When her mother dies suddenly, Alex Lee is forced to leave the California commune where she was raised and move to sultry Savannah, GA where her grandmother lives. Grandmother Lee, descended from the famous general, is the leader of the most exclusive social club in the south: The Magnolia League. Dread-headed, pudgy, fashion eschewing Alex not only experiences a strong sense of culture shock when she enters society for the first time, but she also knows that her morals and values differ from the debutantes who now surround her.
Still, the longer she spends with Hayes and Madison, the two young Magnolias Grandmother Lee arranges for Alex to learn from, the more Alex realizes what she was missing her whole life on the commune. The temptation to be thin, rich, pretty, and popular is hard to resist when you're a high school girl. Although some strange supernatural occurrences scare Alex, she is still seduced by the benefits power and privilege bring. But when Alex takes things too far, and has to choose between the two most significant people in her life, she knows it's time to stop letting the Magnolias dictate her journey and she must make her own path.
This was a nice fluffy read, something I needed after months of slogging through "good literature." I would promote this book as a read-alike for the other recently published southern-magic-romance series, Beautiful Creatures being the first. The Magnolia League isn't going to win awards, and it's not particularly compelling, but it was fun enough. I would recommend this books to teen girls who enjoyed Beautiful Creatures, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and similar series, or any of the magic book series that were popular before vampires took over the world.
