Review of Sisterhood Everlasting: A Novel by Ann Brashares

Title: Sisterhood Everlasting: A Novel
Author: Ann Brashares
Published by: Random House
Pages: 224
Source: ARC borrowed from a friend
Available: June 14, 2011
Rating: 4/5

From Goodreads: Tibby, Lena, Carmen, and Bridget have grown up, starting their lives on their own. And though the jeans they shared are long gone, the sisterhood is everlasting. Despite having jobs and men that they love, each knows that something is missing: the closeness that once sustained them. Carmen is a successful actress in New York, engaged to be married, but misses her friends. Lena finds solace in her art, teaching in Rhode Island, but still thinks of Kostos and the road she didn’t take. Bridget lives with her longtime boyfriend, Eric, in San Francisco, and though a part of her wants to settle down, a bigger part can’t seem to shed her old restlessness. Then Tibby reaches out to bridge the distance, sending the others plane tickets for a reunion that they all breathlessly await. And indeed, it will change their lives forever—but in ways that none of them could ever have expected. As moving and life-changing as an encounter with long-lost best friends, Sisterhood Everlasting is a powerful story about growing up, losing your way, and finding the courage to create a new one.

This novel took me by surprise.  I was expecting fun and laughs just like the original Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants novels, but instead I got a more serious and heart wrenching novel.  These ladies really did grow up and are not dealing with little issues anymore, instead they are adults with serious problems and the consequenses of their decisions and life choices haunt them at times.

This novel focuses on the girls separation from each other and how they've grown apart.  They are so much a part of one another that their lives all tend to go astray when they don't have daily involvment with each other. 

Something big happens and each person has their own way of dealing with the aftermath.  This novel was truthful, heart-breaking, joyous and enlightening.  It was quite an emotional rollercoaster, but was definitely worth taking.

I'd recommend this to anyone who loved the original Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series, or for people who didn't like it or never read it because while it does feature the same characters, the style and tone of this novel are quite different.