Audiobook Review: Little Women

Little Women (Little Women, 1) by Loiusa May Alcott, read by Lorelei King, 2011. 8 CDS (8 hrs 7 min.). Published by AudioGo. Source: Audiobook Jukebox/publisher.

Louisa May Alcott paints a vivid portrait of New England at the time of the American Civil War in this touching classic. With their loving father away at the front, times are particularly difficult for the four March girls and their mother, left at home. Despite these hardships, the "little women"—Meg, Jo, Amy and Beth—never lose faith, remaining ever cheerful with a generosity of spirit to warm even the coldest of hearts.



Story
Ah, Louisa May Alcott's Little Women one book I had never really planned on reading, even though one of my sisters has been telling me to for ages. It was definitely not what I was expecting, but in a good way.

Little Women really did remind me of my sisters while listening to it. Hard to explain exactly how, but it did, which explains why I was able to finish listening to it in about two days. While it is the unabridged version of the book, it is just part one and so it did not end how I thought it would (one of them dies and one marries their neighbor).

Louisa May Alcott definitely knows how to weave a story about sisters living during the Civil War while still keeping the reader interested in what will happen next. I liked how each of the girls were so different from one another and that they all had their quirks that made them...them.
While I liked how different they were, what I really liked about them was how (with the exception of Beth in the beginning) they were all kind and generous with the little that they had. It was definitely nice to see some characters looking out for others.

What I did like about Little Women were the March girls themselves. I always enjoy seeing how authors play out the whole sibling dynamic-especially when it makes me think of my own sisters. I really enjoyed how different each of the girls were, even, if at times a couple of them did irritate me I thought they were generally well rounded characters.

The one thing I did not like about Little Women would have to be that Beth annoyed me to no end..well until she finally started to think of others before herself. Plus, every time Beth would speak all I could think about was that one vlog Meg Cabot did with the dolls (y'all should watch it because it is hilarious).

Narration

I am of two minds on the narration of Little Women, on one side I thought that Ms King did a fantastic job on voicing all of the March girls and bringing out their individual personalities and making it easy to tell them apart from each other. On the other side, I felt that some of the other points in the story lacked the energy to pull one completely into the characters lives.

So, even though I'm a little vague on my feelings about the narration of Little Women I still feel like it was on a whole good and this version is definitely worth listening to. The short tracks also make it a pretty quick listen because you'll just be one more till you realize that you're very nearly done with the whole thing.

Final Verdict: While not something I would normally pick up, Little Women was definitely an excellent read about sisters. And we all now how I like books about sisters.

Little Women earns 5 out of 5 pineapples.