Princess in the Spotlight

I definitely liked this book better than its prequel. Character development kicks into high gear. Mia is progressing with her lessons, and her struggle with them is probably what prevents her from becoming completely self-absorbed. Lilly is... meh. She's got some serious exploitative flaws that make me dislike her as a friend. First and foremost, though, I will always love the romance with Michael. It has its issues and they're not perfect, but they find value in what they have anyway, and I really like that. Good job, Meg Cabot! ( )

One of the big problems I have with many long-running series—Princess Diaries in particular—is the point where some books start becoming filler as opposed to actual plot development. (Wait ‘til I get to book seven.) Technically, this should be one of the filler books, but it’s not. I tend to see the first three books as a mini-trilogy, and Princess in the Spotlight is a good bridge between books one and three. I like the further insight to Mia’s princess lessons, and how quickly she does have to adapt to the public eye, the romantic subplot is fairly engaging, not to mention the fact that she’s willing to try to be with Kenny. (Also, the continuing references to the “Corn-in-the-Chili" boy is even funnier after reading the whole series.) However, this also shows a lot of the weak points in the series. The constant pop culture references are jarring and shows how much the book is dated (again, reading an “updated” rerelease, the find & replace is really noticeable). This is also the first book where I really start to dislike Lilly as a friend—she’s exploitive of Mia, though not to the extent of Lana or Josh Richter, extremely dismissive, and is actually pretty rude to her friends. (In contrast, Tina Hakeem-Baba is my favorite character in the whole series. She is awesome, that is all.) My other big complaint, which is really going to show for the next few installments, is how fast the plot moves in the series’ timelines (again, we’ll touch on this a little later). Still, for all of the flaws, it’s still an enjoyable book, and I still had a ton of fun revisiting it. ( )

It would be interesting to have to explain the whole -can't be on the phone and the internet at the same time- thing to today's teens who can be on the internet on their phone now. ( )

Mia just can't get a break. This one is also amazing. I admire Meg Cabot's ability to write in the proper "voice"- like an actual teenager, and not like what some square out-of-touch fossil might imagine teenagers speaking. ( )

Meg Cabot really needs to tone back on the preachiness. The story is good, but she doesn't need to shove her morals down our throats. Mia doesn't seem like a very relatable character. Even before she finds out she's a princess, she's one of those people that are just really out there. I think it would have been much more effective if Mia truly was an average teenager.
This is one of the few book-to-movie adaptions where I'd recommend the movie over the book (most movie-to-book adaptions I prefer the movie). ( )