The Princess Diaries

Title: The Princess Diaries

Author: Meg Cabot

ISBN: 9780061479939

Publisher: HarperTeen

Copyright: 2008 (2000)

Genre: Fiction

Age Range: 13 - 17

Reader’s Annotation: Mia Thermopolis is a klutzy teen who lacks all grace and is secure in her identity until she finds out that she is a princess.

Plot Summary: Mia Thermopolis thinks she is an average girl. She lives in Greenwich Village with her  single, liberal mom who is a semi-famous painter. Being a realist, the two biggest things she dreams about is passing algebra and kissing senior Josh Richter. Mia’s parents are divorced. She has believed all her life that he was a European politician and it was work that got in between him and her mom. Mia is starting to come of age. He comes to town and confesses the truth. He's not just a European politician. He is the crown prince of Genovia. Because Mia is his only daughter, that makes her the crown princess of Genovia. She has no idea how to cope with this reality and denies that she is even capable of being a princess due to her physical appearance.

            Mia’s life starts to fall to pieces as her mom starts dating her algebra teacher, the paparazzi are showing up at school, and she has a big fight with her best friend Lilly. Lilly and Mia grow apart. Mia starts developing a friendship with another girl named Tina. Throughout the book, she is trained by her Grandmère to become a princess. Can Mia make up with Lilly, become a princess, and survive freshman year?

Critical Evaluation: The Princess Diaries series has been nominated to the American Library Association’s Best Books for Young Adults and Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers lists. Meg Cabot has been nominated Queen of Teen for her work on these books and many more. When looking at Cabot’s work, she has written an amazing spectrum of books that should be included as part of a well rounded collection. Many of her books and their series are good foundation books to have in a collection because they appeal to a wide audience or are specifically a read for girls to enjoy. Seeing that teen girls are the main demographic for library use, it is good to provide books that they want to read. The Princess Diaries series has also spawned a successful movie franchise as well that might want to be added to a audio visual collection.

Author Information: Meg Cabot is a #1 New York Times bestselling author of books for both adults and tweens/teens. Born and raised in Bloomington, Indiana, Meg also lived in Grenoble, France and Carmel, California (the setting for her bestselling Mediator series) before moving to New York City after graduating with a bachelor’s degree in fine arts from Indiana University.

After working for ten years as an assistant residence hall director at New York University (an experience from which she occasionally draws inspiration for her Heather Wells mystery series—two new books in the series will be out in 2012 and 2013), Meg wrote the Princess Diaries series, which was made into two hit movies by Disney, sold over 20 million copies, and has been translated into 38 languages. Source - http://www.megcabot.com/about-meg-cabot/

Curriculum Ties: Social Studies

Challenge Issues: N/A

Booktalk Ideas: Changes – One could start talking about all of the changes a n average Cinderella would have to make to transform into a princess.