White House Autumn: Meg Powers, #2 -- Ellen Emerson White
I have this problem.
When I love something -- I'm talking love-with-the-very-fiber-of-my-being-love -- and I know that that something has a very definite end in sight, I start avoiding THE END. Cases in point: I have not watched Season Five of Six Feet Under. I have not watched Season Three of Deadwood. I have not watched the last three episodes of The Wire. I have not finished Season Seven of Buffy. I haven't watched the Extras Christmas Special. I have not read Sayers' short stories about Lord Peter. I have not finished Octavian II.
The list goes on. It's pathetic. I know that.
But my fear of physical pain is greater than my freakish dislike of finishing beloved stories. So I read White House Autumn, which brings me one step closer to finishing the Meg Powers series. Which devastates me. But, it'll keep me from getting beat up by my little sister, who really did threaten me with violence if I didn't HAND THE BOOK OVER soon*.
Of course, after I read it, I started procrastinating about writing this post. Because, as with the first book, everything I have to say is a big gushy gush of gushing praise. I loved this book. I love Meg Powers. For sure, I've always had a soft spot for Angry Girls. But Meg is special. My angry girls have always been Mary Lennox and Meg Murry. I've met many others over the years, but they were always the pinnacle. Well, now the Pair has become the Triumvirate. I don't say that lightly -- there are a whole lot of years that separate my discovery of the two Megs. (Mary came first.)
But it isn't just Meg. I love her family, her friends (BETH!), the people who work at the White House. I love Ellen Emerson White for bringing me this story. I love Feiwel & Friends for saving these books from their dreaded (and fricking tragic -- how could that have happened to begin with?) Out of Print status.
In White House Autumn, Meg and her family have settled in -- as much as possible -- to life in the White House. To life with magazine interviews and reporters everywhere and never being alone, because there're always Secret Service guys around. But then there's an attempt on the President's life. And the Powers family needs to find a way to survive the press, the fear, the grief and each other as they wait to see if Katherine Powers will live.
I can't really say anything that I haven't already said or that is just, basically, me jumping up and down and shaking the book at you while chanting READITREADITREADITBECAUSEILOVEITLOVEITLOVEIT.
So, yeah. READ IT. BECAUSE I LOVE IT.
But read The President's Daughter first.
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Previously:
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*Along with the not-wanting-to-finish-thing, I also don't like to loan my books out if I haven't read them yet. I know that the second the book leaves my sight, I'll want to read it. And what if something happens to it and every other copy on the planet somehow simultaneously vanishes? Then I'd NEVER get to read it. Welcome to my brain. It's a frightening place.