Right Reads…Book reviews for babies, kids and teens

When I found this book on the library shelf, I admit that I thought it was a “flaky”, “airhead” kind of book that almost every pre-teen or teenaged girl is reading now…

I was attracted by the blurb:

“Amanda Woods is discovering that the person other people think she is and the person she really is are not the same. She doesn’t want to be like her demanding mother or her perfect older sister, and even though she feels close to her father, she doesn’t want to be like him either. But she has to start somwhere.

So she changes her name from bland Amanda Woods to Amanda K. Woods – someone who is proud and strong and sure of herself.”

…and glad that I read the book! I think The Secret Life of Amanda K. Woods is a must-read for every young girl out there who’s trying to find herself as she grows and change amidst her family, friends and community around her.

The book starts with 11 year old Amanda saying goodbye to her childhood friend, Lyle, who’s moving to another city. Her mother is glad he’s moving away because she never really approved of Lyle, whose family lived in a house trailer…

You can imagine what Amanda’s mother is like from these lines:

“Amanda’s mother was an elegant woman who had strong opinions about what was proper. She had made a rule that Amanda couldn’t buy comics or have any in her house. Comics weren’t literature, she said.”

Boy, she sure reminds of me of the controlling, prim-and-proper mother who:

• dresses up her children in beautiful and expensive but impractical clothes,
• forbids her children from playing with water, mud or getting dirty;
• chooses EVERY one of her children’s playmates and later, friends;
• manipulates the husband or father into submitting to her every decision with the excuse “It’s best for the children”…

At 11, Amanda’s too young to question her mother but slowly, she realizes that her mother dictates pretty much everything in her daily life and her future.

Amanda doesn’t get along with her older sister, who she sees as Ms. Perfect but later, both sisters reveal surprising truths about each other.

Amanda also gets to know her father better and is surprised to hear her father defying her mother and insists that he will be the one to raise Amanda since her mother had already done her part (or damage) on Amanda’s older sister.

The book also shows Amanda having trouble making friends at school – she thinks the “cool girls” are not worth being friends with and when she succeeds in being study partners with a nice girl, her mother’s “holier-than-thou” attitude threatens the friendship…

“The Secret Life of Amanda K. Woods” also has funny episodes especially Amanda’s adventure with her French pen friend…the letters between them make interesting reading but what’s funnier is Amanda’s attempt at creating a new identity for herself.

I’d strongly recommend mothers with pre-teen girls to get this book for your pre-teen or teenage daughters. Growing up as a teenager, I also had problems with friendship, peer pressure, trying to fit in and of course, the mother-and-daughter relationship.

If you have a 9-12 year old daughter, I think reading a book about the challenges ahead may help her (and you) be better prepared for them

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