In Ann Brashares’s The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, a pair of jeans connects the four friends.
Lena, Tibby, Bridget, and Carmen discover the jeans in a thrift shop before spending their first summer apart. Although the girls have different body shapes, the trousers somehow fit each of them. They decide to share the garment by mailing it from one friend to the next throughout the summer.
The jeans become a physical symbol of their friendship while each girl faces a different experience. Lena visits Greece, Bridget attends a soccer camp, Carmen stays in South Carolina, and Tibby remains in Maryland while making a film. The alternating storyline is one of the book’s defining features.
Brashares’s novel was published in 2001. It became the first book in a series, followed by sequels including The Second Summer of the Sisterhood and Girls in Pants. A film adaptation was released in 2005.