"All the Summer Girls"

Meg Donohue is the bestselling author of All the Summer Girls and How to Eat a Cupcake, which was translated into Dutch, German, Italian, and Polish. She has an MFA from Columbia University and a BA from Dartmouth College. Born and raised in Philadelphia, she now lives San Francisco with her husband, two young daughters, and Cole, her endearing Taiwanese rescue pup.

Donohue applied the Page 69 Test to All the Summer Girls and reported the following:

Page 69 of All the Summer Girls both is and is not representative of the book as whole. I’ll start with the ways it’s not: The scene on page 69 is not set at the beach, and it doesn’t mention summer, both of which are integral to the tone and setting of the book. Page 69 is representative of the book because it’s a conversation between old friends, and the book revolves around the friendship of three women—the ways and reasons each woman, and their friendship, has changed over the years. The chapters are told from alternating points of view, rotating between each woman. Page 69 falls in one of Vanessa’s chapters; it is the scene in which she reveals to her friend Kate that she is thinking of reconnecting with an old boyfriend. Kate has her own issues going on, which the reader knows from her chapter, and in this phone call we see the way information is passed between the friends, how some things are left unsaid, and others are misinterpreted. Some secrets are bared, and others kept longer still.

Learn more about the book and author at Meg Donohue's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: How to Eat a Cupcake.

Writers Read: Meg Donohue (April 2012).

My Book, The Movie: How to Eat a Cupcake.

--Marshal Zeringue