Kelly O’Connor McNees is a former editorial assistant and English teacher. The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott is her first novel. She says, "I am looking forward to a great 2011. The paperback for The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott goes on sale May 3, 2011, with a gorgeous cover. And I am at work on a new historical novel, set just after the Civil War, in Nebraska."
Kelly's 2010 Favorite Reads:
This brilliant novel is based on the little-known historical fact that Thoreau accidentally set the Concord Woods on fire as a young man—the same woods in which he would later carry out his experiment at Walden Pond. But Thoreau is just one of several fascinating characters in this story, and the destructive and cleansing power of fire is a metaphor throughout. This is a deeply satisfying book
I don’t know why I came so late to the Barbara Kingsolver party. Fear, probably—fear of how good her novels would be. And it turns out that the fear was completely justified. Kingsolver is an exquisite writer and a captivating storyteller. These three loosely connected stories will transport you to Southern Appalachia and introduce you to characters who will haunt the time you spend away from the pages. Kingsolver’s Tennessee forest is alive with fertility, and so is, well . . . you’ll just have to read it. A pretty steamy ecology lesson.
This slim novel in stories examines a family broken by the disappearance of a child. Each sentence is like a polished stone, and Lombardo captures the nuance of how grief distorts and changes relationships. I am in awe of this writer.
Simon Bear is an ambitious physician who treats patients who have chronic pain, and he believes his ship has come in the day he discovers a new drug that may give them some relief. But Simon is blind to the fact that he, his wife, and their teenage daughter are suffering just as much as his patients are, from a pain they cannot measure. This is the story of a fractured marriage told from both sides, and the well-intentioned things we do to redeem ourselves—things that only make matters worse. Ledger is an assured, skillful writer and this book is full of nearly unbearable tension. Couldn’t put it down!
Fanny Fern—the pseudonym under which Sarah Willis wrote—was one of the most famous writers of her day. Like Louisa May Alcott, she wrote to earn a living and became in her own time a hero for woman who sought to claim greater independence. Ruth Hall, Fern’s autobiographical novel that was first published in 1854, feels fresh and modern. Its chapters consist of short scenes and conversations, and the narrator of the tale has a wicked sense of humor, even as she tells the sad story of Ruth’s widowhood and desperate efforts to get published.
Anything by the late, great Laurie Colwin
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