Louisa May Alcott: Little Women, Little Men, Jo's Boys »

"Set in a small New England town during the Civil War years and Reconstruction, Little Women; or, Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy (1868-69) introduces Alcott's remarkable heroines, the March sisters, and above all her alter ego Jo March, with her literary ambition and independent spirit. The novel chronicles the episodes, large and small, of the sisters' progress toward adulthood: their amateur theatricals, sibling rivalries and reconciliations, friendships and romance, lessons about work and charity, and the loss of loved ones." "Little Men: Life at Plumfield with Jo's Boys (1871) extends the March family saga. Jo - now married to the good-natured Professor Bhaer, and with sons of her own - has become the unflappable matron of an extended family at Plumfield, a school the Bhaers have founded with Aunt March's legacy. Jo's rambunctious youngsters grow up in an atmosphere full of high spirits and misadventure - a world enlivened by Alcott's unique powers of observation and sympathy." In Jo's Boys, and How They Turned Out (1886), her final novel, Alcott returns to the familiar precincts of Plumfield. Ten years later, Jo's pupils have started to make their way in the world, and find themselves tested: Josie longs to be an actress; Emil, now a sailor, is shipwrecked; Dan, out West, lands in prison; Nat, studying music in Germany, in tempted into living beyond his means. Faced with new obstacles, they look back on the lessons learned at home, and begin to appreciate the real value of their Plumfield education.

The New York Times - Mary Jo Salter

The cleareyed critic Elaine Showalter, who has written frequently on Alcott, has come back to us in 2005 with a Library of America edition of the March family trilogy, complete with the original, touchingly amateur illustrations by Alcott's sister May. As is standard for this series, Showalter offers extensive notes and a chronology of the author's life, but no introduction. She, like the Norton editors, has replaced the 1880 text with the pluckier originals.