The Inheritance

Set in the lavish English court of Jane Austen's time, this previously unpublished work by a 17-year-old Louisa May Alcott tells the story of Edith Adelon, an impoverished Italian orphan, who wields the persuasive charms of virtue, beauty and loyalty to win her true birthright--the eponymous inheritance--as well as the affections of her champion, Lord Percy. LG Main Selection. TV & motion picture rights licensed by Cosgrove Meurer Productions, Alliance Production, Ltd., and Televist. 176 pp. 150,000 print. (Literature/Criticism)

Here at last is the book "Jo" wrote. Generations of fans have longed to plumb that first romance, hinted at so captivatingly on the pages of Little Women, Alcott's autobiographical classic. Now, after nearly one hundred fifty years spent among archived family documents, Louisa May Alcott's debut novel finally reaches its eager public. Set in an English country manor, the story follows the turbulent fortunes of Edith Adelon, an impoverished Italian orphan whose loyalty and beauty win her the patronage of wealthy friends until a jealous rival contrives to rob her of her position. In the locket around her neck, she carries a deep secret about her natural birthright. But an even greater truth lies hidden in Edith's heart - her deep reverence for the kind and noble Lord Percy, the only friend who can save her from the deceitful, envious machinations of Lady Ida. Reminiscent of Jane Austen in its charms, this chaste but stirringly passionate novel affirms the conquering power of both love and courtesy.

Publishers Weekly

Dutton compares Alcott's recently discovered, charming first novel (written in 1849, when she was just 17) to those of Jane Austen. The comparison is apt, even if Alcott, though impressively accomplished for her age, can't match Austen for smart dialogue or lived-in characters. In fact, the novel is pure romance and reads like a fairy tale. Set in a manor house somewhere in England, it tells of two virtuous lovers separated by rank and the machinations of a jealous interloper. Alcott's heroine is a lovely Italian orphan with a mysterious past (and the wonderfully un-Italian name of Edith Adelon). The hero, Lord Percy ("Would to heaven I were a peasant"), is chivalrous, handsome and resigned to a life of loneliness after the loss of an early love. Will fate bring them together? Of course it will. Meanwhile, Alcott trots her characters through a delightful series of vignettes: an overheard garden colloquy, a candlelight boating party, a revealing round of tableaux vivants, a discovered theft, a deathbed promise-and the inevitable unearthing of a missing will that explains Edith's lineage. Alcott handles all of this machinery with aplomb and winning earnestness. According to the scholars who recently found the manuscript in Harvard's Houghton Library, The Inheritance is the novel Jo March writes in Little Women. Whether this is true or not, The Inheritance proves that years before Alcott invented the young adult novel, she could already give voice to the preoccupations and fantasies of the "little women" who would become her most enduring subjects.