Sisterhood Everlasting and Series Thoughts

Reading Sisterhood Everlasting, the "fifth" book in the series that begun with The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, was a bit of a surreal, strange experience for me. Like many YA readers in their 20s, I read the Traveling Pants series as a teenager and was deeply, deeply invested in the lives of Lena, Tibby, Carmen, and Bridget. They were and are such well-written characters, so complex and intricately developed, that it was almost impossible to not be swept away in their lives and struggles.

I loved that series. Loved it. There was no way for me to not read the fifth book, the grown-up book, the one that can exist as a stand-alone if you haven't read the other four. But reading it there was something wrong. These girls had gone through so much, and now they were going through even more. And it was, to a certain extent, more of the same. The issues and struggles the girls went through were similar to, if not the same as, ones they'd battled in the series.

It made me think that as much as I love these characters and as interested as I was to know where they ended up, maybe it's okay to leave them in the past. Because another book means more troubles, more drama, and to a certain extent it has to be contrived, doesn't it? In order to keep the same style/voice/mood/whatever of the series? With this series, I felt like it sort of did.

And I thought of what Gayle Forman has said in response to reader requests for a third Mia and Adam book. It's brilliant and right on the nose. I really encourage you to read this post, by Gayle Forman (especially the fifth, sixth, and seventh questions) because it says so much about stories and series that's really smart. She's talking specifically about If I Stay and Where She Went, but I think it applies so well to many contemporary series and stories.

Review: Sisterhood Everlasting

SISTERHOOD EVERLASTING
Ann Brashares
Random House

Picking up ten years after the end of the fourth book, Forever in Blue, this all-grown-up extension of the series introduces us to the 29-year-old versions of the Septembers. Carmen is living in New York and has scored a recurring role on a crime show; she's engaged to and living with a man whom everyone else finds insufferable. Lena lives alone and teaches art classes; she has almost no friends and is essentially a recluse. Bridget lives with Eric in San Francisco and works various odd jobs; any hint of commitment or stability sends her running away from her life. Tibby and Brian have lived in Australia for two years and she hasn't had a lot of contact with the other three until she sends them plane tickets for a Sisterhood reunion in Santorini, Greece. What the girls discover there and the ways it changes their lives, shakes them out of their routines, changes the Sisterhood in extreme ways.

It's hard to review this one without a few major spoilers, but I intend to do just that because it really is best to go into this book a bit blindly (unlike the way I did it). Sisterhood Everlasting is an emotional book not only because of the characters and events contained within it, but also because, as the jacket flap of the book says, the friendship between these girls "became a touchstone for a generation." That's true, and because of that an unbiased, impersonal review is nearly impossible. I started reading the first of this series in junior high and the intense friendship the girls shared was hard not to get caught up in. Brashares has a way of writing her characters as real, complete people with strengths and weaknesses and mistakes all their own. I always connected most closely to Tibby and Lena and the relationship of the four girls was immensely personal to me. As with all fiction that I read, I related and connected the Sisterhood to my real life and the people I most cared about.

When I found out that Ann Brashares had written a fifth sisterhood book, one meant for the adult instead of YA market/demographic, I couldn't leave it unread. I liked how Forever in Blue ended, but there was no way I could let the continued lives of these girls go on without me. And, I think, this is probably how a lot of readers feel about it.

My thoughts on the book itself are conflicted. I love these characters and I will never not love them, but between the YA series and this new book (which works as a stand-alone though it definitely loses much of its context) something went wrong. Their lives did not end up, at 29, at all the way I would have expected and sadly it felt contrived. None of the girls are married, none of them have children, and the issues they're dealing with at 29 seemed the same as the issues they'd dealt with as teenagers. It was as if much of the progress they'd made individually (and together) since The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants was lost or simply erased in order to make way for this new book, and that rubbed me the wrong way. Though it makes some sense for them to be struggling because Sisterhood Everlasting really is about the girls entering adulthood, it was still a bit much. The issues you have at 29, even if you're still growing up, are not the same ones that you would have had at 16 and this book forgot that.

I wanted, and expected, grown-up versions of Carmen, Tibby, Lena, and Bee. I wanted to know about the lives they'd forged for themselves -- successes and failures and careers and families. What was Bee doing and did she have children? How had Lena found happiness for herself and was she any closer to her sister? Were Tibby and Brian still together? Did Carmen have a daughter, a husband, a family? But no, these girls are stuck somewhere between the past and the present and the future, unmoored and floating. Bridget is, at one point in the story, homeless. She still runs away from what she needs. Lena is reclusive, living alone and guarding herself from happiness for fear of getting hurt. Tibby hasn't spoken to her best friends in years. Only Carmen, whose fiance I didn't hate nearly as much as the girls did, has some of her life together. But even she has distanced herself from her family, her friends, and who she truly is. There were so many moments in this book when I wanted to yell at the self-sabotaging characters, to snap them to reality. To have the lives they deserved and should have had instead of the lives they ended up with.

That said, there were elements of this book that absolutely, positively were amazing. The immense love between the Sisterhood is not always at the forefront, but when it is the emotions, characters, and relationships are arresting. They're beautiful. Ann Brashares' writing is straight-forward and without frills but somehow this makes certain moments and certain emotions hit even harder. This is a tear-jerker of a novel. Even if some (much?) of it feels contrived and the characters don't feel as authentic as I'd like, there are more than a few moments of startling honesty and raw, honest emotion and actions that help to make up for the book's flaws. Additionally, while I've always always haaated the Lena and Kostos relationship, this book goes a long way towards redeeming it in my eyes. Explaining just why would spoil parts of this book, so suffice it to say that I have always, always wanted Lena to be happy.

So did I like this book? Yes. Yes, but I had, as you can tell, some pretty big issues with it. It broke my heart and there's definitely a large part of me that thinks it was an unnecessary addition to the Traveling Pants story and series; I would have preferred to imagine their adult lives the way I think they would have gone. But, since the book was written and published, there was no way I could pass it up. I don't really want to recommend it or not recommend it because for previous readers of the original series the characters and their stories are so personal that reading or not reading Sisterhood Everlasting is really a decision you have to make for yourself.

Waiting on Wednesday - Sisterhood Everlasting

I hardly ever do a Waiting on Wednesday, but I can't not talk about this one. I absolutely loved the first four in the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series and am insanely excited and nervous about this fifth installment that picks up ten years later. As much as I love these girls, it's going to be hard to deal with them not ending up where I wanted them to. I have high hopes for this novel but a huge fear that it won't live up to those hopes. In either -- any -- case, I can't wait to read it when it comes out in June.

Part Three: Girls in Pants (The Third Summer of the Traveling Pants)

As always, spoilers for the first three books.

• Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - Part One
• Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - Part Two
• Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - Part Three
• The Second Summer of the Sisterhood - Part One
• The Second Summer of the Sisterhood - Part Two
• The Second Summer of the Sisterhood - Part Three
• Girls in Pants: The Third Summer of the Sisterhood - Part One
• Girls in Pants: The Third Summer of the Sisterhood - Part Two

Book: Girls in Pants (The Third Summer of the Sisterhood)

Pages: 234-338

Topics: Decision of Favorite, Family Portraits, Looks, At the Center, MOAR QUOTES

Decision of Favorite:

I guess I'm just going to talk. This time around, finally reading the last third of the book, I remembered why I considered it my favorite for so long. The ending is brilliant. Not just brilliant, but also something that I find myself relating to. The entire book (the entire series) ambles along at a leisurely pace, but it's in the last hundred pages here that we get all those big revelations that the sisterhood is all about. All those passages that make me love the book so much. Right now, I don't think I have a favorite. There are parts of each book that I absolutely love, and it's too difficult to choose.

Family Portraits:

As a child, you were taught to see the world in geometric shapes and primary colors... Then you had to spend the rest of your life unlearning them. That was life, as near as Lena could tell. Making everything simple for the first ten years, which in turn made everything way more complicated for the subsequent seventy. (pg. 252)

While the scenes with Lena doing the portraits of her family can be tedious at times, I love all the realizations she comes to, all the ways she comes to view the members of her family and the ways she knows she's misjudged them in the past. The scenes with Valia and her father are the most tremendous to me, and Brashares always has such a simple way of stating the epiphanies and realizations of her characters.

Looks:

Lena had a funny relationship with her face. She wanted it to be beautiful, and she didn't. She looked at it with the desire to find some overriding flaw that would kick her from one category (beautiful) into another (not). And she also looked at it with the fear that she'd succeed. Either way, she didn't usually find it. (pg. 291)

I love how these books tackle the whole concept of self-image as it pertains to looks. I love that instead of focusing on Tibby's or Carmen's insecurities, the focus is always on the complicated relationship Lena has with her own beautiful looks. It's such an interesting and unique perspective that it constantly surprises me.

At the Center:

They were growing up. It was inevitable.

But please, God, [Tibby] couldn't do it if it was a trade-in. She couldn't strike the bargain if growing up meant drowning out the friendship that stood at the very center of her life, the thing that gave her strength and balance. (pg. 331)

It's pretty much impossible to explain how much or why I love this quote, so I won't even try. But I do love it.

MOAR QUOTES!!

"Whatever happens," Bridget said, "we will find each other. We always will." (pg. 332)

How perfect.

How could she explain? Eric wasn't her boyfriend. He wasn't her anything. Why did she feel like she needed him so desperately? (pg. 289)

Bee + Eric > Lena + Kostos. That is all.

[Carmen's] mother once told her that when you feel someone else's pain and joy as powerfully as if it were your own, the you knew you really loved them. (pg. 267)

I've talked about the relationship between Carmen and her mother before, but I feel like it bears repeating. I think Carmen and her mother have the closest ties and the deepest relationship of any of the relationships outside of the Septembers and I love that the books don't ever shy away from the exploration of this relationship in favor of other things.

Top 10: Series

I promised more top 10 lists, didn't I? Well, starting from the top I'm going to be tackling the topics over at Random Ramblings Top Ten Picks meme. (When I come up with more of my own topics, I'll post those, too. I'm such a sucker for top 10 lists.)

1. Baby-Sitters Club, by Ann M. Martin. It's not the most consistent, not the best writing, not the best anything, but it is one of my great literary loves. It was the first series I was hooked on that wasn't somehow, in some way, related to school. These were my trashy novels (ha!), the books my mother disapproved of, the characters I couldn't quite believe and still loved. The BSC was my obsession and, like so many of my obsessions, I haven't quite gotten over it yet.
2. Luxe, by Anna Godberson. Despite the fact that the last book in the series, SPLENDOR, was the single most disappointing book of my young life, I love this series. It's incredible. Though it's been compared numerous times to Gossip Girl, there's a certain flair here, a spark that only comes with really, really great books. There are lines in these novels that struck such a chord with me when I read them and continue to hit close to home long after. The characters here, their lives and choices and how the story unfolds is just amazing.
3. Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, by Ann Brashares. Come on. It's sort of iconic, right?
4. Series of Unfortunate Events, by Lemony Snicket. One of the most inventive, imaginative series out there. This is the type of series that the first time you discover it, the first time you read the books, is pure magic and though it never seems quite the same in subsequent readings, that magic, wonderful feeling stays. The feeling of discovering something amazing, something completely different.
5. Hunger Games trilogy, by Suzanne Collins. MOCKINGJAY might just be the best YA novel I've ever read and on the whole I loved the entire journey from heart-aching beginning to the painful end. Collins is a master of world-building and setting, and as a result this is one of the best series out there.
6. Suite Scarlett, by Maureen Johnson. Though this series isn't over yet, the books are definitely some of the most hilarious and crazyawesome that I've come across. It helps, of course, to have Spencer Martin (love!) as a main character, but it helps even more that Johnson's trademark internet-humor is here and even if the rest of the series was crap (it isn't) that alone would probably carry it.
7. Peaches, by Jodi Lynn Anderson. Less well-known than the traveling pants series, this is another story of friendship, love, and heartbreak. And though it's lower on the list, in a lot of ways I prefer it. The characters have less epic storylines, but the setting is so incredible, the character's growth is so real, and it's such a gem of a series that it's a bit sad it never got the large readership it deserved.
8. The Naughty List, by Suzanne Young. Another series that isn't finished yet, this is a funny, cute, cute series. Spies, cheerleaders, and skeezy boyfriends make for a winning series here. Seriously, reading these books is like eating a piece of pie. MADE OF RAINBOWS AND SUNSHINE.
9. Uglies trilogy, by Scott Westerfeld. One of the first dystopian series I read, it's an incredible and futuristic read. The characters are sharp, the world-building is sharper, and nothing here feels lacking.
10. Twilight, by Stephanie Meyer. Yes, seriously. Because as much as the last book sucked and as much as I hated Edward and thought his relationship with Bella was completely abusive, I loved the emotions of this book. And, yes, I loved Bella.

Part Two: Girls in Pants (The Third Summer of the Sisterhood)

Back when Ten Cent Notes was a Wordpress blog, I started a series of posts on The Sisterhood of Traveling Pants series. It's taking me absolutely forever to reread these books and write the posts, but I am doing it. As this is a discussion type of post, it should go without saying that there are SPOILERS for the first three books in the series.

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - Part One

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - Part Two

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - Part Three

The Second Summer of the Sisterhood - Part One

The Second Summer of the Sisterhood - Part Two

The Second Summer of the Sisterhood - Part Three

Girls in Pants: The Third Summer of the Sisterhood - Part One

Book: Girls in Pants (The Third Summer of the Sisterhood)

Pages: 123-233

Topics: Favorite?, Good Carmen, Lena and Paul, Tibby Hides, Sick Bee, Quotes

Favorite?:

Like I said before, in my mind I always remembered this book as being my favorite in the series. In rereading it though, I'm not quite sure that holds up. The book is good, no doubt, but all books in this series are good. What I'm remembering more than anything, I think, is how much I loved the rediscovery of Bee and Eric's relationship. Aside from that, I'm not entirely connected to the stories in this book. Carmen's always been the character I'm least connected too, and it's even less in this book. Though I love Lena, her story didn't quite capture me in this book like it does in the others, and I adore Tibby, but her story here takes a long time to really get going for me. So, is this book my favorite? Probably not.

Good Carmen:

I find it so great that Carmen has this idea of herself as being a horrible person and thinks that all the times Win (the guy she likes who works at the hospital) sees her doing good deeds are just aberrations. Like, those times don't matter. It's a little hilarious to me because of all the girls, Carmen is the one who always has the most struggle with good and bad. She has a temper, she acts out, she says things and does things that hurt others and that she doesn't mean, but she's always trying, trying, trying to be good and yet she never sees this. She refuses to give herself a break.

Lena and Paul:

It's no secret that I wasn't a fan of the Lena/Kostos relationship; I never liked them together, never thought he was good for her, and was disappointed at the way their story ended up in the last book. (For more of my thoughts on Lena and Kostos, you can visit this post.) Anyhow, I always sort of wanted Lena and Paul to end up together. I realize that much sadness might just be a recipe for disaster, but throughout the books it did seem like Paul understood Lena better than anyone else, at least anyone who wasn't Bapi. There was a certain amount of hope for them in the second book, but it pretty much gets destroyed here, or at least pushed aside in a way that makes me feel like the books missed out on what could have been a really great storyline.

Tibby Hides:

I adore Tibby. She reminds me of myself. And though her story does take quite a while to get going in this book and the reader is never quite sure why she feels the way she does, or does the things she does, it starts to come together here. I have no words to explain Tibby except to say that a lot of her struggles are my own struggles and on a very basic level I connect with her. There's a scene in this book with her climbing out onto the apple tree outside of her window, and it's like a culmination of everything she's been struggling with and feeling since her younger sister, Katherine, fell out of that same window. And I can't explain it, but it just reminds me that there are so many different layers to these characters and the story as a whole - a million different ways for readers to connect to the books.

Sick Bee:

Eric taking care of Bee when she gets sick is one of those rare events in these books without which I feel like the book couldn't have gone the way it did. Bee's story has always been my favorite of all four girls, and the fact that her relationship with Eric comes back to the forefront in this book is - I think - one of the best things about her story. Unlike the other girls, Bee's story has always been a combination of the present with the past, and whereas in other books the past is her mother's past, here she's finally dealing with her own issues, the things in her past that have everything to do with her, and I really think that over all, Bee's transformation and change throughout the books is the best of any of the girls.

Quotes:

The truth was, she had never felt so overwhelmingly drawn to anyone. In the two years since they'd seen each other, she had questioned this particular magnetism Eric had for her. Was it real? Or was she so caught up in a mania of her own making that summer in Baja that she had imagined it?

Seeing him again this summer answered her question. It was real. She responded to him the same way, even though she was different. (page 131)

Listening to her friends' voices felt like hearing a familiar symphony, with one instrument coming in and layering atop another. The way the cadences linked and harmonized made her feel safe. (page 135)

How sad it was, Carmen thought, that you acted awful when you were desperately sad and hurt and wanted to be loved. How tragic then, the way everyone avoided you and tiptoed around you when you really needed them. (page 216)

Questions:

1. Which character do you feel most connected to? For me it's always been a split between Tibby and Lena.

2. Do you have a favorite book throughout the series? I used to think this was my favorite but now I don't know.

3. Favorite quote?

Tween Tuesday: 3 Willows

3 WILLOWS

Ann Brashares

A traveling-pants-esque novel for younger girls, 3 WILLOWS has a promising premise. Three girls (Jo, Polly, and Ama) became best friends on a fateful day in third grade when their parents forgot to pick them up from school. For years the girls were incredibly close, but by the end of eighth grade (when the book picks up), the three have drifted apart. Jo's en route to being high school royalty, Ama's well on her way to following in the footsteps of her Princeton-bound older sister, meanwhile Polly seems to be the only one holding on to the friendship both other girls have given up on. Unlike the girls with the magic pants, these three have already drifted apart and this book is much more about them each coming to their own realization over the summer before high school -- who they are, who their friends are, and what's truly important to them.

I had hopes for this book, I admit, because Ann Brashares original series is so good, so inspired. This offshoot, however, seems to lack that spark of magic inherent in the traveling pants series. The characters here, despite their very different stories, roles, and personalities, don't seem all that defined. Jo has the most depth, with the backstory of her dead brother and parents going through a separation, but even with this the three girls' voices mostly tend to blend into one. And though there are a few stand-out relationships (Jo's summer romance has a certain amount of spark, as does Polly's relationship with her mother towards the end of the book), for the most part nothing here really jumps out.

This book does bring back some of our old favorites from the Traveling Pants series (most notably Effie, in a less-than-stellar role for a character I utterly love) and pays homage to the sisterhood in a few ways I wasn't expecting, but it always feels a bit tacked-on. Like a spin-off television show that failed to deliver on its promises.

This dull, overall feeling of meh carries over into the rest of the novel. The book definitely isn't what I'd call "bad" in any way, but it's also not so good. It just sort of is. An enjoyable enough read, especially since it goes quickly, but not a title to put at the top of your list. Young girls (and the rest of us) would be much better of reading (or rereading) the Traveling Pants series.