Invincible Louisa, Newbery Winner 1934

 Do you know what this review represents? This is review number 99 out of... 99.

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FINISHED

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PROJECT!

More than six years ago I was stoked to reach number 50. But today... I don't know... in a few days the 100th Newbery winner will be announced and I will review it, then I will do the final round-up. I've been writing this blog for nine years, admittedly not very faithfully for a while. I'm well aware this blog is a personal project, pretty much just for me - but that somehow makes it even worse, and yet better, that I finished.

Without further ado...

Invincible Louisa, I'm so glad I didn't finish with a dud. Probably the best of the biographies that won Newberys - though I'd have to double-check. Before I read this book there was one other point that needed clearing up. Little Women. You just can't read a biography of Louisa May Alcott without having ever read Little Women. That's why this kept getting pushed. I just was certain that Little Women would absolutely not be my cup of tea. Whelp... I was incorrect. Little Women 5/5 stars - everyone that says it is a great classic is right.

Going straight from Little Women (759 pages) to Invincible Louisa (240 pages) is like reading an incredibly condensed and slightly twisted rewrite. Louisa based Little Women very heavily off her own life - especially herself and her sisters compared with the March sisters. Louisa certainly had to be invincible - her life was so fascinating! Anyone notice famous people run in packs? Louisa grew up around the likes of Thoreau and Emerson. Her father was very into the transcendentalist movement and was - in many ways - ahead of his time. Unfortunately that doesn't always translate very well into livable income. Louisa was often finding ways to help her family earn money and promised to one day find a way to give them all what they most desired.

Overall - an excellent biography (which I hope is mostly true) because then it is a historical fiction... This best parts are when you don't know what will happen because it veers so far from her fictionalized life as Jo March. All in all I'd recommend this easily to anyone but especially to fans of Little Women!