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1-Page Summary of Little Women
The book starts with the four March sisters—Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy—sitting in their living room. They’re feeling sad because they are poor. The girls decide to buy something nice for themselves as a Christmas present but later change their minds and decide that instead of buying presents for themselves, they will buy presents for their mother. Their father has written a letter from the war (the Civil War) which inspires them to not complain about being poor anymore.
The March sisters are excited about Christmas, as they receive books from their father. Later that day, the girls give away their breakfast to a poor family and are rewarded by Laurie, an elderly neighbor of theirs. Meg and Jo meet Sally Gardiner at her house for New Year’s Eve party. While there, Meg sprains her ankle while dancing with Laurie. The Marches enjoy celebrating holidays but miss the excitement when it ends.
Jo visits Laurie when he is sick and meets his grandfather. She insults the painting of Mr. Laurence in front of him, but luckily he admires her spunk anyway and they become friends. Soon, Mr. Laurence meets all the sisters except for Amy, who’s gone to Europe with Laurie’s dad on business; Beth becomes his favorite because she reminds him so much of his deceased granddaughter who loved music like Beth does. He gives her a piano that belonged to his granddaughter before she died at age 19 from polio (it was common back then).
The girls have various adventures. Amy is caught trading limes at school, and the teacher hits her as punishment. As a result, Mrs. March withdraws her daughter from school. Jo refuses to let Amy go with her to the theater. In retaliation, Amy burns Jo’s manuscript, and Jo nearly lets Amy drown while ice-skating in retaliation for burning the manuscript. Pretty Meg attends Annie Moffat’s party where she learns that people think she intends to marry Laurie for his money after seeing how expensively dressed up she was at the party by other girls there who were trying to make themselves look good too but not doing so well without help from others like Pretty Meg did when they tried it on their own first before asking her if they should try it too or just leave them alone because of all those mean things they said about her behind her back when no one else was around except them talking bad about Pretty Meg behind closed doors which only makes me wonder why are people so mean?
In the year 1827, the March family forms a club and starts writing a newspaper. In one of their meetings, they decide to get in touch with Laurie by having him attend one of their meetings. He is then invited to join them as an official member of the Pickwick Club. At this point in time, Marmee decides that it’s time for her girls to be independent women so she allows them to take control over some aspects of their lives while she takes some days off work herself. The following week goes well until Jo accidentally ruins dinner which results in everyone laughing about it instead of getting upset about it like before because they now know that everything will turn out fine no matter what happens. One day, Laurie invites his English friends over and the family decides on going on a picnic with them but not before Jo publishes her first story ever which makes Marmee proud.
One day, the family receives a telegram saying that Mr. March is sick in Washington D.C., so Marmee goes to see him. Jo sells her hair to finance the trip and chaos ensues as everyone neglects their chores again. Beth visits the Hummels, but contracts scarlet fever from them and nearly dies. When Marmee returns home, she saves Beth’s life just in time before everything gets back on track with Amy spending time at Aunt March’s house while avoiding getting infected with scarlet fever like Beth did earlier on in Part One of the book when she was almost killed by it as well.
