The President's Daughter by Ellen Emerson White

The President's Daughter
Ellen Emerson White
ISBN 0312374887
304 pages
Feiwel & Friends, 2008

Genre: Contemporary Life

Reader's Annotation:
Sixteen-year-old Meghan Powers' relationship with her mother becomes even more complicated when she becomes the first female President of the United States.

Plot Summary:
Meghan Powers is a pretty typical teenager; smart and sarcastic, she lives for tennis, hangs out with her friends, and loves to tease her younger brother. Her family life drastically changes, however, when her mother, the senior senator from Massachusetts, decides to run in the Democratic primary. Her parents are usually off campaigning, and Meghan finds herself with unwanted attention both from people and teachers at her high school and from the media.  Things get even stranger when her mother wins the primary. Megan goes from hanging out in Boston with her best friend Beth to staying at the Presidential Suite in the Waldorf-Astoria. 

When her mother wins the election and is sworn in as president, Meghan and her family move into the White House, where life gets really weird.  Not only is it kind of strange to be waited on by the Cast of Thousands (the nickname Meg and her brothers come up with for the large White House staff), but now every move the First Family makes is captured by the media.  Meg's relationship with her mother, too, is complicated; Meg admires how beautiful, smart, and honest her mother is, but she also wishes that she weren't so ambitious and that she were around more.  Meg wonders if she can ever carve out an identity for herself, or whether she'll always be the President's daughter.

Critical Evaluation:
White's novel is at once an interesting political piece and an intimate look inside a very smart, very funny teenage girl's head.  The novel is well-researched, and the reader gets a very inside view at what life is like both inside a national political campaign and in the White House.  The political aspect of the book is exciting and accessible, appealing to political junkies and those readers who may be new to politics. 

Meg's family is both appealing and honestly drawn.  Her parents and brothers are all complex, fleshed-out characters.  Her father, like Meg, is both proud of his wife's talents and accomplishments, but also fiercely protective of his family; a life in the spotlight is not one he would have chosen for himself or his children.  Her brothers lovingly tease Meg, as younger brothers do, but there is a real sense of love among the siblings. In the character of Meg's mother, Katharine Vaughn Powers, White creates a character equally driven by her love for her family and her personal ambition, not to mention her honest desire to serve her country and improve the lives of Americans. 

The story is told in the third-person, but entirely from Meg's point of view.  Meg's voice is unique; smart, cynical, at times slightly bratty and immature; at others wise beyond her years. She's a realistic and wonderful teenage girl.

Other Titles in the Series
White House Autumn (2008)
Long Live the Queen (2008)
Long May She Reign (2007)

Note: The President's Daughter, White House Autumn, and Long Live the Queen were originally published between 1984 and 1991.  In 2007, White published a fourth in the series, Long May She Reign. The events in that novel take place immediately after the end of the third book, though White moved the setting from the '80s to the modern day. In 2008, her publisher released updated versions of the first three novels, also setting them in the modern day.  They remain largely the same, though White took out some outdated things (old technologies or pop culture references) and added in some contemporary things, like cell phones and email.

About the Author
Ellen Emerson White wrote a number of young adult novels in the 1980s.  She is largely known for her smart, strong, funny, and complicated female heroines.  She's written under several pseudonyms; as Zack Emerson, she published a young adult series about the Vietnam War, and then under her own name, she wrote The Road Home, a standalone novel involving some of the same characters from the point of view of Rebecca, an army nurse.  White has also written an adult mystery novel.

Curriculum Ties
American politics

Booktalking Ideas
1. Talk about the political aspect of the book, tying it into the 2008 election with the Democratic primary between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
2. Talk about Meg's relationship with her family, especially her mother.
3. Talk about how Meg's relationships with her friends and classmates change as her mother grows in prominence.

Reading Interest/Level
9th grade and up, though some junior high students may enjoy it.

Challenge Issues
None, though there is some mild language and a scene where Meg attends a party where underage people are drinking beer.

Selection Criteria
I read and enjoyed this novel as a teen myself and was excited to read the recent sequel and the updated version released last year. Shows you how a great book really does hold up!