(Wow, Amazon actually had a composite for that. Thanks, Google Image Search!)
I'm sure everyone and their brother has read this series/knows what it's about by now, so I'm going to try to do a very TL;DR summary of the books. Ready? Okay!
Carmen, Lena, Tibby, and Bridget are lifelong best friends about to spend their first summer apart. As they're packing, they unearth a pair of jeans Carmen got secondhand a few months back, and each of them end up trying the pants on. Somehow, mysteriously, the pants fit all of them, though they have different heights and builds. They decide to mail the Pants (now worthy of a capital P) to each other throughout the summer in order to feel more connected and allow the Pants to experience all their adventures, even if they can't all be together to do it themselves.
The basic summary of the girls' exploits in book one: Lena meets a boy, but pushes him too far away. Bridget meets a boy and lets him in too much. Tibby meets a girl who teaches her more about life than she'd thought was possible, and Carmen meets her father's new family, to her surprise and dismay. Each girl learns a little more about herself and those around her thanks to the exploits they have in the Pants.
The next three books continue on in similar veins. Lena has to learn how to live her life without centering it around the whims of a man who can't always be around her. Bridget loses herself for a bit, but eventually learns to balance taking care of herself and letting others take care of her without depending on them too much. Tibby continually learns that she has to face her demons head-on if she wants them to really go away, and Carmen eventually realizes that change is a good thing, especially for her family. She also comes to terms with a toxic friendship.
The last book ends with the sisters back together for the first time in months after a minor tragedy happens. It rocks their world for a while, but they soon realize that it was exactly what they needed.
We don't talk about book five.
It had been years since I'd reread this series, and I'd kind of forgotten how good they are. I love the little quotes Brashares intersperses between the chapters, and it's fun seeing how the messages of those quotes play out in the actual story. While the references are a bit dated (CosmoGirl? I'd almost forgotten that even existed), the basic lessons and contents of the story feel timeless.
My only beef is that sometimes it feels like the girls never really grow from their experiences. Tibby and Carmen are my two prime examples: Tibby has to re-learn that sealing herself off from her emotions every novel isn't healthy, while Carmen always gets angry or bitter about any new people entering her family, at least in the first three novels. I've got next to no experience with psychology, so maybe it really does take people that long to change, but over four years - especially when the girls go off to college - I'd think that they wouldn't get so easily stuck in their bad habits. At some point, I feel like they'd kick themselves in their rears and realize that their old behaviors aren't going to help them.
Still, the books are immensely enjoyable, and every girl has her moments of relatability, even if you don't identify closely with one of them in particular. Four and a half stars.
No comments:
Post a Comment