I opened the cover of To the Nines - the ninth (unsurprisingly) book in The Princess Diaries series - and read "Oh, and Michael, the love of [Mia's] life, has dumped her." Noooooooo! I was so devastated that I almost didn't want to read the book. Of course that feeling lasted all of five seconds and soon I was as engrossed in Mia's life as ever.
If you remember, at the end of After Eight, Michael headed off to Japan to work on a research project, leaving Mia devastated. The loss of her first love has sent Mia into a depression and matters aren't helped by the fact that her best friend (and Michael's sister) Lilly, isn't speaking to her. Mia's not stuck for friends, of course - she's got Tina Hakim Baba and, inexplicably, Lana Weingarten also wants to hang out with her. No Michael or Lilly? Hanging out with Lana? It's like Bizarro World!
On top of her personal struggles, Mia has to deal with the prospect of giving a Grandmere-mandated speech to a secretive and all-powerful women's group and deal with the cowboy (literally) therapist her father is making her visit. All this while she's missing Michael terribly. Of course, there's always JP (aka The Guy Who Hates It When They Put Corn In the Chilli) to make her feel a little better about everything...
I loved this book, of course. Mia is forced to address some issues about herself and her friends and to grow up a bit. I don't want her to grow up, because the sooner she does, the sooner this glorious series will come to an end (in fact, the next book is the last - nooooooo!), but Cabot handles all of Mia's challenges so brilliantly that you can't complain.
This book, with its focus on depression and, fabulously, the differences between a constitutional and absolute monarchy (which I didn't understand until reading this book - what did they teach me at school anyway?!), is the most mature and feminist Princess Diaries book so far.
Like the Harry Potter series, I can see how events in this book foreshadow what's going to happen in the last and I can't wait to read it (except that I don't want to since then there won't be any more ... it's a hard life, being a booklover...).
Rating: 5/5
Like this? Try The Boy Book by E Lockhart
