THE MOTHER-DAUGHTER BOOK CLUB
Much Ado About Anne
by Heather Vogel Frederick
The eclectic group returns for a year of discussion centered on Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables series. In a structure similar to Karen Joy Fowler’s The Jane Austen Book Club, seventh-graders Cassidy, Megan, Jess and Emma’s life circumstances run parallel to characters and scenes in the books they are reading. Megan’s former “Fab Four” girlfriend, Becca, and her mom join the book group, which adds a bit of spicy acrimony. Megan, caught between her book-club crowd and the snooty “Fab Three,” manages to bring the two together in a large-scale fundraising effort to help Jess’s family save their historic small farm. Frederick hones her writing for this outing, with chapters in the girls’ alternating voices supplying humorous disasters, suspense and excitement as she suggests the virtues of ethical behavior while remaining cognizant of typical tween “queen bee” attitudes. References to key Montgomery quotes in chapter headings and dialogue with lists of “Fun Facts About Maud” create a nice blend of modern and classic themes to stimulate discussion. (Fiction. 10-13)