This list is by no means comprehensive or even close to complete. Most of these are books I own or have read. Many of them can be found my kidlit history shelf in my goodreads account. Titles that I’ve missed are always welcome!
Books About the Authors and Their Novels
Louisa May Alcott
- Eden’s Outcasts: The Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Father by John Matteson
- The Little Women Treasury by Carolyn Strom Collins and Christina Wyss Eriksson
Frances Hodgson Burnett
Inside the Secret Garden by Carolyn Strom Collins and Christina Wyss Eriksson
Virginia Lee Burton
Virginia Lee Burton: A Life in Art by Barbara Ellemann
Maud Hart Lovelace
Future in a Handbasket: The Life and Letters Behind Carney’s House Party by Amy Dolnick
L. M. Montgomery
- The Anne of Green Gables Christmas Treasury by Carolyn Strom Collins and Christina Wyss Eriksson
- Anne of Green Gables Treasury by Carolyn Strom Collins and Christina Wyss Eriksson
- The Annotated Anne of Green Gables edited by Wendy E. Barry, Margaret Anne Doody, and Mary E. Doody Jones
- Aunt Maud’s Recipe Book: From the Kitchen of L. M. Montgomery by Elaine Crawford and Kelly Crawford
- The Intimate Life of L. M. Montgomery by Irene Gammel (Disclaimer: One chapter in this book, “The Hectic Flush: The Fiction and Reality of Consumption in L. M. Montgomery’s Life” is written by me.)
- The Lucy Maud Montgomery Album compiled by Kevin McCabe and edited by Alexandra Heilbron
- Lucy Maud Montgomery: The Gift of Wings by Mary Henley Rubio
- Lucy Maud Montgomery: The Wheel of Things by Mollie Gillen
- Maud: The Life of L. M. Montgomery by Harry Bruce
- Remembering Lucy Maud Montgomery by Alexandra Heilbron
Laura Ingalls Wilder
- The Ghost in the Little House: A Life of Rose Wilder Lane by William Holtz
- I Remember Laura: America’s favorite storyteller as remembered by her family, friends, and neighbors by Stephen Hines
- Inside Laura’s Little House by Carolyn Strom Collins and Christina Wyss Eriksson
- Little House, Long Shadow: Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Impact on American Culture by Anita Clair Fellman
Non-fiction Goodies From the Authors
Doublefields by Elizabeth Enright (both autobiographical and a collection of short stories for adults)
The Alpine Path by L. M. Montgomery
The Selected Journals of L. M. Montgomery, Volumes I – V edited by Mary Rubio and Elizabeth Waterston
My Dear Mr. M: Letters to G. B. McMillan from L. M. Montgomery edited by Francis Bolger
Little House in the Ozarks: The Rediscovered Writings edited by Stephen Hines
On the Way Home: The Diary of a Trip from South Dakota to Mansfield, Missouri, in 1894 by Laura Ingalls Wilder
West from Home: Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder, San Francisco, 1915
History: otherwise known as context for the books you love (in no particular order)
Growing Up with the Country: Childhood on the Far Western Frontier by Elliott West (Crucial for the understanding the many pioneer memoirs, including the Little House books)
Bachelor Girl: The Secret History of Single Women in the Twentieth Century by Betsy Israel (Why, exactly, it was such a horrible thing to be an Old Maid—and how that changed)
From Catharine Beecher to Martha Stewart: A Cultural History of Domestic Advice by Sarah A. Leavitt
Living in the Shadow of Death: Tuberculosis and the Social Experience of Illness in American History by Sheila M. Rothman (Consumption is a recurring theme in many 19th century books)
Waste and Want: A Social History of Trash by Susan Strasser
Never Done: A History of American Housework by Susan Strasser
The Children’s Blizzard by David Laskin (not the same blizzards as depicted in The Long Winter, but I challenge you to not think about that book while reading this one)
What Katy Read: Feminist Re-Readings of Classic Stories for Girls, 1850-1920 by Shirley Foster
The Promised Land by Mary Antin (an immigrant memoir, with shades of All-of-a-Kind Family)
One Potato, Two Potato: The Folklore of American Children by Mary Knapp and Herbert Knapp
Huck’s Raft: A History of American Childhood by Steven Mintz
