It would be hard to find an American girl who hasn’t read a book by Judy Blume. More than 75 million copies of her books have been sold, and her work has been translated into more than 20 languages. The enduring popularity of books like Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing, Blubber and Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret is due in part to her ability to deal with real issues and feelings in the lives of children and teens, including racial prejudice, menstruation, divorce and masturbation.

According to the American Library Association, five of Blume’s books are on the list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books. But that hasn’t stopped generations of kids from embracing them, something that’s immediately apparent in this new book of personal essays by 24 notable women writers, Everything I Needed to Know About Being a Girl I Learned from Judy Blume. Edited by Jennifer O’Connell, the book includes contributions from well-known authors for children, teens and adults, including Meg Cabot, Megan McCafferty, Cara Lockwood, Melissa Senate and Julie Kenner.

From recalling teen angst over breast size, to the realization that one’s parents like Karen’s in It’s Not the End of the World are headed for divorce, to taking comfort from a Blume character during a life-threatening illness, the writers in this volume share a myriad of funny, bittersweet and heartfelt Judy Blume moments. Teens and adult fans of Blume will love this tribute to this unique American author and might even be inspired to write their own memories of how Judy Blume’s magic helped them navigate the often rocky road to adulthood.

Many of the literary masterpieces of 19th-century American literature were written within a relatively short span of time by writers who lived in Concord, Massachusetts. This assemblage of intellectuals continues to American Bloomsbury, Susan Cheever’s spirited, perceptive and clear-eyed portrait of literary icons Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Henry David Thoreau, the author writes that she discovered "more and more coincidences of greatness being the result of proximity to greatness." Cheever, author of numerous works of fiction and nonfiction, has firsthand knowledge of life with a famous writer and is perhaps best known for her exquisite and acclaimed memoir, Home Before Dark, which tells of her life as the daughter of novelist and short story writer John Cheever.

American Bloomsbury covers the period from roughly 1840 to 1882, the year Emerson died. It was he who was most responsible for the gifted group of writers being in Concord; he encouraged and, more importantly, financed them. Although his lecture fees helped, it was Emerson’s inheritance from the death of his first wife—a settlement he had to contest in court—that made a significant difference. According to Cheever, "without this obscure lawsuit in 1836, it’s hard to know what would have happened in Concord, if anything."

Despite these writers’ progressive thinking on other issues, Cheever notes that "one of the beliefs of the age, one that had a deep impact on the Concord community, was that women were inferior to men, not just in physical strength, but in emotional strength and intelligence." The presence of the brilliant Margaret Fuller should have been enough to convince everyone of the absurdity of this kind of thinking. Fuller was, as Cheever tells us, "both erotically and imaginatively entangled" with Emerson and Hawthorne, although they were married to other women. She was committed to bringing about a revolution for women’s place in society and took jobs that heretofore only men had done. In the 12 years following Fuller’s death, Cheever writes, Hawthorne memorialized her in his fiction, which included "four of the greatest American novels ever written."

Other Concord women played more traditional roles. Emerson’s second wife, Lidian (she changed her name from Lydia at Emerson’s request), for example, found life with him to be extremely demanding; she felt Thoreau was "the one human being on earth who seemed to see her clearly." Louisa May Alcott, who spent much of her life taking care of her family, had doubts about writing Little Women, but "without intending to," according to Cheever, "invented a new way to write about the ordinary lives of women, and to tell stories that are usually heard in kitchens and bedrooms."

Cheever’s enthusiasm for her subjects comes through on every page of American Bloomsbury. She introduces us to these writers as human beings rather than literary monuments. After reading her book, many will be inspired to read or reread the works of this extraordinary group of writers.

Roger Bishop is a retired Nashville bookseller and a frequent contributor to BookPage.

Chris Baty is the founder of National Novel Writing Month (a.k.a. NaNoWriMo), a six-year-old literary contest that began on a whim in the Bay Area and now involves thousands of participants nationally every year. How does it work? Simple all one needs do is craft a 50,000-word novel in a month’s time. It sounds a little kooky, but in fact there’s probably a huge upside to this hardcore, guerrilla-style approach. After all, nothing succeeds like doing, and the fearless NaNoWriMo methodology incorporates an enforced boot-camp mindset that yields results, however imperfect. Baty’s No Plot? No Problem! A Low-Stress, High-Velocity Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days stylishly describes the NaNoWriMo regimen plenty of music and lots of coffee are included and dispenses handy advice on tapping into instant inspiration, hammering out plot and getting the job done. Or, as one NaNoWriMo winner says, “I don’t wait for my muse to wander by; I go out and drag her home by the hair.” They say there’s a novel in each of us; if so, this volume may be the key to unlocking that ominous door. Baty’s surface frivolity is underscored with serious intent, and his book’s handy sidebars provide good realistic advice for all writers.