Follows the activities of seven children in nineteenth-century NewEngland as they prepare for the Thanksgiving holiday while Mother is away caring for Grandmother.

"In this richly annotated, illustrated edition, Daniel Shealy illuminates the novel's deep engagement with issues such as social equality, reform movements, the Civil War, friendship, love, loss, and of course the passage into adulthood. The editor provides running commentary on biographic contexts, social and historical contexts, literary allusions, and words likely to cause difficulty to modern readers. With Shealy as a guide, we appreciate anew...