Talking about this book today. Transcript after the jump!
Hi everybody! I'm Miriam and I'm doing this week's Not Oprah's Book Club. I'm standing in for Courtney because I wanted to talk about this book I just read.
Today I'll be talking about Along for the Ride, a new book by Sarah Dessen. It just came out last week and it's a YA fiction novel.
I've actually been reading Sarah Dessen's books since high school, when she actually came and did a reading at my high school public library in Chapel Hill NC. It turns out Sarah is also from Chapel Hill and actually went to my high school. She's actually since written 8 books and has been really really successful. This book was actually a NY Times bestseller last week, and two of her books were made into a Mandy Moore movie, How to Deal, a few years ago. I really like her books. I'm really into young adult fiction and like getting to talk about it.
This book is about a young girl named Auden who is spending her summer with her father in a beach town in NC, Colby. Her parents are divorced, her mom is an academic, an overachieving academic type. Auden is this overachieving really smart intellectual type who has spent most of her high school dedicated to her books and has grown up too fast seemingly because of her parent's divorce.
So Auden is spending her summer before college in Colby with her father, her stepmother and her new half-sister who has just been born. So that's where the book places us. It's a really great story of self-discovery and Auden finding more about her social side. It's a sweet story and I really enjoyed it.
I really like all of Sarah's books, I've read all 9 of them. They all feature really strong, independent and dynamic female protagonists and I really appreciate that. They're good role models for young girls.
Sarah also does a good job of tackling tough issues, like in this book divorce, in others intimate partner violence, teen pregnancy. All sorts of different hard issues and I appreciate that she takes them on and makes them accessible.
My own main criticism about her books is that all of her characters have been straight (at least that I can remember). I'd be really excited to see a character who was struggling with issues of sexuality. Also almost all of her characters have been white. So Sarah, if you're watching this, I'd love to see some more diversity in your upcoming books.
The only other thing that has been a criticism for me of her books is that the main character's path to self-discovery always includes a guy, a love interest. While he's not the knight in shining armour who comes in to save the day, he is involved her process. I've been a little disappointed to see that plot line reoccur.
But all in all I really like her books.
If you've read Along for the Ride, leave your thoughts in comments!
You can buy the book here, check out Sarah's livejournal here and see her other books here!
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Do you follow @SarahDessen on twitter? You could totally take your fandom to the next level, Miriam.
Haha I do! I also just direct messaged her the link to the video. Maybe I've also been to a few of her readings...
Keeping the Moon is my favorite Sarah Dessen book -- lots of good stuff about self confidence and size stuff.
Joan Bauer is another awesome YA author who writes strong girls. Same criticism with the always white-main character, but her books aren't as formulaic and don't always have that boy-helps-me-achieve-enlightenment thing. Hope Was Here, Squashed and Rules of the Road are particularly good.
but really, the best strong girl YA book I've read lately is The True Meaning of Smekday. It's hilarious, the main character is multiracial (but that's not the main issue of the book), she doesn't depend on adults or boys, and it had lots of really clever (not heavy-handed) allusions to imperialism & other social justice awesomeness. 10 Reasons to Read the True Meaning of Smekday. Plus it has aliens. And mini graphic novels. And the main characters' names are Gratuity and J.Lo. And J.Lo's a boy. A boy alien. I mean, what's not to like???
The House You Pass on the Way is supposed to be really good and it's a YA book about queer girls of color. I haven't read it but it's by Jacqueline Woodson and she's fantastic.
Word to "Smekday" and to ALL of Jacqueline Woodson's work. She's incredible. Carolyn Mackler's The Earth, My Butt and Other Big Round Things is my favorite feminist YA novel, though it does feature yet another straight, white protagonist. For a really honest exploration of teen sexuality, Maureen Johnson's The Bermudez Triangle is awesome. Plus, they tried to ban it from a small town library earlier this year, and the librarians totally stepped up and defended keeping it on the teen shelves
Yes I just found The Bermudez Triangle--it was really great! I was disappointed by her other books though, much less diversity in those it seems.
Honestly, I think the reason that these people are writing white straight characters is because thats what they themselves are.
I just finished Along for the Ride two days ago and, like Miriam, enjoyed it.
However, I would like to bring up for discussion something that Miriam did not mention in her post which is that Dessen seems to be exploring feminism itself throughout the book. She presents Auden's mother, the serious, sexually liberated woman who is critical of most things, especially anything that might be degrading to women. She is particurally offended by a perfume she sees called "Booty Berry."
Dessen also presents, on the flip side, the character Maggie who is smart and dynamic but also enjoys traditionally feminine activities like reading celebrity gossip magazines and shopping.
In the book Maggie looks like the preferable road to follow, a dynamic woman who does not reject any part of herself-even the part that likes Booty Berry. I think that in this glowing portrayal of Maggie and in a scene where Auden is mocked for thinking pink is degrading for girls, Dessen might be inadvertently giving the reader the message that they must be smart like Maggie, Auden, and Auden's mom, but also fun and pink like Maggie. I wished that this part was left out as it seemed to reinforce stereotypes.
Did anyone else have thoughts on this?