Polly and Her Friends Abroad

Two American girls set sail for Europe with dreams of studying interior decorating and wandering through the great museums of Paris and beyond. Polly Brewster and her friend Eleanor Maynard are aboard a steamer crossing the Atlantic, their heads full of ambition and their eyes fixed on the art and culture waiting across the ocean. But the voyage brings more than just scenery: they encounter Mrs. Ebeneezer Alexander, a mother obsessed with maneuvering her daughter Dodo into European nobility, while Dodo herself chafes against her mother's schemes and yearns for independence. As the girls navigate foreign customs, new friendships, and the gap between old-world tradition and American modernity, they discover that growing up means carving out one's own path. The novel captures a moment when American girls dared to want more than marriage and manners, instead chasing art, adventure, and self-determination on foreign shores.