Meg and Jo

I love Little Women and I doubly-loved this NYC/North Carolina reinvention in Meg and Jo. This story focuses on the older March girls, with Beth and Amy appearing like guest stars. Jo is a food blogger and prep cook in New York, while Meg is a stay-at-home mom to adorable twins in North Carolina. Amy’s doing a fashion internship in Paris, and Beth is a country singer in Branson, MO??? (What now? The rest of these are so on-target that I’m trying to reserve judgement on this one until I read Beth And Amy).

This review is going to have spoilers, because it’s almost impossible to discuss this book without mentioning ways in which it followed and deviated from the original. Anyway, Little Women came out in 1868, which makes it a 151-year-old spoiler.

I just loved the sisters’ relationship here, and I absolutely believed that not just that they were really sisters, but the girls took wildly different paths and still called each other every day. I thought Jo’s blog was a perfect updating. In Alcott’s life, magazine serials were considered pop culture, and sometimes minimalized as lowbrow and easy. just like blogs today. I loved Jo and Eric’s relationship, too.

My only concern was a moment where Jo and Eric decide that it doesn’t matter whether they live in NYC or North Carolina, as long as they’re together. Nope.  Speaking as someone who moved from Brooklyn to Chapel Hill when my Southern boyfriend proposed, OMG, IT MATTERS A LOT. Jo, you deserve better than extra-slow conversations about traffic and college basketball, don’t move to North Carolina!

Meg and John’s story was believable and engaging, but a bit Romance 101. The basic premise is that Meg is running herself ragged being a supermom when her problems could be solved if only she could learn to ask for help from John, as if assigning the husband chores isn’t just more mental load for the wife. I realize that grown men sometimes need to be told to take out the trash and buy milk and whatever, but it doesn’t make for an appealing romantic hero. I always thought the modest, hardworking John Brooke was more appealing than selfish Laurie, so I really wanted him to be a great husband too.

Finally, I was just as sad as the March sisters when Marmee and Father’s marital problems are revealed! The modern Mr. March is consistently and realistically inconsiderate towards his wife, leaving her with all the responsibility while he does Important Work, just like in the original story, but modern Mrs. March isn’t having it. Plus, Bronson Alcott was off doing charitable works while his family struggled, making this a sick 151-year-old burn.

I loved this retelling, and I’m already looking forward to seeing the rest of the story in Beth and Amy.