A review by carlyoc
So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix by Bethany C. Morrow

adventurous emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

I like this retelling better than the original, which I only read for the first time a couple years ago. This remix contains the same heart-warming mother-daughter and sister-sister relationship depictions, but with added thought-provoking description of the transition from enslavement to precarious and unfinished freedom as experienced by a Black family living on the Freedman's Colony of Roanoke island, North Carolina. The existence of such communities built near union army camps by the recently freed was left out of my education, and I am grateful to this book for prompting me to look up more about them. 
I also think that this version does better justice to many of the sisters, especially Jo and Beth. The way Jo is depicted here, I read her as asexual and aromantic and I love to see ace-spec representation and the acceptance, self-assuredness, and happiness she finds. Beth is portrayed as living with a chronic illness (my interpretation was perhaps sickle cell anemia), but her story is not cut short as in the original. Instead, she finds her own voice and passion and pursues her dreams just like her sisters. 
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