352 pages
Publisher: Delacorte Press (2001)
ISBN: 0385729332
Reading Level/Lexile: 9th-12th grade/600L
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Annotation/Teaser: It all starts with a pair of pants bought at a thrift store. But this pair of pants becomes so much more than a ratty pair of jeans. Carmen, Tibby, Lena, and Bridget form a sisterhood and the traveling pants starts on a journey.
Plot Summary: Carmen buys a pair of jeans in a thrift store. There is nothing special about the jeans so she decides to get rid of them. On the night before she and her friends are to part ways for the summer, they all try on the jeans. Much to everyone's surprise, they fit all 4 girls. So they decide to form a sisterhood and pass the pants back and forth over the summer. Carmen is going to South Carolina to spend the summer with her father. Lena is going to Greece. Bridget is going to soccer camp in Baja California, Mexico. Tibby is the only one who stays home to work. They name the pants the Traveling Pants and each girl gets a chance to wear the pants during the summer. What follows is an amazing adventure for all the girls and when they return home they decide to write the story of the Traveling Pants.
About The Author: Ann Brashares grew up in Chevy Chase, Maryland with her three brothers and attended a Quaker school in the DC area called Sidwell Friends. She studied Philosophy at Barnard College, part of Columbia University in New York City. Expecting to continue studying philosophy in graduate school, Ann took a year off after college to work as an editor, hoping to save money for school. Loving her job, she never went to graduate school, and instead, remained in New York City and worked as an editor for many years. Ann made the transition from editor to full-time writer with her first novel, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants.
When asked where the idea for the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants came from she replies: "It started with a conversation. A woman I used to work with, a dear friend, Jodi Anderson, talked about a summer where she and her friends had shared a pair of pants that wound up being lost. It was sad, but I loved the idea - a concrete thing in the middle of a great big, amorphous, rich world of fiction."
Brashares and her husband, 42-year-old portrait painter Jacob Collins, live in a four-story building in the East 60s in New York with their three children, Susannah, Nate and Sam, who range in age from about 5 to 11. Jacob runs a classical painting school called the Water Street Atelier out of the house with about a dozen students at at time. In late 2006 the New York Times described him as "the ringleader of a group of youngish painters devoted to classical techniques" with a style that is "so out, it may be in again". He was recently named one of the art world’s most powerful people by Art & Auction magazine, and lately his paintings have been selling for as much as $125,000.
They met when Brashares was 18 and he was 21. He was a junior at Columbia, and she was a freshman at Barnard; his father, Arthur Collins, was one of her philosophy professors. During their first encounter, in the library, he sketched her portrait.
Brashares' books in addition to the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants books include Forever in Blue, The Last Summer (of You and Me), and My Name is Memory.
Ann Brashares Bio (6/19/2011) Retrieved from www.bookbrowse.com
Critical Evaluation: One of the most prevalent literary devices in Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants is foreshadowing. There are several examples in this story that allows the reader a glimpse of what is to come. The first is when Carmen writes Tibby a letter telling her how bad she feels that she is taking such an exciting trip while Tibby is forced to stay home and work. This letter foreshadows the fact that her trip might not be as exciting as she thinks it will be. Another example is Carmen's dad. He trades his Saab for a station wagon, which is a weird car for a single man. We also see that he is reluctant to talk about his home. Finally he stops the car in a suburban neighborhood and gets out in front of a large Victorian house where she finds out he is to be remarried. One last use of foreshadowing in the book is Bridget and Eric's relationship. Even though Bridget
is warned against a relationship with Eric and knows that Eric is off limits, she pursues the relationship anyway. This is a sign that they will both be disappointed at the end of the summer. Also the psychiatrist says that Bridget is single-minded in pursuing her goals to the point of recklessness. This gives us some insight into her persuance of Eric. I consider the foreshadowing in this book very subtle. I think you must read it more than one time to pick up on the foreshadowing especially with Carmen. Bridget's is a little more obvious. This is a great story for teenage girls and if you love the first one there are several more in the series.
Curriculum Ties: English, Language Arts
Book Talk Ideas: What would happen if you bought a pair of pants that fit all of your friends?
Could you spend the summer away from all your friends and still keep your relationship going?
Controversial Issues: Sexual content
Defense:
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a written rationale to justify the reasons this material is included in the
collection, such as educational significance and curriculum ties.
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sure I read the material and are very familiar with it.
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in the event that my other strategies don't work.
Why I Chose This Book? I chose this book because it is still a popular book among teen girls. I had to put the book on hold in my library which proves people are still reading it. I think the content is still relevant and appeals to young adults.
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