to spend two weeks with rich friends, where there are parties and cotillions for the girls to dance with boys and improve their social skills. Laurie is invited to one of the dances, and Meg's friends incorrectly think she is in love with him. Meg is more interested in John Brooke, Laurie's young tutor. Word comes that Mr. March is very ill with pneumonia and Marmee is called away to nurse him in Washington, DC. Mr. Laurence offers to accompany her but she declines, knowing travel would be uncomfortable for the old man. Mr. Laurence instead sends John Brooke to do his business in Washington and help the Marches. While in Washington, Brooke confesses his love for Meg to her parents. They are pleased, but consider Meg too young to marry, so Brooke agrees to wait. While Marmee is in Washington, Beth contracts scarlet fever after spending time with a poor family where three children die. As a precaution, Amy is sent to live with Aunt March and replaces Jo as her companion and helper. Jo, who already had scarlet fever, tends to Beth. After many days of illness, the family doctor advises that Marmee be sent for immediately. Beth recovers, but never fully regains her health and energy. While Brooke waits for Meg to come of age to marry, he joins the military and serves in the war. After he is wounded, he returns to find work so he can buy a house and be ready when he marries Meg. Laurie goes off to college. On Christmas Day, a year after the book's opening, the girls' father returns home. Part Two (Published separately in the United Kingdom as Good Wives) Three years later, Meg and John marry and learn how to live together. When they have twins, Meg is a devoted mother but John begins to feel neglected and left out. Meg seeks advice from Marmee, who help.... Discover the Laurie A Belknap popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Laurie A Belknap books.