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 MISS ALCOTT’S E-MAIL is available from David R. Godine “I will do something by-and-by. Don’t care what, teach sew, act, write, anything to help the family; and I’ll be rich and famous and happy before I die, see if I won’t!”
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News, Reviews & Updates Sound & Video Reviews March 2007 "As a member of the radical political activist group [the Weather Underground], Bakke certainly had seen guns pointed in her direction over the past couple of years. But things were different now. She was pregnant." "Seattle author, Kit Bakke has had an interesting life. In the '60s she was a member of the Underground Weatherman, an activist group who protested the Vietnam war. This interested the FBI enough to compile a 100 page file on her. Today this mother of two with two post graduate degrees and a book publication speaks to us about another reformer, the one featured in her first novel, Miss Alcott's E-mail: Yours for Reforms of All Kinds (David Godine Books 2006) Intrigued? Click on the link to our podcast in this article and listen along. " September 8, 2006 "Somewhere along the line, would-be writer Kit Bakke, former member of the Weather Underground, now a middle-aged, middle-class mom, went on a Louisa May Alcott binge. "Earlier, she'd tried sending notes and even short
stories to living writers, all of whom ignored her. She got the
idea of e-mailing Louisa, and to Kit's surprise, Louisa e-mailed
her back. On that charming conceit, this excellent book is based
. ..." September 24, 2006 "Five years ago, Kit Bakke was just one of millions of Americans groping for meaning and direction after the attacks of 9/11 ..." November 9, 2006 "MISS ALCOTT’S E-MAIL, Yours for Reforms of All Kinds is a remarkable memoir by Kit Bakke about a political activist, mother, nurse and management consultant's midlife review interwoven with a biography of her political and literary soul mate Louisa May Alcott." September 1, 2006 Library Journal reviews Miss Alcott's E-Mail "In this biography, Bakke, a consultant in clinical information systems, initiates
an email correspondence with her childhood role model, writer Louisa
May Alcott. Together they go "far beyond Little Women," discussing,among other things, Alcott's social activism (she supported women's
suffrage and the abolition of slavery). Bakke draws stimulating parallels
between Alcott's life in the 1860s and her own background as a nurse
and 1960s antiwar activist. Through Alcott, Bakke explores such issues
as feminism, war, transcendentalism, nursing the sick, writing, and
civil rights.
Each chapter begins with a letter from Bakke introducing a new topic,
then continues with historical and biographical information about
Alcott, her contemporaries, and her times. By mixing Alcott's biography
with intriguing phases of her own life, Bakke successfully underscores
that social struggles continue. Despite a few inaccuracies (e.g.,
Bryn Mawr College is not in the Ivy League) and the occasional modern
colloquialism, this work is a delight. Recommended for all libraries." Summer 2006 Interview with the author December 2007 I recently finished writing the oral history of Hilda Evangeline Silva Sprague, a 101 year old women who lives north of Seattle. She was born in a log cabin on the Pilchuck River and has lived and worked in the Pacific Northwest all her life. She was a cook in a logging camp, worked in a plywood mill, a fruit-packing plant and other quintessentially Northwest businesses. She grew up with our region, becoming a superb cook, an incredible gardener and a generous hostess. She camped and fished and hiked all through the Cascades. She remains sharp as a tack, living on her own and has only recently stopped mowing her lawn and chopping her firewood. The finished book was published by www.lulu.com for her family and friends, and is chock full of her stories, both in word and picture. See it at http://www.lulu.com/content/1428561. August 23, 2007 Dear Friendly Readers, I take keyboard in hand today to let you know that MISS ALCOTT’S E-MAIL has just been released as a handy-dandy paperback soft cover book! This is a good thing and just in time for the 2007-2008 book club reading season. Although twenty-odd book clubs have already taken the plunge and chosen the book while still in its extremely beautiful gold-stamped hard covers, I know such delights aren’t for everyone. But now there are plenty of inexpensively priced paper copies to go around. The interior pages are identical to the hard cover, down to the lovely illustrations and photographs, the reader’s guide, the suggestions for further reading, the Alcott chronology, even the picture of the page ripped from my very own FBI file. What’s next, you ask? Below is a sneak peak of DOT TO DOT:
Coming to a bookstore near you, but not until a publisher buys it and we go through all that editing, designing, printing, distributing and marketing rigmarole. I also have to add that my agent does not like the title, but whatever we end up with will have DOT in there somewhere. Meanwhile, I’m quite sure Louisa joins me in wishing you all the best in reading, thinking, working and living, September 9, 2006 Hello patient friends! Third time’s the charm, so I have saved this Alcott Alert #3 for Real Thing. MISS ALCOTT’S E-MAIL is finally a Real Book, existing in Real Time in Real Space!! • Got the idea in late 2001. Did lots of research, wrote mountains of pages that didn’t survive. Whined all through 2002 about how hard it was to work a full time job and write a book at the same time. • Thanks to kindness of well-employed husband, took time off from work and re-wrote full time through most of 2003. • Collected eight rejections, mostly from New York publishers (“I wasn’t persuaded that there is a wide popular readership” “Unfortunately, I found the device of the letters rather confusing” “I could not achieve the necessary suspension of disbelief” “I do not see a significant market for this book” etc.) • Decided to help agent look for a more simpatico publisher, perhaps a regional New England house. • Found one in David Godine, founder and owner of David R Godine Publishing in Boston. He wrote to me on March 17, 2004: “It won’t make you rich, so don’t plan to call the contractor to expand the kitchen, but we’ll do what we can. It’s a wonderful book; I learned a lot.” My agent, on his way out of town for a while, advised “Be your charming self if he calls but commit to nothing.” • Book scheduled for release Fall 2005. • I’ll spare you the crate loads of edits, illustrations, footnotes, references, format and content discussions that flew between me in Seattle and Godine in Boston. Suffice it to say, I spent many hours non-ergonomically hunched over my laptop, rocking from foot to foot over hot Xerox machines, waiting patiently in line at the Post Office, and otherwise agonizing over the process of getting Louisa and me dressed and ready to face the world. Simultaneously we did some back and forth on the contract; it was officially signed in January 2005. • Book delayed until Spring 2006. More cross-continental flurries. • Book delayed again until Fall 2006. Ditto. But here it is! Or at least I’m holding a copy. Mailed from the printer last week. My best understanding is that if I have it, distributors and some bookstores have it too. I haven’t seen it actually reposing on a shelf yet. Amazon’s page says they will be shipping orders September 15. As an appetizer, here’s a review of MISS ALCOTT’S E-MAIL from the Washington Post, Friday September 8, 2006. To view the entire article, click here. Hope to see you at a book signing (see list at http://www.kitbakke.com). Don’t hesitate to contact me at kit@kitbakke.com to schedule a visit or give me feedback. April 19, 2006 Today is Patriot’s Day, a holiday in Louisa May Alcott's home state of Massachusetts. On April 19, 1775, local settlers took a stand against British redcoat regulars on Concord’s Old North Bridge. Ralph Waldo Emerson, Louisa’s surrogate father and the Alcott family’s not-so-secret Santa, wrote this stanza in his “Concord Hymn” celebrating their hometown’s role in the American Revolution: By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Emerson also wrote “How much of human life is lost in waiting.” Which brings me to the second, slightly less uplifting topic of today. My publisher, David R Godine has decided to postpone Louisa’s entrance into the 21st century from this June to mid September 2006. Various wheels and gears that aim the publishing industry generally forward apparently have not been adequately greased or filed or aligned (I do not pretend to fully understand), and a little extra maintenance time is required. So be it. Please check back later on the website www.kitbakke.com to see the calendar of re-scheduled events launching MISS ALCOTT’S E-MAIL. Meanwhile, assuming you are in the northern hemisphere, enjoy the lengthening days of spring, and the warmth and flowers of summer. I know Louisa would. And if you are moved to e-mail either Louisa (louisa@kitbakke.com) or myself (kit@kitbakke.com), we stand ready to receive and reply. More anon, March 4, 2006 MISS ALCOTT'S E-MAIL Hello to all, “I used to imagine my mind a room in confusion, and I was to put it in order; so I swept out useless thoughts and dusted foolish fancies away, and furnished it with good resolutions and began again. But cobwebs get in. I’m not a good housekeeper, and never get my room in nice order.” Louisa May Alcott, age 22. When Louisa May Alcott speaks, how can we not listen? She sure got my attention, and now I’m hoping she’ll earn yours. Apologies if you detect the faint whiff of spam in this email. I’m trying out a “newsletter” feature of my website, www.kitbakke.com. Hit “unsubscribe” below if you never want to be bothered again. Also let me know if this HTML version is gibberish to you, and I’ll change your address to receive it in Plain Text. I’m so pleased (in a humble sort of way) to be able to tell you that…ta-da…MISS ALCOTT’S E-MAIL is Almost Here! Actual physical copies of the book will be available by mid June. Pre-ordering is already possible at www.amazon.com, directly from the publisher www.godine.com and shortly from www.louisamayalcott.org. MISS ALCOTT’S E-MAIL is chock-full of tales of Louisa’s brave, funny and inspiring life as well as my own ups and downs in the Weathermen (remember them?), my time as a pediatric nurse (Louisa was a nurse too, in the Civil War, did you know that?) and various other peregrinations. There are photographs, too, of Louisa and me (not together). My website details several bookstore and other group appearances that have been scheduled between mid June and mid July. I will be adding a few more on both coasts, as well as dates in September and into the fall. I can’t wait to share Louisa with all of you. I’d love to talk with your book groups, in your favorite bookstores or classes about Louisa, about writing or publishing, about life in the 1860s or the 1960s… Please let me know your suggestions for a venue or an event, by replying to kit@kitbakke.com. Thanks so much for reading this far, and I hope Louisa’s pixie dust will cheer you on as much as it has me. Yours for Reforms of All Kinds (as Louisa used to say in her Women's Suffrage letters), |
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Copyright Kit Bakke 2006-2010 |