Celia, April, Sally, and Bree are all thrown into a dorm together their freshman year at Smith. None of them like each other, at first sight. Sally seems stuck up and distant, April is the over-the-top feminist rebel, Celia is slightly judgmental and conventional, and Bree is the epitome of Southern belle (complete with engagement to her childhood sweetheart). Yet, being stuck on a floor together means that they must turn to each other in times of need...and there are times of need! Sally comes to school still mourning over the death of her mother; April finds herself carried away by radical feminists who border on violent; Bree must battle with pleasing her parents or following her heart; and Celia just watches. The reader watches as these girls fall in and out of love, find their calling in life or miss it, and test their friendships with each other.
The novel is predictable but that's not why I kept reading. I flew through this book because I was interested in the choices that these women made. Maybe it's because I am around their age and understand their anxieties over entering the real world, but I think it's more than that. I think that reader older and younger than myself would also enjoy this book because it's about the power of friendship and unconditional love. I could rip apart the banalities that plague the plot and characters or describe how one can guess the ending in the first 50 pages...but I won't. This is a summer read and because of that there should be lowered expectations. This is not the next great American novel but it certainly goes well with some sand and a beach chair.
-DLP
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