The Princess Diaries

The Princess Diaries
Meg Cabot, 238 pages.

The movie was good, remember? Cute, fun, enjoyable. So why did I need to read the book? The movie left me with a big question: Why didn't she want to be a princess? I didn't follow that. I mean sure, Anne Hathaway says something like "I'm just trying to fit in," or something, but that little one liner wasn't good enough for me.

The Mia Thermopolis of the book is a little bit deeper. Or, at least, we get to see that she's deeper because the story is told from the pages of her diary. And there were really several reasons for the princess phobia -- you'll have to read the book for yourself if you want the whole story. (Though if you post me a nice comment I might think about enumerating some of them.)

That burning question of mine was cleared up fairly quickly, and I enjoyed the rest of the book. It has some differences from the Disney film (surprise, surprise): most notably, Mia's father is still alive, her Grandmother is more evil than Julie Andrews, and Mia (like most 14 year olds, if I was any indication) is slightly preoccupied by her bust size. Also there's not quite as much kissing in the book.

That said, the book was not made to be quite as timeless as the movie -- it was very "in the now." I enjoyed it, but I don't know if my 14 year old sister would catch as much as I did. It was written in 2000 (when I was 14, incidentally), and I doubt that today's 14 year olds know who Leonardo DiCaprio is. They've got their own heartthrobs. I mean, 7 years ago today's 14 year olds were 7. There's a thought.