Publication Date: November 29, 2022
Rating:
Goodreads Synopsis:
Sharp and subversive, this delightfully messy YA rom-com offers a sly wink to the classic Little Women, as teenage Jo Porter rebels against living in the shadow of her literary namesake.Lit's about to hit the fan. Jo Porter has had enough Little Women to last a lifetime. As if being named after the sappiest family in literature wasn't sufficiently humiliating, Jo's mom, ahem Marmee, leveled up her Alcott obsession by turning their rambling old house into a sad-sack tourist attraction.Now Jo, along with her siblings, Meg and Bethamy (yes, that's two March sisters in one), spends all summer acting out sentimental moments at Little Women Live!, where she can feel her soul slowly dying.So when a famed photojournalist arrives to document the show, Jo seizes on the glimpse of another life: artsy, worldly, and fast-paced. It doesn't hurt that the reporter's teenage son is also eager to get up close and personal with Jo--to the annoyance of her best friend, aka the boy next door (who is definitely not called Laurie). All Jo wants is for someone to see the person behind the prickliness and pinafores.But when she gets a little too real about her frustration with the family biz, Jo will have to make peace with kitsch and kin before their livelihood suffers a fate worse than Beth.
Review:
I think I need to disclaimer this review by noting that I have not read (or watched) any version of Little Women. I know the story but just have never found myself with the need to pick it up, nor an assignment that called for it. That being said, you don't really need it in order to read and understand this book because the family helps you throughout, referencing scenes etc.
This was a weird read for me, I was torn between enjoying it, cringing a lot, and really just trying to push through to get it over with. The book is about a family that reenacts Little Women at their home. Three daughters and their mother put on the show with others from the community filling in for the other roles as needed, but it is very much a family business. However, not all the girls like their family obligation.
We follow Jo specifically throughout her want to leave this lifestyle behind but feeling the guilt of obligation. Jo is a runner for school and wants to focus on that aspect of her life, while her mother still wants her to focus on the show. Additionally, the business now has a reporter coming to do a story on them, so Jo needs to be there for her family.
The drama of this story is multifaceted. There is some romance around Jo, there is the family drama both of Jo not wanting to act but also sibling issues with all the girls, and then there is the conflict of the reporter being around and what she is actually reporting on.
I really liked this idea - a family reenacting a classic book, but I didn't really like the characters or how they handled themselves. I think that the mother was too self-centered and didn't realize that her family was imploding around her. The girls were all their own sorts of dramatic, Jo always complaining, Meg being the deviant or not there, and Amy being over the top into it all. While we followed Jo, she was annoying most of the time, complaining about her role in this whole thing and how horrible her family is, but she was just being horrible to them too. I liked her sarcasm, but it was thick and oftentimes too much. The romance elements were a little predictable, but they were ok. I found Hudson to be cringey from the beginning and was sad when she was interested in him.
The best parts of this book were the life-lessons but it too so much slogging to get to them and the pace was very slow through the middle then ran for the end. Overall, if you like family drama, this is a good book, but be prepared for some weirdness and some romance as well.
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