Louisa May Alcott 
Little Women — Unabridged [EPUB ebook] 

Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888) was an American poet, short story writer and novelist whose best known works are ‘Little Women’ and its sequels ‘Little Men’ and ‘Jo’s Boys.’ Born in what was then called ‘Germantown’ in Northwestern Pennsylvania (the area has since been absorbed into the city of Philadelphia), Alcott — the second of four daughters — was required to go to work at an early age due to the family’s financial difficulties. She served at various times as a teacher, seamstress, governess and domestic helper and saw writing as an escape from the drudgery of her life. Alcott’s writings soon gained attention and she published her first book, Flower Fables, in 1849 at the age of seventeen. Her writings did not originally find an audience, however, and by the late 1850’s, she found herself depressed, broke and suicidal. She soon found solace in a biography of Charlotte Brontë (in whose life she found many parallels), and became an avowed abolitionist and feminist, serving as a nurse during the Civil War. Never abandoning her writing, Alcott wrote a number of sensational ‘gothic thrillers’ in the mid-1860’s under the pseudonym ‘A.M. Barnard’ and published a series of children’s books and detective stories before she was finally catapulted into the mainstream with the publication of ‘Little Women’ in 1868. She never ceased writing, despite a number of debilitating health problems, and her sequels to ‘Little Women’ enjoyed great success as well. Sadly, Alcott’s health continued to decline and in 1888 she died of a stroke at age 55 just two days after her own father’s death. She is buried in the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Concord, Massachusetts.