An entertaining take on Little Women, modernised in this YA mystery.
Feature image credit: Penguin Books Australia
As a modern retelling of Little Women, Beth Is Dead had my curiosity piqued. The premise is that Beth is murdered in the first chapter, and the remaining three sisters spend the rest of the book hunting for her killer. From the blurb and the bright pink cover, I was a little afraid of what I was in for with this book, but I found myself pleasantly surprised. Though it takes the characters and main themes from the original books and gives them a modern twist, it is not overly reliant on the momentum of the original story, instead holding its own as a thrilling YA mystery.
Katie Bernet has put a lot of thought into the modernisation of the characters and situations, while still keeping them identifiable as the characters everyone knows. The book features Jo, Meg, Beth, and Amy, as well as their parents (Marmee is simply Mom in this version), Laurie and his grandfather, Meg’s friends Sallie Gardiner and Annie Moffatt, and even minor characters (some resembling their original counterparts in name only, such as the Hummel family — Henry Hummel is Beth’s boyfriend in this story). The only main character who seems to have been steered far from the original is the girls’ father. Rather than his rather noble wartime calling of the original story, Robert March is a disgraced novelist, fleeing from a barrage of hate from fans after he writes a novel, titled Little Women, which is largely autobiographical and contains sensitive information about his family. He goes into hiding, leaving the March women to deal with the fallout.
Each chapter was from a different sister’s perspective, labelled with the sister’s name and either ‘Then’ (being before Beth’s death) or ‘Now’ (after her death). While the gradual coming together of all the puzzle pieces is quite cleverly constructed, the challenge with multiple POVs is always the sense of voice. Amy’s voice is quite distinct, but the others were quite similar, and for Meg and Jo chapters in particular I found I kept forgetting whose POV I was reading if the context wasn’t obvious.
This story was a really fun read, not only as a Little Women fan finding all the references from the original book, but also as a fast-paced YA mystery. Although the whodunit was fairly easy to guess before the end, it was entertaining and easy to read. You could read Beth Is Dead without knowing anything about Little Women and enjoy it for the story it is, but it is definitely enhanced by knowing the original source material.
Reviewed by Kristin Stefanoff
The views expressed in this review belong to the author and not Glam Adelaide, its affiliates, or employees.
Distributed by: Penguin Books Australia
Released: January 2026
RRP: $24.99
