Beth is Dead is the Young Adult debut novel from author Kate Bernet. It was published in January 2026.
Our Sleuth(s): This modern take on Little Women gives us the March sisters Meg, Jo and Amy as amateur sleuths trying to uncover the killer of beloved sister Beth. Here, oldest sister Meg is a student at Harvard, Jo is a social media influencer and aspiring author, and Amy, the youngest at 15, is a hard-partying high school student.
The Setting: Like the original, Beth is Dead is set in Concord, Massachusetts, about 20 miles northwest of Boston. Timing is present-day.
The Premise: The novel opens the morning of New Year’s Day, with Jo discovering sisters Beth and Amy are not in their bunk beds. This isn’t unusual for Amy but it is for Beth and Jo begins to worry, wanting both girls home before their mother gets off her night shift at the nearby hospital. Jo grows frantic when Amy returns alone and the two set out in search of Beth. They find her body in a nearby park, blood pooling in the snow around her.
My Take: I was enthralled by this propulsively written story from chapter one, as the author unwraps layer after layer in a nuanced mystery centered around familial love and obligation in 2026 America. Knowledge of the original Little Women isn’t necessary, but understanding the contrast between that novel published in 1868 and this current telling deepened my enjoyment. Beth is Dead is thoroughly modern, and the sisters wrestle with modern dilemmas such as social media and stalking as they close in on the identity of their sister’s murderer.
As a writer, I’m studying how the author was able to combine alternating points of views from all the March sisters, from before and after Beth’s death, without confusing the reader. In addition, as the action quickly unfolds after Beth’s body is discovered, we learn how the girls’ father had published a novel titled Little Women that led to a familial split and made his daughters the target of public adoration and condemnation. It’s a lot to unpack and yet this debut author accomplishes it with apparent ease.
Opening Lines:
Jo (Now)
On the first morning of a new year, Beth is not in her bed.
From the hallway, I peer into her room, and my heart moves to my throat. Sunlight falls on her pillow, dust suspended in the air. Beth should be here, tucked under her quilt, chest rising and falling, but there’s only a dent in her mattress.
I stand on tiptoe and sigh a little breath of relief. Amy’s not here either, the top bunk unmade, blankets in a heap. She’s younger than Beth by about two years and ten thousand brain cells, but I feel better knowing they’re together. This isn’t the first time Amy’s spent the entire night at Sallie Gardiner’s annual New Year’s Eve party.
Note: I treasure the city of Concord and its literary history, with Louisa May Alcott being just one of its famous authors. And while I enjoyed Little Women in its book and movie forms, I’m more fascinated by Alcott as a woman, activist and even soldier. In Little Women, it’s the father who joins the Northern forces in the Civil War – in reality, it was Louisa herself, serving as a nurse in a Union hospital. Her work as an author kept her large family financially afloat, and she was a committed abolitionist and feminist, becoming the first woman registered to vote in Concord.
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