Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell up to page 41

I started to read the book Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell because a friend recommended it to me based on the reading I said I liked. I have to admit, I'm impressed at the person's ability to pick out books I'd like! Here's a short summary of what I've enjoyed recently:

Scarlett O’Hara, a charming young woman is on the front porch of Tara, her father’s plantation in northern Georgia, in April 1861. She's with the twin brothers Brent and Stuart Tarleton who proudly inform Scarlett of their recent expulsion from school and how their brothers also left the school because they could not go somewhere that did not accept their brothers. They also discuss the rumors that a war will soon break out between the North and the South. Scarlett changes the subject to the next day’s barbecue and ball at the Twelve Oaks plantation. The gossip continues and Brent and Stuart tell her that Ashley Wilkes, the son of the proprietor of Twelve Oaks, will announce his engagement to Melanie Hamilton, his cousin, at the ball. They don't just tell her this though, she has to promise to give them all the dances and sit with them at the meals at the ball and barbecue if they tell her the information. Scarlett, who wants Ashley for herself, tries to act normally but cannot maintain her vivaciousness. The twins leave, baffled by Scarlett’s sudden silence. They think that maybe she has just come down with a headache and ask their slave if he heard them say anything that might have offended her. Distressed by the news of Ashley’s engagement, Scarlett hurries to the road to wait for her father, who was visiting at Twelve Oaks. After Scarlett probes for a while, Gerald confirms that Ashley plans to marry Melanie. He warns Scarlett that she and Ashley would make a terrible match. Gerald says the Wilkeses are too interested in music and poetry, and though Ashley excels at masculine pursuits like riding and shooting, his heart is not in them. He says she should not tell her mother about this either because she does not need to be worried with heartbreak nonsense. On the porch, Scarlett and her father encounter Ellen, who is rushing out to help baptize Emmie Slattery’s dying newborn. Mammy, an old slave who has been with Ellen since childhood, and Gerald do not think Ellen should help Emmie, whose “white trash” family lives adjacent to the O’Hara plantation. As Scarlett and her dad walk back up the steps, she wonders how her parents ended up together since her dad is so loud and insensitive.

I think it's quite obvious now that I really like books about girls around my age that I can relate to. Teenage love drama? That's what really interests me. Not because I'm obsessed with romance novels, but because I'm going through the same things, or at least observing them happen to friends. And the more I read about a situation outside my friend circle, the more ridiculous it all seems that we spend our teenage years so consumed with our feelings that we don't even know are real. Idk. That's just my two cents for the day. I'll post more later :)