Louisa and the Missing Heiress

This first book in a projected series gives us Louisa May Alcott who in her old age looks back to a “secret” part of her life, her “adventures...in the curious role of a lady detective.” Not yet a well known author, Louisa willingly sets forth from the protective bosom of her hard working, loving family in order to discover who murdered her childhood friend. In the process, her own life is threatened.

Although the story is not particularly fast moving, it provides rich details about the required manners and dress of “respectable” Boston women. Find also bits of information about social issues in pre-Civil War New England, of Louisa’s father, Bronson Alcott, and of Henry Thoreau, Ralph Emerson and Margaret Fuller.

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