(March by Geraldine Brooks, Penguin, 31 January 2006, winner of the Pulitzer prize for literature for the same year)
The novel deconstructs Louisa May Alcott's Little Women by writing about the life of their father March. Marmee and her four daughters live in penury while their father fights in the American civil war in 1862 at the rather advanced age of 39 years. So he is absent in person in Little Women.
The one dimensional goody-goodliness of Little Women is completely offset by 'March'.
March is a trader, chaplain and soldier. He has worked hard throughout his life and his mind is full of noble ideas. He does his best to be fair to the black slaves but is overridden by guilt as his efforts did not yield any positive results. He makes money and gives it away, forcing his daughters to work from a tender age. He loved Grace Clement, a refined black girl whom he meets at the tender age of eighteen and again as lies in a hospital awaiting death. Marmee knows nothing about Grace as March has not had the courage to tell her. Marmee pieces together the missing part of the puzzle and brings him back to his daughters.
The novel is based on painstaking research and other reviewers have averred the historical authenticity of the background created in the novel. It is enlightening. The only other book which I have read on the north versus south America conflict in the late nineteenth century is of course, Gone with the wind which paints a picture of loss of an old world by the south and does not provide many historical information.
The novel brings the background and the characters to life and is an absorbing read.
