CERTAIN GIRLS
Jennifer Weiner
Atria Books
Fiction
ISBN: 9780743294256

• Read an Excerpt
• Author Talk –– April 25, 2008

Cannie Shapiro, who won readers' hearts in Jennifer Weiner’s first novel GOOD IN BED, returns in the page-turning sequel CERTAIN GIRLS.

Cannie is settled into her long and happy marriage with her diet doctor husband, Peter Krushelevansky. She spends her days churning out science fiction books, written under a pen name. Her debut, a highly fictionalized and incredibly sexy bestseller based on her own life, was way too much of a sensation when it was published many years ago; she is not going through that kind of a media buzz again. Meanwhile, she knits, gardens and plans meals, but mostly her focus is on being the best mother she can possibly be to her beloved 12-year-old, Joy. Joy's biological father is Bruce Guberman (who once wrote a piece for a national women's magazine titled "Loving a Larger Woman," about his and Cannie's love life). Bruce is in Joy's life, but her true father is the warm and wonderful Peter.

Cannie's life is shaken a bit as Joy's grades falter. Joy contributes her story as well, and we learn that the seventh-grader is self-conscious about the hearing aids she requires, frequently not wearing them at school. Peter rocks Cannie's world further when he announces that, in spite of Cannie's hysterectomy after Joy's birth, he believes they should find a surrogate mother and have a baby of their own.

Meanwhile, Joy finds herself unaccountably popular at school. Normally, she hangs with her friends, twins Tamsin and Todd. But the most popular girl at school, Amber Gross, suddenly asks Joy to sit with her and her friends at lunchtime. Despite Tamsin's displeasure, she can't resist the siren call to join Amber's clique in the cafeteria, where she finds herself sitting right next to her crush, Duncan Brodkey. Joy is ecstatic --- until she learns that her popularity is sparked by her mother's friendship with a famous actress.

Joy’s new friends also discuss BIG GIRLS DON'T CRY, which her mother wrote years ago. Cannie has protected Joy from the book, forbidding her to read it. Now Joy feels compelled to disobey Cannie’s order, and her world is turned upside down. It is, as Duncan says, "hot stuff," which makes Joy uncomfortable. But she also discovers that when the book’s heroine unhappily finds herself pregnant, the baby's father leaves. All of a sudden, Joy wonders about the truth behind the book. Didn't Cannie want her?

CERTAIN GIRLS is an absorbing read and the perfect escape story. While rediscovering Cannie feels like catching up with an old warm-hearted, witty best friend, readers will also relate to Joy's preteen angst as she struggles to find her place in the world. Jennifer Weiner leaves us with a tantalizing taste of Cannie and Joy's future. Dare we hope for another sequel?

    --- Reviewed by Terry Miller Shannon (terryms2001@yahoo.com)

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