Kid Konnection: The Revelation of Louisa May & Giveaway

Every Saturday, I host a feature called Kid Konnection -- a regular weekend feature about anything related to children's books. This week, I'm going to share with you a guest post by the author of a new young adult novel about Louisa May Alcott.

Summary: Louisa May Alcott can't believe it—her mother is leaving for the summer to earn money for the family and Louisa is to be in charge of the household. How will she find the time to write her stories, much less have any adventures of her own? But before long, Louisa finds herself juggling her temperamental father, a mysterious murder, a fugitive seeking refuge along the Underground Railroad, and blossoming love. Intertwining fact, fiction, and quotes from Little Women, Michaela MacColl has crafted another spunky heroine whose story will keep readers turning pages until the very end. -- Chronicle

I am so excited to welcome Michaela MacColl, author of the new YA mystery novel THE REVELATION OF LOUISA MAY to Booking Mama! I recently read THE REVELATION OF LOUISA MAY and really liked it -- my review will come in the next few days. Meanwhile, Ms. MacColl has taken time from her busy schedule to write a wonderful guest post about her novel. After reading it, I'm sure you will be anxious to check out this book... or even win a copy!

Hi Julie! Thanks for hosting The Revelation of Louisa May blog tour!

The Revelation of Louisa May is a murder mystery. A sixteen year old Louisa is my detective and, boy does she have her hands full. Her father is a hard-working philosopher who refuses to work for money. Marmee is abandoning the family to a job in New Hampshire. A fugitive slave comes knocking with a vicious slave catcher hard on his heels. Beth is on the sofa. Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson are visiting all the time. How on earth is Louisa going to manage the cooking, the cleaning, the shopping and her writing?

The answer is … she can’t. Something has to give. Particularly when Fred shows up. Fred used to be a harmless companion, but he’s been away at college. He’s handsome and admiring – and Louisa’s not sure how to handle him. And did I mention the dead body? Yup, there’s a body.

My character Louisa is a combination of biography and Louisa’s own writing. Jo March, her wonderful creation in Little Women, was based on herself (the rest of the sisters and her mother have real life counterparts too). Like Jo, my Louisa is “resolved to take fate by the throat and shake a living out of her!” Like Jo, Louisa was a fierce and loyal friend and a bitter antagonist. Both loved to write so wildly they were in a “vortex.” Both girls were runners. Meg chastises Jo by saying, “"You have been running, Jo. How could you? When will you stop such romping ways?" Louisa was proud of how she could walk twenty miles in a day. I grew to love the prickly Louisa as much as I did Jo. I hope you will too!

JO, RUNNING TOO FAST TO BE GENTEEL (LITTLE, BROWN AND CO. 1886 EDITION, LITTLE WOMEN, FRANK MERRILL, ILLUS.)

Please visit me at www.michaelamaccoll.com or AuthorMichaelaMaColl on Facebook or follow me at @michaelamaccoll.

*****

Michaela attended Vassar College and Yale University earning degrees in multi-disciplinary history. Unfortunately, it took her 20 years before she realized she was learning how to write historical fiction. Her favorite stories are the ones she finds about the childhood experiences of famous people. She has written about a teenaged Queen Victoria (Prisoners in the Palace, Chronicle 2010) and Beryl Markham’s childhood (Promise the Night, Chronicle 2011). She is writing a literary mystery series for teens featuring so far a young Emily Dickinson in Nobody’s Secret (2013) and the Bronte sisters in Always Emily (2014). She has recently begun a new series with Boyd’s Mill/Highlights called Hidden Histories about odd events in America’s past. The first entry in the series is Rory’s Promise and will be published in September 2014. She frequently visits high schools and has taught at the Graduate Institute in Bethel, CT. She lives in Westport CT with her husband, two teenaged daughters and three extremely large cats.

Check out these other stops of THE REVELATION OF LOUISA MAY blog tour:

Day	Post Date	Blog	URL
Tuesday	4/28/2015	Teenreads	http://www.teenreads.com/blog
Wednesday	4/29/2015	A Dream Within A Dream	http://adreamwithindream.blogspot.com
Thursday	4/30/2015	The Children's Book Review	ww.thechildrensbookreview.com
Friday	5/1/2015	Book Nerd Canada	http://booknerd.ca
Saturday	5/2/2015	Booking Mama	http://www.bookingmama.net
Sunday	5/3/2015	Chapter by Chapter	http://www.chapter-by-chapter.com
Monday	5/4/2015	Mother Daughter Book Club	http://motherdaughterbookclub.com
Tuesday	5/5/2015	Forever Young Adult	http://www.foreveryoungadult.com

Thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy of this novel.

Giveaway alert: I have a copy of THE REVELATION OF LOUISA MAY to share with one lucky reader. To enter, just fill out the form below before May 15th at 11:59 p.m. EST. I will randomly select and notify the winner the following day. This contest is open to those of you with U.S. and Canada addresses only. Good luck!

If you'd like to participate in Kid Konnection and share a post about anything related to children's books (picture, middle grade, or young adult) from the past week, please leave a comment as well as a link below with your name/blog name and the title of the book! Feel free to grab the little button too!