quarta-feira, 19 de agosto de 2009

The Princess Diaries X

Forever Princess (or Princess Forever?), by Meg Cabot. The Princess Diaries X. The nothing-special blue paperback with the Arial ugly page numbers (though compensated by the cute seriff-y body text and curvy readable dating).

"See, I knew this was going to happen. Tina takes everything and wraps it up in silver tissuepaper and puts a big bow on it and it Love." p241

I read the final Princess Diary these past couple of days. (And the two previous last week, because I was so shocked after Ransom my Heart.) I don´t know why I liked it so much. I realise it is acceptable to be bubbly happy to find The Princess Diaries in the school library in fourth grade, while being so excited about reading the last one at 16 is sort of laughable, but whatever. It was fun.
That´s how the Princess Diaries have always been: fun. Not many things happen (mainly it´s just one drama written in one or two weeks of Mia´s diary), it is very predictable, and you can totally see when she´s just being nonsensical about things, which is annoying – you read it because they are comforting. All of Meg Cabot´s stories are, but this series in particular is like watching Tuck Everlasting with a bucket of Belgian chocolate Haagen Daaz. And I can´t really tell why, it just is.
Like most romance and teeny novels, it ends nicely. No, it ends perfectly, everything working out. It´s not a spoiler thing – even if you get a little nervous with the whole “Life isn´t a romance novel” part, you still have to keep in mind this is Meg Cabot. And her purpose on this world is making people happy and hopeful and relaxed (X is after Mia wrote a romance novel, so she says a lot of things supporting and defending the genre, which I, of course, agree. But then, since I read all kinds of silly-cute-predictable stories, where is the surprise there?).
Now that I´ve admitted to being ubberly and completely giggly happy about Michael´s return (in both Mia´s life and mine), allow me to share some other impressions on the book. If you, like me, don´t remember (or haven´t read) the other nine books, this is a quick, spoilerly recap: JP, the rich, handsome and boringly perfect guy Lilly had been dating (and dying hair for) dumped her, dumped her good; Michael got a scholarship and was moving to live in Japan for a year (or more) to develop some robotic surgical arm, and had ommited something Mia thought was very, very important at the time, which caused them to fight and break up; weird, non-intentional kiss with JP happened (afterall he was such a good friend she didn´t feel like losing him), which of course was seen by Michael and Lilly, which resulted in no best friend and no long time boyfriend and (in the IX) her behaving a little like Bella in New Moon, only she was dragged to therapy and worked it out with Dr Knutz (yep); exchanged friendly email with Michael; went out with JP (who liked Beauty and the Beast and all) and had press say they were dating, that later on turned out to be true. So what you need to know is that she is now friends with Lana (yeep, she proves herself to be shallow and a little too honest, but a good gal) and Tina (who, quite unfairly, I had totally forgotten about, and she´s such a great character!), and now Mia is dating JP (I´m not saying anything besides: Oh come on, he´s such a big boring clichê that looks more like a trained house pet than a boyfriend!). That´s it. In almost 400 pages you get to see Michael´s return as a the millionaire who invented CardioArm, Dr Knutz´s horse stories, Grandmére´s irritating habits and shocking advices, as well as those princessy things envolving tiaras and declining suitors. And a bit of MHC learning. Thankfully this book isn´t nearly as filled with trig and science and calculus and chemestry hatred as the others.
The one thing I didn´t get was why she decided not to write about It. I mean, the book is filled with all the sex (or sexy) scenes from Ransom My Heart (she didn´t even put any of the nice, messy family scenes!), so it´s not as if it was a censorship thing, which leaves me clueless.
Anyway, if you liked Mia, I think you´ll be pleased with the ending. Not to mention drool over the best and most wonderful fictional male ever created.

C, pleeease read it so I can share the bubbliness with someone?

"AND THAT IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF WHAT MAJOR HISTOCOMPATIBILITY COMPLEX IS ALL ABOUT!" p267

Um comentário:

  1. Yes, i am definitly reading it.
    Besides being Mia, it's Meg Cabot for God's sake!

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