Author: Meg Cabot
Pages: 447
Country: United States
Genre: Young Adult Novels
Pubisher: Harper Collins
Published in 2000
'The Princess Diaries' was published in the year of 2000. It is written by Meg Cabot which has been one of the best sellers of hers. This is a series book. The one I am introducing today is 'The Princess Diaries' Book 1 and 2 that is Two in One book. It has 447 pages. It was published by Harper Collins Publisher and later it was made into a film which had been a huge success.
The story begins with the diary writing of a girl whose mom gives her to jot down her feelings that she cannot share with her. The main character is Mia Thermopolis a ninth grader and an average girl of fourteen, five foot nine inches tall, flat chested, having bad hair, feet looking like skis and just a freshman who doesn't even have a proper single dream in life. One of her biggest dream is to have one grade senior Josh Ritcher as a boyfriend and another dream is if some day she can earn a lot of money in future she wants to donate to Greenpeace to save whales from being killed by humans.
One day, she finds out herself as 'Amelia Mignonette Grimaldi Thermopolis Renaldo', the princess of Genovia, a small European country near France whose population is not more than 50,000. She was born out of wedlock to her mother who is an artist and her father who is a prince of Genovia. Her father and mother are divorced. Her father is a cancer patient and cannot have any more kids again. So there is not a choice left for Mia than to accept the fact that she is the only heir to the throne. But she doesn't want to be a princess. She cannot even think of a thought of being one person today and waking up to know that she is completely another new different person the next day. 'You never saw anyone who looked less like a princess than I do. I mean, I have really bad hair, I don't have breasts at all, my feet look like skis, I'm five foot nine inches tall and just a freshman who is flunking Algebra.This is how she thinks that she cannot be a princess and this shows how normal girl she is.
To become to look like a princess her grandmother decides to give her some princess lessons like how to sit, how eat, how to react and so many other things. This way a transformation begins in Mia's life. All the bumpy rides in the story makes the book very interesting. How she hates to learn all those princess lessons and how she hates to be with her aristocrat grandmother. Mia and her grandmother never get along well with each other. The conflict is between a queen and a normal girl who had never thought in life one day she comes out to be a princess. She tries to make as many excuses as she can to avoid the princess lessons. So her father decides to give her some cash in return of learning those lessons. How she hates her father for doing this to her. She thinks she can't sell her soul to a company store ( she thinks that her dealing of her father with her with that hard cash for learning those lessons are like dealing with a company store ). She just cannot sell her soul for those mere few bucks. But later her dad tells her that he would donate 100 dollars everyday to Greenpeace if she agrees to take the lessons. Now she thinks that this is an entirely different matter if it comes to the saving of whales. Here she accepts the deal.
This character of a fourteen year old with so much intelligence and integrity really appeals me a lot. It is a fiction but still somewhere, in some points or in some ways we find ourselves in Mia's character. When I went through every chapter of this book I felt like this is me, not Mia. When I was young I always had a dream of saving those strayed dogs in the village when I would earn a lot of money. This dream has not come to be true yet but if I ever happen to earn a lot of money in the future I still want to fulfill this dream of mine.
Mia has a best friend, Lily Moscovitz who is an activist, bold and runs her own TV show called ' Lily Tells It Like It Is'. She wants to be like Lily. To speak up everything that she wants to. But she cannot hurt people. So she can never be like Lily. Lily's parents are psychoanalysts and they say that Mia has fear of confrontation. That is why she doesn't want to be princess. She doesn't want to be popular.
One day her friend Kenny asks her out. She hates to go out with him but to her surprise she hears her voice saying, "Yes Kenny, why not?" She can't hurt him. Later Kenny wants to pay for her pancake and her bodyguard Lar's five cups of coffee. She doesn't want Kenny to pay for her because she is not dating him. "I am a feminist. I don't let boys pay for me", she says to herself. She also remembers she is a princess and she is supposed to be gracious. She is so much concerned about her self esteem.
One day her makeover artist flashes out the secret of Mia being a princess before renouncement date. She suddenly becomes so popular that some people like Josh Ritcher who she had a crush while he used to date another girl tries to take advantage by kissing her trickily in public only for a few seconds cheap publicity. This hurts Mia a lot. So going through all these bumpy rides in such a short time she is so exhausted that she wants to give up the throne. But she doesn't have any choice left than to accept this roller coaster ride in her life from now onwards.
But at the end, being a princess she is at least satisfied with one thing that it is now for sure that she can afford to donate for Greenpeace and save the whales from being extincted.
The book is so interesting because of the stupid, funny but very witty monologues of a fourteen year old teenage girl that keeps the readers glued to it unless it is not finished. And the most important thing is that the writer has created a so much real character of a teenage girl who has to face all the politics that normally exists in every school and how she has to go with all the emotional ups and downs.
Lastly, there is a quote in the book which is derived from another similar book ' A Little Princess" by Frances Hodgson Burnett. 'Whatever comes,' she said, cannot alter one thing. If I am a princess in rags and tatters, I can be a princess inside. It would be easy to be a princess if I were dressed in cloth of gold, but it is a great deal more of a triumph to be one all the time when no one knows it.'
So being a princess is not only being a princess alone but it is also a feeling of princessly, thinking of princessly and acting of princessly. Even if you are clad in rags but if you have beautiful princessly heart you are always a princess from inside even when nobody knows it.
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