The Spring Girls: A Modern-Day Retelling of Little Women

I think Anna Todd did a good job in modernizing tale of Little Women, while also relating to more modern issues too at the same time. Overall good read.

"The Spring Girls" has its moments, so I'll start with my positive opinions first as I did not feel like the book was a complete waste of time -- though it skewed a little younger and descriptive sexually than I tend to prefer to read. Had it not been called "a modern retelling of 'Little Women'," I probably wouldn't have read it nor been interested in reading it.Some of the updates from the 1860s to the 2000s are fun. (Cell phones, teen lifestyles, references to pop culture and brands, Dad is away in Afghanistan, Laurie has a man bun, Meg works at Sephora, etc.) Just given the huge difference between the times, I do think the March girls of the 2000s would be a little more street smart, more precocious (including possibly sexually precocious), more likely to be exposed to dark or adult experiences, and more jaded than their 1860s counterparts. I think it's fairly realistic that they spend a large amount of their time thinking and talking about boys and thinking and talking about sex (whether they have any experience or not). I also don't mind the profanity as I didn't find it to be egregious for teenagers, nor could I say with certainty that the March girls of the 2000s would never utter a curse word. Recall in Alcott's original, Jo was always saying things like "Christopher Columbus," which in the 1860s could have been considered a mild oath. I am reminded of something I once read about one of my all-time favorite series, HBO's "Deadwood" -- which was that in the 1870s, rough customers in a mining town might have gone around saying things like "Tarnation" -- so to get the point across that these people really are rough customers, the writers upped the severity of their curses to the script full of some of the world's worst words. The same could be said to apply here.With that being said, if you took away the names Meg, Jo, Beth, Amy, Laurie, and John Brooke, and this book was kept intact with all of the characters renamed, I'm not sure that it would occur to me that this was a retelling of "Little Women" -- it would just come across as a teenage drama, where "Little Women" is much more than that.Some of the characters are relatively true in spirit to the originals; others, not at all. First of all, the fact that the girls call their mother by her first name, Meredith, is a misunderstanding of Alcott's use of "Marmee," which is actually some sort of endearment form of "Mommy," not the mother's first name. (Her name was Abigail.) As other readers have noted, the fact that the girls here call their mother Meredith denotes disrespect, when the March girls never had anything but almost reverential respect for their mother. And in my opinion, this character is way off base. Here, we see Marmee/Meredith not only as a drunk, but as a rather slovenly woman who spends hours in the recliner and at times seems to not care if the girls just fend for themselves. While I am sure Marmee had a bad moment or two trying to raise four girls on slim financial resources, with her husband off in battle against the hideous backdrop of the Civil War, she would never, ever have shown this to her daughters.Off base too is Meg. While the original Meg *was* vain and at times materialistic, as well as very aware of her beauty, this Meg is completely self-obsessed and seems to believe her body is all she has to offer (and in terms of the lack of development of this character in other ways, I'd sadly agree). Despite telling us more than once that she is wise and learned from being burned by the former boyfriend who put her naked pics all over the internet, she isn't any wiser nor appears to have learned from that experience. And do we really need a *very graphic* sex scene between Meg and John Brooke? Gross! Not to mention that not only does Meg not seem to respect herself, but John doesn't seem to respect her a lot either. The original John Brooke worshiped Meg and would never have treated her as other than a lady, whereas this John Brooke's contact with Meg is limited to hotel room trysts, and she's so special to him that he's never told his mother about her. And why does this Meg even like this John Brooke? We certainly don't know. Finally, entirely too much airtime of the novel is spent on the Meg/Shia relationship. Why did Shia get engaged to Bell Gardiner? We certainly don't know. Not to mention that beyond the association with the King family, mentioned in the original, the Shia character and his relationship with Meg are nothing that has anything whatsoever to do with "Little Women."I found Jo, Beth, and Laurie to be relatively true to the original characters in spirit and attitudes, but to suggest that Jo and Laurie get together and are ever anything more than friends is to go against an absolute fundamental of the original. And Louisa May Alcott absolutely refused to have this happen or to even suggest that it would ever happen, even though she knew that's what her readers probably wanted.I more or less liked the handling of Amy, but when each chapter or series of chapters is a first-person narrative from one of the sisters, why is there never a narrative from Amy? This was a REAL missed opportunity in my opinion. Regardless of what a brat she is (let's be honest, she was a brat in the original too), the absence of her first-person voice in the chapters is a lost opportunity not just for humor, but also for getting inside the very scary world of just how quickly kids grow up these days.Another reason this can't be deemed a straight "retelling" is that the author very much cherry-picks among some of "Little Women's" most iconic moments, using some which are easily recognizable while jettisoning others. Notably missing are Meg's getting her head turned after being dolled up by the rich girls; Amy's destroying Jo's book and all that that unleashed; Beth's death; Jo cutting her hair; and poor Professor Bhaer is nowhere to be found, nor is any facsimile of him. I don't believe that the 2000s timeframe or the change of the location to New Orleans necessitated leaving out some of the book's best-known events. Instead, we have pages and pages devoted to the Shia thing, which was never a thing to begin with.If you are a true fan of "Little Women", don't *not* read this because it isn't a true retelling, as there are some things in this book that you may find creative or might appreciate. Just go into reading it with the right expectations (or lack of). And while "Little Women" was suitable for children at a certain reading level, understand that "The Spring Girls" is not.

This book is soooo good. Anna Todd is such a great writer. Buy this book you will not be disappointed...until the end when it ends and you wish there was just one more book...haha..

This was a fantastic read! The story telling was refreshing... def not the same story I’ve become accustomed to. The Spring Girls was symbolic of change and growth. We watched these young ladies blossom. The characters were diverse; there is a little something for everyone. So many love and life lessons were explored throughout these pages. It’s def a 5 Star read for me, because it was very unexpected. Anna Todd outdid herself with this one. I need a sequel. #gimmiemore

Product was as expected.

I liked the original premise of this modern take on Little Women, but after the first third or so of the book felt it strayed far from who those girls would be in modern times. I was disappointed but admittedly I had high expectations.

When an author updates a beloved classic, she can either choose to be tightly bound by the original, or she can use it as a loose sketch for a new work to emerge. In this case, Anna Todd tries to do both, and it doesn't quite work out. By keeping the character names largely the same and yet completely misinterpreting who they are (Meg and Meredith/Marmee most of all), the book falls pretty flat. The "little women" of this book are, despite their straitened circumstances, whiny, shallow and entitled. Their mother is an essentially weak person who cannot handle her own daughters. The love stories from the original have been nicely updated, but that's the only element of the book that holds any appeal. The book would have fared far better if it had been a story unto itself, rather than a weaker version of Alcott's best-known title.

All good

Anna Todd never disappoints!!The spring girls each with their own personalities, learn how life can change in a moment and each have to decide what their future holds and who it will be with.Great read and can’t wait to see more from Anna!

Grandaughter loved this book ,

This book gives a really good insight of what some army families and camps are actually like. Thoroughly enjoyed it

Man kann "The Spring Girls" als eigenständiges Buch lesen, ohne "Little Women" von Louisa May Alcott zu kennen und wird sicher Spaß an dem Buch haben. Wirklich interessant wird es aber, wenn man das Original kennt und vergleichen kann. Für mich war es der Reiz, die vier Schwestern in einem modernen Setting zu erleben, in der Hoffnung, möglichst die Original-Charaktere wiederzuerkennen, die mich zum Kauf bewogen haben.Todd kürzt Alcotts Original-Fassung inhaltlich deutlich ein, letztlich geht es in den Spring Girls um die vier Schwestern Meg, Jo, Beth und Amy, die - zwischen 12 und 19 Jahren alt - ihren Weg von kleinen Mädchen zu jungen Frauen finden müssen und dabei vornehmlich über die Liebe stolpern. Und es geht um ihre Beziehung zueinander. Viele der kleinen und größeren Geschichten, die den Mädchen in Little Women zustoßen, lässt Todd ganz weg oder deutet sie vage an. Was schade ist, weil es den Mädchen einige ihrer Facetten nimmt, aber, so erklärte die Autorin in einem Interview, das Buch wäre sonst wohl doppelt oder dreifach so lang geworden. Somit müssen die Leser sich mit einem Teenager-Liebesroman anfreunden, in dessen Fokus die vier Schwestern stehen.Wie gut Todd die Charakterisierung der einzelnen Schwestern gelungen ist, ist sicher diskutierbar, ich halte sie im Großen und Ganzen für gut gelungen. Megs Verhalten mag im ersten Moment irritieren, bedenkt man aber, dass auch in der Gesellschaft in den letzten 150 Jahren Veränderungen stattfanden, ist vieles davon gut nachvollziehbar. Und die Veränderungen regen an, darüber nachzudenken, wie die Mädchen im Original porträtiert wurden, welche Sozialisation sie erfahren haben und was tatsächlich den Kern ihres Charakters ausmacht.Ein bisschen schade fand ich Todds Entscheidung, im Gegensatz zu Alcott insbesondere gegen Ende des Buchs Handlungsstränge auf sehr erwartbare Art und Weise enden zu lassen. Sonst war ich aber recht zufrieden und würde mich freuen, wenn Todd ihre Andeutung aus einem ihrer Interviews wahr macht und es noch Folgebände geben wird.

Felt story was dry and boring. I’ll stick with the original “Little Women.”