The Sisters Club

Author: Megan McDonald

Publisher: Candlewick Press

Publication Year: 2008

Most of the readers will be: Mid-elementary age girls.

Reader's Advisory: For another book on sisters try C. S. Adler's Split Sisters.

Summary:
Stevie Reel loves her sisters Alex and Joey but she struggles to find something good about being in the middle. Finally she decides that she is the "glue" that holds the family together. But after Stevie and Joey humiliate Alex in front of her crush, who has come to dinner, Alex wants to quit the Sisters Club. Is there anything Stevie can do to make it up to Alex?

My favorite passage:

King Lear
Starring Alex
Time: Old-Timey England
Setting: The Kingdom
(A.K.A. The Reel Living Room)
Characters:
King Lear (The Father)
Three Daughters:
Goneril (The Oldest...That's Me!)
Regan
Cordelia (The Youngest)

Before the curtain rises: King Lear is preening himself, waiting to be flattered. He sits, looking at a map.

King Lear: (Why do I have to remind Dad three times? Stage directions say 'Point to map'!) 'Tis time I remove myself from public life. I wish to give each of thee, my three daughters, a parcel of my kingdom. This will depend upon how much each of you loves me.

Goneril: Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? (Good line!) Thou art more-

Stevie: Alex, quit showing off!

Me: What? That's a real line from Shakespeare. (I should know!)

Stevie: Well, it sounds like Romeo and Juliet, not King Lear.

Joey: Sick! It's from an ooey-gooey love poem!

Dad: Are we going to do this scene or not?

Regan: OK, I love thee more than all four of the seasons, not just one day in summer.

Goneril: I love thee more than meat loves salt.

Regan: Well, I love thee more than meat loves special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, on a sesame-seed bun. My love is Supersize!

Me: Hey no fair. Dad, she's making it sound like an old hamburger commercial, not Shakespeare. (Since when is Stevie the Shakespeare expert?)

Stevie: Don't look at me. You're the one who loves Dad like meat. I'm just following your lead. You always say to ad-lib.

Goneril: (Getting down on one knee in front of King Lear.) I love you more than the ocean has water, more than the sky has stars.

Regan: (Breaking into song.)
My love is warmer than the warmest sunshine,
Softer than a sigh.
My love is deeper than the deepest ocean,
Wider than the sky.
My love is brighter than the brightest star
That shines every night above...

Me: Um, last time I checked, King Lear was not a musical. (Or a comedy!)

Joey: Then when do I get a line? You guys are the greedy sisters, fighting over all Dad's, I mean, King Lear's, stuff. Doesn't the good daughter get to say any words?

Me: Just be happy you didn't have to be an eggplant.

Dad: OK, Cordelia. Your turn. Read your line.

Cordelia: I can hardly breathe for all this odious hot air that fills thy room.

Joey: What's odious mean?

Stevie and Me: (Holding noses.) Stinky!

King Lear: My youngest, you have been strangely silent. Have you no tender musings on your love for me?

Cordelia: My love for you, dear father, is as a daughter's should be. No more, no less.

King Lear: Thou art a boil, a plague-sore, an embossed carbuncle in my corrupted blood. Away with you! Cast thee from my sight forever!

Joey: (Being dragged from room.) Hey! What did I do? You mean I get sent away? I thought I was the only one who really loved King Lear.

Stevie: You're still banished!

Joey: No fair. you guys told me I was the good one.

Goneril and Regan: (Snickering.) More for us! More for us!

Cordelia: What stugly upsisters you have proven to be. Off with their heads!

Me: You're supposed to say, "A pox on you."

Cordelia: Chicken pox on you!

Me and Stevie: (In fits of giggles while dragging Joey, a.k.a. Cordelia, from room.)

Lights go down as Cordelia is banished, stage left. Quick curtain.

Joey: Wait! We're not done. Nobody got stabbed or poisoned or anything.

Me: That's 'cause we lost the plastic dagger.

Joey: Couldn't we just use a spoon or something?

Goneril: How daft! King Lear was lying in his bedchamber, unaware, never guessing he was about to be spooned to death!

Regan: Then, when Goneril saw her own image reflected upside down in the spon, she keeled over and died.

Goneril: Thou thinks thee so clever, but thou art not the least bit funny.

King Lear: (Collapsing on couch.) Give an old man some peace! (pg 23-27)

What I really think:
What a great book about sisters! McDonald has illustrated beautifully some of the best and worst things about sisters and made me want to put marshmallows between my toes.