The Mother Daughter Book Club AND Much Ado About Anne - Heather Vogel Frederick

These two books are by local author Heather Vogel Frederick, and I loved both of them. I loved them for their strong character development, for their honest portrayal of teenage girls and their relationships with their mothers and with one another, and for their literary references to two of my most favorite books - Little Women and Anne of Green Gables.

The four main characters in these novels are Megan, who would definitely rather be at the mall than at the library; Cassidy, whose over-protective mother thinks hockey is NOT the sport for her at all, even though Cassidy thinks it's her life; Emma is the Mrs. FB of the group - she's read EVERYthing; and Jess is so busy missing her mother who went off to New York for an acting job, that she can hardly think of much else.
But whether they like it or not, these four girls are going to spend one evening a month discussing books in the Mother Daughter Book Club organized by Emma's mom!

Over the course of the first book the club reads Little Women, and over the course of the second book they read Anne of Green Gables. In both books the author does a nice job of tying together things that are happening in the girls' lives with things that are happening in the novels they're reading, but you don't have to have read Little Women to understand the reference.

I thought these books were really thoughtful without being preachy, and lots of fun to read. I would definitely recommend them to middle school girls. I am hoping to use the first one as our first WOMS Book Club book. If you're interested in joining our book club, please be sure to take the SHORT survey that's on the library webpage.