Book Review: "Beth Is Dead" by Katie Bernet

I’ve been thirsting for a good retelling for a while now, and this book was excellent!! Thanks so much to Sarah Barley Books, Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, and NetGalley for the complimentary advance copy!

⁣ The four March sisters—Meg, Jo, Amy, and Beth—are household names because their father wrote a book called Little Women. While the book is fiction, much of the plot hews close to reality, so the girls—and the public—accuse their father of exploitation.

On New Year’s Day, Beth is missing. She went to a party with Amy the night before, where they had a brutal argument. When Beth is found murdered, her sisters are determined to find her killer. And each feel like they could have been a contributing factor in her death.

While the remaining sisters console each other, they also go through periods of time where they consider each other as guilty. Yet there are a number of other suspects, too. Could it have been someone looking to punish their father, or perhaps one of the men in the sisters’ lives?

The book is narrated by all four sisters, shifting between past and present. (Beth tells her story from the past.) It’s really a twisty story; while I ultimately guessed whom the killer was, it took me a while to settle on a suspect.

I love the way Katie Bernet gave Little Women a modern twist while still retaining the traits of Louisa May Alcott’s original characters. I thought this really was a brilliant retelling—and you don’t honestly need to have read the original to appreciate this.

The book will publish 1/6/2026.