“Claudia and Alan Gray? Is she crazy?”……BSC FF # 7: Claudia Gets Her Guy

Recap

So, this starts right after Stacey and Jeremy break up.  Actually, it starts at the same time, with Claudia baby-sitting while all her friends are at Mr. Zizmore’s good-bye party.  The next morning Mary Anne tells Claud the news, and she’s nervous/excited about what this means for her and Jeremy.  However, the next morning, Jeremy totally ignores her in the hall.  This goes on for days, so she finally decides to make a move herself and invite him to the upcoming dance.  She’s scared to do it in person, so she writes him a note and slips it in his locker.

The only problem is, she had typed the note so she could spell check it, then rewrote it by hand.  But spell-checker couldn’t figure out what she meant by “Jaramy,” so she addresses it with “To a good friend.”  (For the record, Microsoft Word does suggest Jeremy as a correction for that).  But spell check may not have been so advanced back then.  Anyway, Claudia accidently puts this note in the wrong locker.  And since she used that neutral greeting, the person who gets it thinks it’s intended for him.  That person?  Alan Gray.

Claudia’s horrified when she realizes Alan has the letter, but she doesn’t realize he thinks it’s for him.  She thinks he’s going to tell the whole school she likes Jeremy. But he actually tells her how the note’s the nicest thing anyone has ever written to him and that he knows he can be a pain, but he liked that she saw the real him.  AND he tells her how much he’s always liked her. So, he wants to go to the dance and Claudia feels like she can’t turn him down. 

After that, Kristy keeps telling Claudia she’s crazy, and Stacey keeps asking about Jeremy.  But Alan’s being super sweet – he asks what color corsage to get, he brings flowers to her in school, he leaves all sorts of other gifts for her, he brings a tablecloth and candle in so they can have a “romantic lunch” at school, etc.  Claudia tells him she meant they should go as friends, but Alan says he knows but thinks they could be more in the future.

Anyway, Jeremy hears that Claudia’s going with Alan and gets all upset.  Even though he spent days avoiding her.  Claudia tells him she really wanted to go with him, but says she can’t not go with Alan now.  At the dance, Jeremy cuts in to dance with her.  While dancing, Claudia realizes that she really isn’t that into him after all.  She’s just not feeling it and keeps thinking how she wishes she were still dancing with Alan.  So, Claudia and Jeremy briefly talk about how they weren’t meant to be a couple and will stay just friends, and Claudia goes back to dancing with Alan.

While all this is going on, Claudia and Stacey continue to mend their friendship.  Early on, Claudia says she can’t talk about Jeremy with her.  But eventually, she decides that if they are going to be friends they need to be able to do that, and she and Stacey talk all about it.  They both apologize for the things they said.  Stacey even tells her Jeremy’s feelings for her were part of the reason behind their break up.  Anyway, by the end things are all good with them.

High/Lowlights

• On Sunday morning, Mr. Kishi’s making blueberry pancakes for breakfast and Claudia asks for 5 pancakes.  Now….I know pancakes aren’t totally junk food, but that’s not exactly a healthy balanced breakfast, especially once you load them with syrup.  What’s up with her parents only wanting her to eat healthy foods, but serving a huge stack of pancakes?

• Also, these books were always showing the parents cooking big breakfasts for their kids on weekend mornings (pancakes, omelets, etc.)  Was I deprived as a kid?  That was a pretty rare occurrence in my house, if we were lucky it was frozen waffles that we toasted ourselves (and added ice cream to if it was before my parents woke up).  But I wasn’t served anything, especially not when I was in middle school.

• The day after Claudia finds out about Jeremy and Stacey splitting up, she decides she needs to look really good and spends ages picking out her outfit.  Janine actually picks out the final outfit – a blouse she made out of a kimono that belonged to Mimi and a skirt, with a black chopstick in her hair.  I don’t really have anything bad to say about that, but we don’t really get much detail. 

• When Mary Anne told Claudia about the break up, she forgot the part about Ethan and Toby being at the party.  That…..seems like an important detail.

• Claudia actually starts her letter to Jeremy several times.  She spells his name differently each time – Jermy, Jermery, Jerymy, Jermie, and Jaramy.  Spell check knows I mean Jeremy for every single iteration.  At least in Word.  Blogger only knows about half of them.

• I know Claudia’s a crappy speller, but you’d think she’d have learned the name of the guy she’s been obsessing over for months.

• Seriously, Jeremy’s kind of annoying.  When he was with Stacey he would stop and chat with Claudia in the halls all the time.  But he’s newly single and suddenly can barely wave before turning and walking away?  He was never presented as shy and he knows how Claudia feels about him, so what’s the problem?   And then he’s mad at her?  Even after she explains the note was meant for him?  I mean, what did he expect when he stopped talking to her?

• So, after Claud realizes she put the letter in the wrong locker, Kristy suggests that they get Cary Retlin to open the locker and take the letter back.  Since apparently Cary can get into anyone’s locker.  Of course, by the time they do this the letter’s gone.  But Cary does figure out that the letter wasn’t meant for Alan and threatens to tell him.  But Claudia tells him she doesn’t want to hurt Alan.

• I think Cary does eventually tell Alan about the letter, while Claudia’s dancing with Jeremy at the dance.  But, I guess he gets over it when Claudia comes by and says she really wants to be dancing with him.

• Kristy keeps going on about how awful Alan is.  Are we supposed to forget that Kristy went out with him?  Several times actually.  That doesn’t mean she can’t dislike him, but maybe she should mention that or something.

• I can’t believe they got away with a “romantic” lunch at school.  When I was in school we weren’t allowed to be in classrooms if no teacher was there.  It was a liability thing. And we certainly wouldn’t have been able to light a candle.

• Cary’s actually a pretty smart guy to figure out what’s going on.  I think most boys that age would be clueless.

• Claudia’s dance outfit: “a short retro dress [she’d] found in a thrift shop.  It had white trim and white heart-shaped buttons…..[she] also wore clunky black shows with a stacked heel and a square toe.  [She] had a wristful of hot-pink bangles.”  Again….not really anything bad to say.  Either she’s getting saner or I am losing brain cells from reading books that are meant for 8-year-olds.

• Janine (of all people) tells Claudia and Alan they look good together.  But then she clarifies that she meant his red shirt went good with her pink dress.  But since pink and red kinda clash I’m going to take that is confirmation Janine still doesn’t get fashion and her earlier suggestion was a fluke.

• Claudia’s still friends with Erica Blumberg, who apparently has been fighting with her parents because she wants to find her biological parents.  She even was looking at websites about it, but hasn’t done anything because she doesn’t want to go behind her parents back.  I wonder if this will lead anywhere.  Although, I can’t imagine too much can happen with it since she’s not a main character.

• So, Claudia and Alan seems kind of random....but I can see sort of see it.  We are always seeing Alan at his most annoying because that's when he's been relevant, but it makes sense that he can be sweet too.  I'm not sure if it will last though, he'll be sure to regress at some point.

• There’s this annoying subplot where Claudia and Erica volunteer to help recent immigrants to the US learn English and about living in the US.  We get like three whole chapters devoted to it, but it felt like more.   And the woman Claudia’s helping has little kids, so we have to hear about them too.  And there’s even an acknowledgement in the dedication that mentions some organization that I guess is a real life version of where Claudia was volunteering.  I didn’t look it up because I really don’t care.

• Not that it’s not good to help other people or anything.

“I’ve never had trouble finding a boy who liked me”……BSC FF # 6: Stacey and the Boyfriend Trap

Recap

This book starts on New Year’s Eve.  Stacey’s in NYC with her dad and makes a resolution to be a better friend.  So, she calls Ethan, since they said when they broke up they said they wanted to be friends but haven’t stayed in touch.  Ethan mentions he may be going to some art exhibit at the Stoneybrook Museum, and suggests Stacey go with him as a friend.  Stacey says sure, just let her know when it’s definite.

When she gets home she finds a letter from Toby (from Sea City) saying he’s traveling with his family to look at colleges for his brother and will be near Stoneybrook.  He wants to stop by to see Stacey.  She’s unsure what to do, since he was kind of a jerk the last couple of times she saw him, but he was her first kiss so I guess she’s sentimental or something.

The next day at school, Stacey finds out that her favorite teacher, Mr. Zizmore, is moving to Texas because his wife got a job working for NASA.  Stacey’s sad he’s leaving, so when Pete Black approaches her to suggest they plan a going away party, she’s happy to help out.  She also reminds us that she and Pete used to date back in 7^th grade (since this book’s all about the boys Stacey used to date). They end up talking to the principal about the party, who says students should join the staff party he was planning and asks if she and Pete can organize any student involvement.  On the way out they run into Wes, that student teacher that Stacey had a crush on.  He’s interviewing to replace Mr. Zizmore, and Stacey invites him to the party.

Then Robert talks to her and says he wants to help with the party too, as long as she’s okay with it.  Stacey says okay.  Then Kristy says that Sam loved Mr. Zizmore when he was in middle school and wants to help with the party too.  Again, Stacey agrees. She also asks Jeremy (her current boyfriend) to help, but he feels weird about it since he never had Mr. Zizmore.  This is one of many things that makes Stacey think something’s off with Jeremy.  Cause what 13-year-old wouldn’t want to plan a party for a teacher he never had? They also have different reactions to some movie they went to.  What serious problems those two have.  And okay, she also doesn’t like him hanging out with Claudia so much.  That one may be a more reasonable complaint.

Meanwhile, Stacey emails Toby.  Apparently, the BSC lives in a world with email now.  She doesn’t say whether he can visit her or not at first, but they start talking and she eventually agrees to it.  Then she realizes he’ll be visiting the same day as the party and has a mini-freak-out, but her mother tells her to just tell Toby that she can only see him in the day. Which she does. 

When the day comes, Toby proves to still be kind of a jerk.  He asks her to confirm how obvious it is that he works out. And kind of pressures her to kiss him. Right when Toby’s family’s supposed to pick him up, the doorbell rings and it’s Ethan.  He came up for that art exhibit, but I guess decided to surprise Stacey and he wants to hang out until the art thing starts. Then Toby’s dad calls and says he got delayed because the brother got a “last minute interview” at Yale and they can’t pick Toby up until later.  Stacey asks her mom to entertain the boys while she goes to the party, and her mom actually agrees, but the guys decided they want to just go to the party with Stacey (which is at the school).

The party goes well, and Mr. Zizmore’s all surprised and honored and all that.  But the more interesting stuff that happens: Jeremy sees Stacey with Ethan and Toby and decides she has more in common with them then he does and they break up.  He also admits he may be into Claudia. Stacey’s barely upset about it.  Toby leaves and Stacey gives him a quick kiss good-bye but knows she won’t stay in touch.   Ethan comes back after his art exhibit and he and Stacey have a nice moment and make plans to see each other again.  And Wes got the teaching job.

Oh, and Stacey asks Claudia to help decorate for the party since she’s an artist, and they sort of make up. There’s no big discussion, Stacey just says how she misses being friends and Claud says she does too, and they smile at each other.  We don’t see a huge amount of interaction after that, so who knows if it will last.

High/Lowlights

• So, the total ex-boyfriend list is: Pete, Toby, Sam, Robert, and Ethan.  That’s not counting Wes, since he was a crush, not a boyfriend.  I think the only guys not mentioned are that guy she met in Super Special 3 and the guy she went on one date with right when she met Robert. 

• Stacey begs her dad to go to Times Square on New Year’s Eve.  The most ridiculous part’s this is at 6:00 at night and her dad says he doesn’t want to stand out there for six hours.  Stacey says they’ll go to dinner first, which they do, and Stacey mentions getting there an hour before the ball drops.  And yet not only do they manage to get fairly close, Stacey gets interviewed by a TV reporter.  That everyone she knows sees.  Of course.

• Now I’ve never gone to Time Square on New Year’s Eve.  But I know a lot of people who have and said it was a completely miserable experience.  You have to get there hours before midnight to even get within site of the ball, and once you get there you can’t leave, can’t go buy food, can’t walk around, can’t use a bathroom, anything.  And when I say hours I don’t mean 2-3, I mean 10-12.  You just stand there all day.  So, Stacey’s little adventure was annoyingly unrealistic.

• Even if they’re friends, it’s kind of ballsy of Ethan to show up at Stacey’s house un-announced when he knows she has a boyfriend. 

• Stacey’s first thought for a New Year’s resolution was to pick better colored clothes.  But she decides she’s not that shallow.  At least she acknowledges it.

• I have a hard time believing Stacey would agree to let Toby come see her.  She gave Mallory such a hard time for wanting to go out with him, and kept saying how he couldn’t have changed, but as soon as he gives HER attention, she changes her mind.  It’s not like she’s hard up for a guy’s attention.

• Stacey tells us when she and Ethan “go out for coffee” they don’t actually drink coffee cause they’re too young.  Which I kind of like, because in a past book where she talked about them going for coffee I complained about her being too young for that.  If this wasn’t written 13 years ago, I could pretend I influenced the ghostwriters.

• In this book Stacey says that she and Claudia still sit at the same lunch table they always sat at, but this contradicts what Claudia said in her last book.  Maybe it changed since then?

• Stacey never told her mom about Toby.  I guess it makes sense she wouldn’t have at the time, but since the divorce Stacey and her mom are supposedly close, and they talk about boys sometimes, so I’m surprised she wouldn’t have mentioned a guy in Sea City.

• It’s kind of random that Stacey and Claudia just make up with almost no preamble. Stacey just says she misses being friends and Claudia’s all, “me too!”  And…it’s over just like that?  An apology didn’t really work before.  Granted, it was a really, really, crappy apology, but this was too.

• Toby’s email address is “tobythegreat” – that should tell Stacey everything she needs to know.

• When Mr. Zizmore says he’s moving to Houston, Pete makes a “Houston we have a problem” joke.  As always, it feels super weird to see pop-culture references to things that happened after I stopped reading the books.

• Stacey says that Wes substituted for Mr. Zizmore after student teaching.  I don’t remember this at all.

• Wasn’t Stacey really embarrassed about what happened with Wes?  Why is she excited at him coming back as a teacher?  And why is the teacher who knows this girl had a crush on him giving her his email address.  It’s so she can let him know the party details, but it’s also a little inappropriate, right?

• Pete’s talking to Stacey about Wes and says he didn’t think he was “such a hot teacher.” And I was like, well most 13-year-old guys wouldn’t call another guy good looking. But then I realized he just meant Wes was a bad teacher, not that he wasn’t good looking.

• When Stacey polls her friends, Kristy says she shouldn’t let Toby visit and Mary Anne says she should.  I’m very surprised about that from Mary Anne.  But maybe she was nostalgic for Alex or something.  Who, BTW, does get mentioned.  Toby says he also broke up with his girlfriend and that he and Mary Anne could have a chance.  If you know, they lived in the same state.

• Stacey and Pete get called to the office (about the party planning).  They call Pete as “Peter,” which makes me wonder why they don’t call Stacey “Anastasia.”  It’s her full name, so that’s what should be on school paperwork and all that.  If they don’t use a nickname for Pete, why do they do it for her?

• Stacey wonders if it’s normal to have so many ex-boyfriends at 13.  No.  It is not.  But to be fair, most people aren’t 13 for like ten years.   Most of her relationships lasted a while.

• The first time they mention baby-sitting’s on page 74.  And we just hear how Norman and Sarah Hill went to bed early so Stacey had time to herself.  What’s interesting is I didn’t even think about sitting until then either.

• The principal tells Stacey and Pete one of them should give a speech.  Pete tells Stacey to do it since he can’t talk in front of people.  Isn’t he like….the president of the 8^th grade?

• Toby refers to his parents as “the rents” and Stacey has no idea what he means.  He also talks about using “the cellular.” And refers to a computer as “the emailer.”  Did people ever use those terms?  Like, in real life?

• The party’s after Mr. Zizmore’s last day, on a Saturday night.  And it’s a surprise.  So you would have thought they’d have a say goodbye scene on this last day of teaching.  If I was a teacher and no one did anything on my last day, I’d be kind of insulted. 

• Actually, the whole party’s weird if you ask me.  It’s great that they want to do something for the guy, but I would expect to do it in class or something.  Or right after school if old students (like Sam) are showing up. 

• When Stacey says her friend Toby’s visiting, Jeremy assumes he’s a girl.  Isn’t it mainly a guy’s name?  Stacey doesn’t correct him, but it’s not like he can complain either way, considering all the time he spends with Claudia.

• Would Toby’s parents really just drop Toby off at Stacey’s house for a few hours and not even want to come in to meet her mom/make sure it’s okay?  Toby was a mother’s helper in Sea City too, right?  So I don’t think his parents even met her.  And they just leave him there?

• Toby’s kind of obnoxious when he meets Ethan, saying how he and Stacey had a “summer vacation thing.”  Stacey’s much more impressed that Ethan just tells Toby he knows Stacey from the city.  She’s easy to impress.

• Jeremy thinks Stacey has more in common with the other guys he was seeing her with, which means Ethan and Toby.  But I don’t think she has anything in common with Toby, and the only thing she has in common with Ethan’s NYC.

• I kind of love that Mr. Zizmore is leaving because his wife is smart enough to get a job at NASA. 

• So it’s sort of implied that Stacey and Ethan will get back together.  The girl could really afford taking some time to herself.

“My parents don’t tell me what to read and what not to read”…………BSC FF # 5: Kristy Power

Recap

The back of the book tries to make it sound like it’s about Kristy and Cary Retlin bickering with each other, but it’s really a PSA about why banning books is bad.  Which is really annoying, because I ALREADY think it’s bad and don’t need convoluted plots to convince me. 

Anyway, Kristy’s English teacher had a baby and while she’s on maternity leave her class has a new teacher, Mr. Morely.  Mr. Morley’s young and encourages everyone to call him “Ted.”  He gives the class two assignments.  The first is to pick a novel from a list he gives out and do a report on how it makes them feel, and the second is to write a biography on someone else in the class.  He assigns pairs for the biography part and Kristy and Cary get partnered up.  They try and say they can’t work together because it worked out badly last time, but Ted insists.

Now, it turns out that list of books Ted gave out was questioned by some parent who thinks the books on it contain filth and violence and all sorts of crap like that.  It also turns out that because Ted was new, he didn’t know he was supposed to run all assignments past the head of the English department.  I think this is to make it seem like Ted did something wrong even if you don’t care about banning books, and make the whole situation more dire. The head later says she would have approved the list, so I don’t know why they bother with that whole point.  But whatever.  

I guess the parents are putting a lot of pressure on the school, because Ted’s suspended, his job’s in danger, there’s a big meeting about it the whole town goes to, etc.  It seems like it should be the B plot, but it felt like we spent more time on it.   That may just be because it annoyed me so much.  Kristy ends up encouraging her class to support Ted, and she speaks at the meeting about it.  And ultimately he gets reinstated.  Obviously.

As for the Cary stuff: Kristy’s at his house to interview his siblings for the biography project and walks by his room after using the bathroom. She can’t resist taking a peak and looking around his room.  She sees a notebook that she thinks is his homework, but then she realizes it’s a journal.  (At least she thinks it’s a journal).  It’s talking about getting kicked out of school and loading things on a computer and hating people for being “phonies.”   Now, the use of the word “phony” made me think of Catcher in the Rye, because I remember Holden Caulfield using the word a lot.  I may only have thought of it because that was one of the first books mentioned on Ted’s list.  I thought Cary was doing his project on Catcher in the Rye and that we were going to find out the “journal” was just his version of notes about the book.  I figured Kristy would keep thinking it was his journal and somehow embarrass herself about the whole thing, but ultimately find out she was wrong.  I was only partially right. 

So, Kristy feels super guilty about it, and tries to forget what she saw/pretend it never happened.  But she lets it slip to Cary that she read it. Cary’s super pissed and barely talks to Kristy for days.  He supports her when she says they should defend Ted, but totally shuts down after that.  Then, at a meeting with Ted (after his job’s reinstated), Ted asks Cary how his novel’s coming and says how great it must be to be able to write by hand instead of needing a computer (like he does).  Kristy realizes it wasn’t a journal and is mad at Cary for letting her think she did something so wrong.  But Cary tells her it’s just as personal because he puts a lot of himself into his stories.  Kristy ultimately apologizes to him and they sorta make up.

High/Lowlights

• The two projects are each 50% of Kristy’s grade.  So, if this teacher came in the middle of the semester, how can his two projects be their entire grade? It’s kind of disrespectful to the teacher who started the year.

• Books on the offending list: Catcher and the Rye, A Separate Peace, Homecoming, The Outsiders, The Red Pony, and probably others.

• Kristy has a Christmas party that she describes as a “real party” not just girls sleeping over but with dancing and music and guys and all that. I guess it’s a sign she’s maturing, from her immature days years ago back in 8^th grade when she had sleepovers.

• We get a reference to another BSC book that talked about how much banning books suck.  I get the point already BSC!

• Kristy’s disappointed that Mary Anne isn’t excited about her party, but then she realizes it must be because she “just” broke up with her boyfriend.  But I think that’s about two months ago by this point.  Mary Anne needs to get over it.  She’s the one that ended it, and I get it would still be hard, but really.

• Kristy sees kids talking excitedly in the halls and wonders if it’s about the space shuttle or something.  Which just seems like a really random thing to reference.  But it turns out everyone is just talking about Ted.

• 8^th Grade seems kind of young to have kids calling the teacher by their first name.  Maybe I’m just getting old.

• Okay, Cary cracks me up.  Kristy asks what state he was born in and he says “a state of innocence.”  Then she asks about his first memory and he says he “can’t recall.”  I can see how that would annoy her, but I think it’s funny.  Especially the second one.

• Claudia and Jeremy were partners in the biography thing.  So, this causes a bit of angst with Stacey and Claudia.  I wish we’d seen more of it.  It causes tension because Claudia mentions a story that Jeremy hadn’t told Stacey yet, and says how Jeremy told her about his most meaningful experience.  That one scene alone was more interesting than the rest of the book put together.

• Logan’s partner in the biography thing is that Rachel girl.  It would have been really interesting to hear some of what went on between them, but sadly we don’t hear a thing.  This makes sense, since the book is from Kristy’s POV, but still.  Anytime we got to hear Logan’s voice over the course of the series it was with him and Mary Anne together and happy.

• We meet some girl named Merrie, whose mother’s the driving force behind the whole protest thing.  So the kids aren’t super nice to her, but she ends up defending Ted at the big meeting in front of her mother.  Brave move, but she’s going to have a hard time when she gets home after that. 

• The one issue I had with this book…..it takes place in Connecticut.  It’s a pretty liberal area.  So, while I believe that there may be a couple parents who would freak out about certain books, I don’t believe it would be enough to get a teacher to get suspended and cause a huge crowd at a school board meeting.  Especially if the teacher had the support of the head of his department and the principal.  AND if the books are all pretty much classics. They’d probably just talk to the teacher and make a new rule or something. That’s what they did in my school when someone’s parent complained that they showed us Heaven and Earth, which has a rape scene in it.  After that we had to get permission slips for any movie a teacher showed that wasn’t rated G.

• Cary has MC Escher drawings and Salvador Dali paintings (prints, I’m assuming) in his room.  And a bulletin board full of weird newspaper headlines.  I think he must be a really interesting guy.

• In class, Cokie Mason asks about their assignments and gets ready to take super-detailed notes about them.  But since when does Cokie even think about schoolwork?

• Kristy hears teachers in the hallway talking about how they support Ted because of the 1^st Amendment.  So, Kristy goes to the library to look up what that is.  And while I appreciate that she puts the effort in to do this, and that Ann M Martin’s trying to teach kids about free speech, it is really annoying to read about when I am very familiar with all that information.

• This thing about not turning in the list for approval is silly.  Ted says how his old school was a private school and lesson plans were at his discretion.  But if he came in the middle of the year, he would probably have notes from the teacher he was replacing about what she was teaching.  And I would expect him to do his own thing, but it shouldn’t seem like he was going totally from scratch.

• Plus, again, the head ends up saying she would have approved the list.  So it’s pointless.

• When Cary interviews Sam about Kristy, Sam tells him about the “Spaghetti Episode.”  Kristy’s all horrified that Sam would do this but then tells us she isn’t going to explain.  Totally unfair.  If they’re going to give us a super-boring book, they could at least give us an embarrassing story or two.

• So, Watson calls the school to give his support for Ted and Claudia’s mom speaks at the school board meeting (being a librarian and all).  The BSC parents sure are activist-y.  It must be where the girls get it.

• Kristy’s elected to speak on behalf of her class at the big school board meeting for Ted.  And she talks about being nervous about it.  Really?  Since when is Kristy nervous about speaking in public?

• Mallory, Jessi, Abby, and Shannon all show up for Kristy’s party. As does Dawn, who’s there for Christmas.  They barely get any screen time, but we see them all mentioned, which I think is a good thing.

• I can’t believe Kristy was my favorite character at one point, and I've liked her Friends Forever books the least.

• If Cary's writing a novel, he sort of sucks since what we saw was really a lot like Catcher in the Rye.  Just with the word computer thrown in.

• Ted shows up at Kristy's party. Which seems really inappropriate to me.  Even if her parents were home.

• At the party, Mary Anne keeps avoiding Logan.   Like, if she walks into a room and sees him she goes into another room.  I can understand how she’d feel, but it’s kind of annoying to hear about her being so awkward about the whole thing.

• Speaking of Logan at the party, he ends up chatting with Emily Bernstein.  Kristy doesn’t know if that means anything, but it’s mentioned like it could be. I don’t think they’d actually work as a couple.  Logan didn’t seem to like when Mary Anne managed to be a little assertive, and Emily’s much more assertive than Mary Anne.

• Kristy DOES ask Mary Anne if it’s okay to invite Logan to the party.  She thinks it would be weird not to ask him since all his friends would be there.  And Mary Anne says okay.   But like I said, she gets all awkward about it.

• What I like about Ted’s first assignment is that he tells them to do the report on a book they are passionate about.  So, if they don’t like the first one they start, pick another until they do.  Which seems like an interesting approach to get kids into reading.

• The problem with the biography part of the assignment is all the 8^th graders in this school already wrote their autobiographies, so the kids should just swap those as source material.

• Back when Kristy’s dog Louie died, didn’t we hear that he was named after the song Louie Louie?  Or did David Michael just like the song because of the name.  Cause Cary asks Kristy why they named him that she says, “it just came to us.”  I don’t have a copy of that book to check.

“For the first time in weeks I felt I had someone I could really talk to”…..BSC FF # 4: Claudia and the Friendship Feud

Recap

To set the scene for this book - Claudia and Stacey are still fighting, and Claudia’s still upset about her dating Jeremy.  These Friends Forever books are pretty soapy so far, I’m a fan.

A sitting job comes up for the Pikes and Stacey and Claudia are the only ones free.  Stacey claims she can’t do it and suggests they call Erica Blumberg and see if she can help out.  She can, and agrees to sit.  Claudia and Erica get along great, and Claudia feels like she has a new friend.  They start hanging out and spending more time together.  Even though Erica hates shopping, she goes along with Claud and seems to have fun.  But Claudia can’t stop talking about Stacey and even calls Erica, “Stace.”  Eventually Erica snaps about it and tells her off.

Claudia keeps running into Jeremy in the hall at school and he keeps chatting with her and saying he wants to be friends.  Stacey’s obviously not happy with this, and ends up confronting Claudia at school and telling her to “stay away.”  This makes Claudia even madder, which I think is what happens whenever someone’s told to stay away from someone.  She ignores the order, of course.  At one point, Jeremy talks about how it’s hard to be friends with Claud because Stacey’s definitely still his girlfriend and he wants to be loyal to her.  But he also says how he still does want to be friends.  And he gets switched into Claudia’s English class at the end, which suggests they’ll still be talking.  Or that he’s really dumb and needs to be in the slower class.

Then Claudia and Stacey both end up having to sit for the Pikes together and the kids try and get them to make up.  Stacey gives Claudia this whole talk about how she misses Claud and forgives her for telling Jeremy about Ethan, and she’s happy Claudia has taken her order about not talking to Jeremy.  Claudia says she misses her too, but she can’t get past the boyfriend stealing and the mean things Stacey said.  Later, she decides Erica’s a better friend and apologizes to her.

Meanwhile, Thanksgiving’s coming up and Claudia has been spending time with her Aunt Peaches who has an old friend coming to town.  Peaches tells her how she and this woman were best friends, even though they haven’t seen each other in years.  But she says that in college they fought over a guy before and got past it, so Claudia and Stacey might be able to as well.  Peaches is still nervous about seeing the friend because she’s so successful in her career, but it ends up going fine.  And of course the woman’s all impressed that Peaches has a great family and all that.  I think the point’s to get Claudia thinking about friendship.  And maybe to say that women having kids is just as valid a choice as choosing a career?  (Although that seems slightly less feminist than what Ann M. Martin usually goes with).

High/Lowlights

• It’s kind of random how when they need an extra sitter they just randomly decide to call Erica. Claudia makes a comment that she’s not a “regular dues paying member,” which I think is weird cause it suggests she’s connected to them somehow.  I would think that’s how they’d describe Abby or Jessi or someone who used to be in the club. 

• Claudia says that she overslept one day, and didn’t realize until she got to school that she was wearing one orange sock and one brown one.  I am pretty confident that Claudia wore mismatched socks on purpose many times so I’m not sure what the issue is.

• Janine keeps making fun of Claudia’s clothes.  I didn’t think she was fashionable enough to know when someone looked ridiculous.  I guess she really is a genius though.

• Of course, Janine did once ask Claudia for fashionadvice.  But that was due to the influence of a guy, and I guess even geniuses make mistakes when it’s a matter of teenage love. 

• Claudia says she didn’t always love shopping, it was only Stacey who got her so into it.  I guess we can’t prove that false because we didn’t know Claudia before she knew Stacey, but it seemed like Claudia was already into fashion and buying crazy outfits back in book 1.  That suggests she would have been into shopping.

• When Claudia keeps babbling about Stacey, she mentions that Stacey likes pigs.  Which I like, because I love mentions of random facts from old books.

• When Claudia and Erica go shopping we get a mention of Macy’s and Old Navy.  Don’t they usually use non-real store names when the girls are shopping?  Unless they’re talking about Stacey shopping in fancy NYC stores. You know Claudia didn’t buy Ms. Frizzle clothes at Old Navy.

• Erica tells Claudia that she’s adopted, and Claudia tells her all about her own adoption paranoia.    Which again, I like because of the old book reference.

• Since Mallory’s in town for Thanksgiving, the girls have a BSC reunion with her, Abby, and Jessi.  Only they have two separate ones, one with Stacey and one with Claud.  But we only see the one with Claudia, since she’s narrating this book.  It’s rather tame.

• Claudia starts sitting with Erica at lunch, and Stacey has apparently been sitting with Jeremy.  And Claud mentions that she hasn’t seen Abby in a while, so I guess she has been sitting elsewhere too.  It feels a little sad to see the girls splitting up like that, but it’s certainly realistic. 

• The Peaches plotline’s kind of boring, but we do get to hear about her meet cute story with Russ.  In college, she had a crush on some guy but hadn’t told anyone.  The guy ends up hitting on Molly (her friend) who was pretty happy about it.  By the time Molly finds out that Peaches liked him, she’s already into the guy and doesn’t want to give him up.  They get in a fight at the library and when the student librarian comes to tell them to shut up, Molly leaves, and Peaches starts to cry. The librarian takes her out for coffee and turns out to be Russ, her future husband. 

• The Molly/Peaches fight about the guy doesn’t really work as a comparison, since there’s a difference between going out with a guy you had no idea your friend liked and encouraging a friend to go after a guy, then turning around and going out with him yourself.

• Peaches makes some comment about how she gave up a successful career to have children, but didn’t she have a baby within the last year?  It’s not like she has been away from the work world forever and couldn’t go back.

• Erica seems pretty creative and has a lot of fun in an art store with Claudia (a lot more than in the clothing/accessory stores).  So she and Claudia do make a good pair.   We never really get to see Claudia working with others on art projects, unless you count when Ashley first showed up.

• Also, ages ago I read a fan fiction story that took place when the girls were in 12^th grade.  It had Claudia being BFFs with Erica, which makes so much more sense now.  It was actually a really good story that focused on Mary Anne and Stacey as BFFs, but Claudia made some appearances.

• Stacey’s really pretty self-involved and bitchy if she thinks she should be the one forgiving Claudia and not the other way around.  They both said mean things, but Stacey made the first offense.  AND what she said was a lot meaner, at least IMO.

• Jordan Pike gets a crush on Erica, so after the initial sitting job, Mrs. Pike requests her and Claudia come back to sit.  And Claudia just says okay, without even talking to the other club members.  I get that they decided to be more laid back about the club, but it’s weird to see them just randomly change behavior and not have any issues with the new way of doing things.

• Claudia mentions how on Thanksgiving the TV stays on all day because of the parade and football, but that she usually doesn’t watch TV.  Which, I never really thought about, but none of the girls seem to.  Which seems strange to me, cause I’ve always watched a ton of TV.  But I guess they didn’t want to have pop culture references that were dated by mentioning specific shows.  As if anything in a BSC book could be dated.

“For some reason being part of a couple with Logan didn’t feel right”……..BSC FF # 3: Mary Anne’s Big Breakup

Recap

Lately, Mary Anne has just not been into things when it comes to Logan.  She doesn’t look forward to their dates and doesn’t even really enjoy them.  She’s also annoyed that he still tries to take control of things, like where they go on their dates/what they do.  So, she breaks up with him.  Logan’s surprised and upset about it, and tries to convince her to change her mind.  He tells her he only seems to make decisions for her because he knows her so well.  But Mary Anne’s firm and ends it.

Even though she called it off, Mary Anne’s still upset about the breakup, and she doesn’t like that the kids at school are talking about it. Everyone is really surprised about the split, but most people are understanding and tell Mary Anne she did the right thing.

However, Logan’s friends take his side and keep giving Mary Anne dirty looks in the hall at school.  Mary Anne’s upset that they’re taking sides and says she wishes she could stay friendly with Logan’s friends herself, but it doesn’t seem like an option.  Meanwhile, Kristy says she still considers Logan a friend and Mary Anne feels all weird about that.  She even worries that Kristy and Logan are going to go to a dance together.  They don’t, but Kristy tries to suggest that Mary Anne shouldn’t mind if she did, which I don’t really agree with.  Later Kristy says she wouldn’t go even if Logan asked, so she was probably just annoyed at Mary Anne for suggesting it or something.

Pete Black and some guy named Dave that I don’t think existed before each ask Mary Anne to go to the upcoming school dance, but she says she’s not ready to go out with anyone else.  The night of the dance she wants to hang out with friends, but they all have other plans.  She ends up being home alone and when Logan calls, she invites him over to watch a movie.  He tries to tell her she may be upset about the fire and isn’t thinking straight.  He also says that he doesn’t really try to control her, that’s just how she sees things.  Mary Anne says she can only see things the way she can see them.  She’s upset again when Logan leaves, but she still knows the split is for the best and the end’s pretty optimistic.

High/Lowlights

• I really like that in this book the break up happens early on, and the rest of it is about the fallout.  Because when Mary Anne and Logan originally split up it happened at the end of the book, and we never saw anyone’s reaction to the whole thing.

• Mary Anne says she and Logan went to Renwicks (a café) on their first date, but I’m pretty sure a dance was their first date.  When she kicked her shoe across the room? Or maybe that party Stacey threw for Mary Anne’s birthday happened first. But the first date wasn’t at a restaurant.

• Mary Anne ‘s talking to Dawn about how she’s changed she they first met and since Mary Anne first met Logan.   They say how her hair was still in braids when she met Logan.  Except it totally wasn’t, she stopped wearing her hair in braids six whole booksbefore Logan came to Stoneybrook.  This is not a small detail ghostwriter.

• Logan lends Mary Anne a box he kept with everything she ever wrote to him in, so she can recreate her journal that was lost in the fire.  She finds this picture from when she cut her hair and says Kristy took it to use when she told Logan about the cut.  But again, that’s totally not what happened.  Logan saw her hair before Kristy did, and Kristy was all pissed off about it, so of course she didn’t take a photo.

• I know this is a new series, but you’d think they’d still pay some attention to continuity.

• One of the notes Mary Anne wrote was from when they got back together says how she felt like half a person without Logan.  Which her current self is kind of horrified about.

• There’s one Claudia outfit, but nothing too outrageous.  All we get to hear is that she wore painter’s coveralls with a daisy pattern she made herself on it.  I’m disappointed we don’t get to find out if she has a real daisy in her hair or shoes or something to tie it all together. Cause you know she would have.

• Kristy remembers this “together but independent” thing Mary Anne and Logan did in Hawaii, where they tried not to do everything together.  She says, “remember when we all went to Hawaii and….?”  Only Kristy didn’t go with them.  That error doesn’t bother me as much as the earlier ones, but it’s still annoying.

• We hear about how Logan’s teammates are taking his “side,” but isn’t Pete Black on one of those teams?  Cause asking Mary Anne out sure isn’t taking his side.

• It really annoys me that on the cover they show Mary Anne with her old haircut.  Especially when they say she has chin-length hair in the book.

• Stacey and Claudia are still barely speaking in this book.  It makes BSC meetings a little bit awkward.

• Stacey encourages Mary Anne to go out with Pete, saying how she got to know him when they did a movie project together. But I think Mary Anne already thought highly of Pete because of that young author project they did. She always defended him after that.  (And SMS sure had a lot of projects, didn't they)?

• Also, didn't Stacey sort of date Pete at one point?  It seems weird to try and set him and Mary Anne up after that.

• A sign that this book’s definitely different from the original series…..Mary Anne goes Apple/Pumpkin picking with Kristy’s family, and they make a point of saying it’s NOT a sitting  job. So, even though we hear that Karen got stuck in a tree, we don’t have to deal with getting her out.

• Mary Anne has a sitting job for Logan’s siblings after the breakup, and she’s worried it’s going to be awkward.  But Mrs. Bruno’s super nice to her while his brother and sister give her a hard time.  So, Mary Anne thinks Mrs. Bruno doesn’t know yet.  And I totally get a guy not telling his mother about getting dumped, but it seems weird to then tell your nine-year-old sister and five-year-old brother about it.

• Mary Anne’s really surprised when this Dave guy asks her out.  He asks if she’s going to the dance and she says, “why, do you want me to work on some committee?”  Then she thinks how it’s been so long since a guy asked her out.  But who ever asked her out besides Logan?  Alex in Sea City’s the only one I can think of.

• Everyone keeps pointing out that Mary Anne/Logan broke up before and got back together.  And Mary Anne points out how they thought they worked out their issues, but the same problems keep coming back.  So, she's convinced it’s for real this time.  I’m glad she stays firm about it.

• Dawn tells Mary Anne that Mary Anne always defined herself by her relationship to someone/something else (her dad, the BSC, Logan).  And she says Mary Anne should try to figure out what she really likes for herself.  Which I agree with in principle, but Dawn sounds rather bitchy when she says it. 

• At the end, Kristy, Claudia, and Stacey come by to see how Mary Anne’s doing (the morning after the dance).  They don’t plan this, they just all happen to show up at the same time, and go up to Mary Anne’s bedroom to see her. This seems unlikely, but I'll go with it. A few minutes later they go downstairs and see a note from Richard and Sharon that they went to the barn (where they’re starting construction on the new house).  But they must have been there to let the girls in, so why not just tell them, go up to see Mary Anne, we’re on our way out?

“I totally mind. I can’t believe you would betray me like this”……BSC FF # 2: Stacey vs. Claudia

Recap

I have to say right off, I liked this a lot more than the first Friends Forever book (which I didn’t dislike, it was just a bit different in tone).  Early on Stacey gets annoyed because Ethan (still her current boyfriend) signed up for some art class on Sundays.  Since he lives in NYC, the weekend’s the only time the two can see each other, so the class limits that.

Then Stacey notices a new guy at school – Jeremy who she thinks is totally cute, cool, etc.  So does Claudia.  At first Stacey’s encouraging Claud, since she still has a boyfriend (even though she’s very into Jeremy).  Then she and Ethan have another fight because he has to work on the next Saturday and won’t be able to see her.  They end that call by saying they should “cool things down.”  Stacey asks if this means they are breaking up, and Ethan says no they’re just changing things.  But Stacey still thinks of it as a breakup.  Anyway, she decides that she still needs to be a good friend and support Claudia’s interest in Jeremy.  She even helps arrange a “date” by inviting Jeremy and Claudia to go to the mall with her (as a group) to introduce Jeremy to the area.  Only then she “gets sick” and can’t go with them.  Claudia has a great time and is even more interested in Jeremy.  She keeps drawing him/sculpting him (without his knowledge, obviously).

However, Jeremy shows up at Stacey’s house the next day to see how she is.  He says he’s only into Claudia as a friend and wants to go out with Stacey.  She says she has to talk to Claud first.  She actually writes out note cards about how much she values Claudia’s friendship, to make sure she gets this across to Claud when talking to her.  Her logic is that Jeremy isn’t going to be dating Claudia no matter what, so why shouldn’t SHE date him.  However, when she delivers the news to Claud she skips all the friendship crap and just spits out the news that Jeremy asked her out.  Then she asks if Claudia minds if she says yes.  Claudia says, yes, she does mind and says Stacey is betraying her.  They get into a huge fight about it, and Stacey decides she’ll say yes to Jeremy anyway.

They keep fighting for the rest of the book….after Stacey and Jeremy have a successful date, Claudia mentions Ethan to Jeremy. He gets upset at Stacey for not mentioning she had a boyfriend.  Stacey insists she and Ethan are over and she and Jeremy arrange to go out again.  That night, Ethan shows up at her house right before Jeremy’s supposed to be there.  (Since he apparently meant it when he said cooling things down wasn’t the same as a break up).  But he and Stacey really break up and she goes out with Jeremy.   The book ends without Stacey and Claudia resolving their fight, which is realistic, but a bit surprising.

They only real subplot is that some girl named Rachel moved back to Stoneybrook, after moving away in fifth grade.  Apparently, Rachel didn’t get along with Kristy, Claudia, or Mary Anne back then.  Claudia used to hide from her because Rachel called her a wimp and taunted her into climbing a tree….that she then got stuck in.  But Stacey likes Rachel and they bond and become friendly.  Rachel even gives her some advice about Jeremy. I kept thinking that we were going to find out Rachel was purposely encouraging Stacey to hook up with Jeremy to hurt Claudia, but that didn’t happen.  I also thought we were going to find out Rachel and Jeremy were step-siblings, because it seemed weird that there would be two new kids at the exact same time.  But that didn’t happen either.  The book ends with Stacey and Rachel on good terms.

High/Lowlights

• Foreshadowing for the next book, where Mary Anne and Logan breakup (again) - when Stacey’s checking out Jeremy in the hall, she talks to Mary Anne about how cute he is.  Mary Anne says she has been noticing cute guys more and more lately.  She and Stacey decide it’s totally cool for them to notice other guys while having a boyfriend, but then get weirded out about the idea of the guys noticing other girls.

• Jeremy introduces himself by saying he is “Jeremy. Rudolph.”  Which of course he means his first name is Jeremy and his last name is Rudolph.  But Stacey and Claudia get all confused by this.  Apparently they think someone might actually give their child a first name of “Rudolph.”

• They also get confused when he says he’s from Olympia.  Which….really?  It’s not that small a town, is it?

• Kristy’s description of Rachel: “She’s like Lucy Van Pelt, HelgaPataki, and Angelica Pickles rolled into one.”  The pop-culture side of me is ashamed that I could not figure out who she meant at first. Especially considering I once interned for Nickelodeon.

• Stacey writes Claudia a note because she won’t get a chance to talk to her before lunch.  Only when she passes Claud the note in the hall, she stands there while Claudia reads it, then Claudia says how she’s sorry (about the Ethan breakup).  Why not just tell her?  My friends and I passed notes in the hall sometimes, but we didn’t stand in front of each other and read them.  The point was that you didn’t have time to wait while the person read it.  Especially if that person has Claudia’s reading skills.

• In this book we do hear about the girls having BSC meetings and baby-sitting.  We just don’t get full chapters devoted to the jobs. Stacey just mentions that after school she sat for the Rodowskys then went on with her angsting about Jeremy.  It makes it feel more similar to the original series, but it concentrated on the more interesting stuff.

• Has there ever been a book that had two of the girls’ names in the title?  I wasn’t sure who the narrator was until I opened it.

• Even before the fight, Stacey gets annoyed at all the spelling errors in Claudia’s note.  I think this is the first time anyone has complained about her spelling.   

• When Kristy tells the girls about Rachel being back, she says how her looks have changed and she’s not a “butterball” anymore.  She adds that she looks better than you’d have expected her to turn out.  Which is totally bitchy, but SO something a 13-year-old would say.

• The girls are all at Claud’s house before 5:30, and Kristy just says, “Well, as long as we’re all here, we might as well get started early.”  It’s kind of hard to believe she loosened up about things that much.  In theory, it’s only a couple books since she would stare at the clock doing a countdown.

• Ethan keeps leaving Stacey messages and she just ignores them cause she figures they are done and she no longer cares.  Which is kind of bitchy of her….it seems like she just used the no time together thing as an excuse to go after Jeremy.

• Part of me wants to say it’s good for Stacey to be nice with Rachel, because you shouldn’t be a bitch to someone just because your friend didn’t like them a few years ago.  But isn’t it also a bit disloyal to befriend someone who was actively mean to your BFF?  I’m not saying she should freeze Rachel out, but it seems like there should be more of a balance. 

• Apparently, Claudia and her ex, Josh, are actually doing a good job at staying friends.  They said it a couple times, so I’m wondering if it will become important.

• Claudia and Stacey’s fight is pretty vicious.  Stacey calls Claudia brainless for not being able to spell and says that her artwork isn’t that great.  She also calls Claud a loser, and tells her that no matter how much Claudia follows Jeremy around, he’ll never want to date her.  THEN she says they should stop before they say anything they regret.

• Claudia gets in some mean things as well, but I don’t think they’re as bad as what Stacey says to her.  Especially considering, she’s really the wronged one in this situation. But she says Stacey’s just stringing multiple guys along, that she’s stuck up, and  that 10 million people live in NYC, so Stacey should stop acting like it’s some big claim to fame. (Actually, I think that last part is more hilarious than mean).

• Stacey’s date outfit: “The blue thermal-knit shirt with the tow of small white buttons up the front….it was great with jeans.” Kind of boring.

• Abby’s around in this one…she’s at the lunch table with the other girls every day, which makes a lot of sense.  This may sound silly, but I’m glad they’re all still friends.

• We do get some additional BSC talk – they’re talking about how they want to schedule free time so they don’t all end up with jobs all weekend.  But since they still have people calling, they are still sometimes calling Logan as a backup sitter.  Which actually makes sense.  I’m surprised they wouldn’t still ask Abby to be a backup every once in a while too. 

• I don’t think Stacey’s behavior would be so bad except that she was encouraging Claudia to go after Jeremy.  If she said right off that she was interested in him, then things would have been different.  But she basically set Claudia up for pain.

• Stacey says how she and Ethan didn’t make time for each other over the summer.  Which is totally not what happened in Everything Changes.  But maybe there was another summer since then? You never know in BSC-land.

As an FYI - I'm leaving on vacation tomorrow, so it'll be a couple weeks until the next update.

“He has some…some important news for you”…..BSC FF #1” Kristy’s Big News

Recap

One night Kristy’s dad (Patrick) calls and he asks to speak to Charlie, Sam, and Kristy.  He says he’s getting married and wants them to come to the wedding.  Charlie hangs up after Patrick asks if they’re going to congratulate him. (Cause it’s kinda a douchey thing to say to the kids you abandoned). Sam and Kristy feel a bit weird about the whole thing, but both agree to go. 

After they get off the call, Charlie says he’s not going.  David Michael (who Patrick didn’t even both to say hello to) WANTS to go, but Kristy’s mom tells him he’s too young.  What I think she really mean is, he’s too young to hear, “you’re father’s a dick who doesn’t care about you. “ Eventually Kristy’s mom tells Charlie that if he doesn’t go, Sam and Kristy can’t, so Charlie takes one for the team and goes. They get to California (Sausalito) where Patrick lives and find out that he and his fiancé (Zoey) live in some huge house and work together at a restaurant she owns. Apparently, Patrick gave up sports writing to become chef there.  This surprises Kristy and her brothers because they always thought his leaving had to do with him being so dedicated to his job as a sportswriter.

They’re there a few days before the wedding and things are kind of awkward.  Charlie keeps insulting Patrick, while Sam and Kristy try to be nicer.  Patrick asks Charlie and Sam to be his best men, but only Sam agrees to it.  Zoey tries to get them to do some family bonding, but Charlie keeps throwing out bitter-ish comments.  Kristy spends a lot of time with Zoey, who keeps thinking Kristy will be into fashion issues and other “girl” stuff, which is clearly not true.  But this it’s okay, because Kristy actually really likes Zoey – Sam and Charlie seem to as well. Kristy’s problem comes in when she hears that Patrick and Zoey are planning on having kids.  For obvious reasons, this upsets her, but she still tries to act like she’s okay with things.

The night of the rehearsal dinner, Patrick finally asks Charlie to stop insulting him and act like a “good son.”  Charlie sort of goes off about that and talks about how Patrick’s leaving impacted them.  When Patrick tries to defend himself, Kristy comes to Charlie’s defense.  Charlie says he isn’t going to the dinner and Sam and Kristy stay with him.  But after Patrick leaves they start talking about good memories from when they were kids and how when you grow up you lower your expectations, and they decide to go to the dinner after all.

The wedding goes well and I guess Kristy ends up happy for her dad.  Back in Stoneybrook, she tells her mom about the wedding, who says she wants the best for Patrick.  Which I guess is easy to do after you’ve married a really generous millionaire.  No matter how annoying his kid is.  Kristy also talks to Claudia, Stacey, and Mary Anne about her dad and how she doesn’t know how she really feels about him.

High/Lowlights

• In Stoneybrook, Kristy’s amused that Andrew made a nest for his peas out of mashed potatoes before eating them.  Apparently, Charlie taught him to do this.  She’s even more amused (as am I) when she sees Charlie still does the same thing. 

• The first time Kristy mentions the BSC is on page 20.  She’s like, “I have mentioned the BSC, right.”?  But she hadn’t.  It felt weird.

• This book’s very light on any BSC members other than Kristy.  She talks to Mary Anne a bit before she leaves, and then mentions a BSC meeting at the end, but that’s about it.  I hope the other Friends Forever books aren’t the same, I like the girls interacting.

• Patrick and Zoey can’t pick the kids up from the airport, so they leave their car there and mail Charlie a key and directions to the house.  But how busy could they be, they both seem off work that week?

• I find it interesting, that they have Patrick and Zoey living together before they get married.  Now, I don’t have an issue with this, but it surprised me for a BSC book.

• I was happy to see that we do get some outfits in this book.  They’re not nearly as awful as some of the old-school ones though.

• Here’s Claudia: “Cutoff jeans over bicycle shorts, and suspenders she’d decorated with buttons.  Beneath that she was wearing a paint-splattered T-shirt, which she called her tribute to Jackson Pollock.”  It wouldn’t seem so bad if the book wasn’t taking place in 1999.

• So, the backstory chapter’s pretty much gone in this book.  Which I expected to be happy about, but it actually was a little disappointing. I guess I’m just not a big fan of change. We do get some background on all the members of Kristy’s family though.  And I didn’t notice this until after I finished, but the inside front cover has mini-bios of Kristy, Claudia, Mary Anne, and Stacey.

• The back of the book refers to Kristy being a bridesmaid, but this is never actually mentioned in the book.

• Kristy does get a new dress for the wedding: “It was velvety…colored a deep burgundy…with [a] regular neckline, right at [her] collarbone, and short sleeves.”

• One thing I thought was weird was that the day after Patrick calls, Kristy goes to see Mary Anne because she “needs her friends.”  But in Everything Changes, Kristy kept talking about how close she and Abby were getting.  And now she has a crisis and doesn’t even mention her?  I mean, obviously, the series is now just concentrating on the original 4.  And maybe Kristy wanted to talk to someone who knew her when her dad was around.  But it still felt a bit odd.

• Kristy says that Charlie took care of David Michael most of the time when Patrick left, but doesn’t that contradict her autobiography?  It said David Michael was in day care and Charlie took care of Sam and Kristy.

• Patrick keeps trying to yell at Charlie for being rude.  That’s pretty nervy of him.  I can’t believe he doesn’t EXPECT all his kids to be a bit angry with him.

• When Zoey suggests Kristy get a slip dress, Kristy’s worried she’ll look like she’s going around in her underwear like “last year’s rock star.”  Do you think she was being specific?  I can’t remember a musician doing that in the late 90s.

• Kristy also gets caught in a dress when trying it on.  It would be really amusing if this was a TV show or movie and we actually got to see it, but here it fell a bit flat.

• Claudia supposedly calls Princess Diana, “The late fashion-great.”  It always feels weird to hear the BSC refer to things that happened after I stopped reading. 

• Maybe there’s a rule about ugly clothes showing up in every BSC book.  Because Patrick and Sam pick out AWFUL tuxedos for the wedding: “They were a sort of unnatural yellow-orange…and [had] ruffled shirts with matching yellow-orange edging.” Even Kristy can tell they’re ugly, and Charlie, Kristy, and Zoey make Patrick exchange them. 

• The night before the wedding, Zoey sleeps in the room Kristy’s staying in, because of the whole curse thing.  That’s when Kristy tells Zoey how things went down with Patrick leaving her mom.  Zoey admits she knows, partially from Patrick, but also based on the fact that he had no pictures of the kids or stories about them that weren’t at least six years old.  But she’s still in love with him.

• At the rehearsal dinner, Kristy stands in for Zoey because it’s apparently bad luck for the bride to participate in the rehearsal.  Has anyone heard that one before?

• Apparently Patrick had a falling out with his brother and hasn’t spoken to him since.  He wrote back to the wedding invitation with “best wishes, but no way.”  Patrick’s sounding more and more like a winner. 

• After Charlie tells Patrick he never acted like a good father, Patrick’s all, “Well, I didn’t have a chance, did I? You didn’t exactly stay in touch.”  That’s his actual quote.  Which…really? I don’t even know where to start with that.

• Zoey’s father has been married 4 times, so we have all these scenes that (I think) are supposed to be comic relief with them all at the wedding not getting along.

• At one point, Patrick says that one reason he didn’t visit was because of Kristy’s mom, and suggests she would have made things hard if he tried to visit.  Yes, I’m sure the single mother of 4 children would have hated if someone offered to take them off her hands for an afternoon.

• Now, I should clarify, I don’t have a problem with Patrick deciding he wanted a divorce.  I don’t even have a problem with him wanting to move to California.  But this guy just moved out and never even told his wife he was going.  I really can’t see any excuse for that.

• At the end, there’s a scene where Kristy, Claudia, Stacey, and Mary Anne are looking at pictures of the wedding, and it reminded me of a scene at the end of the book where Kristy’s mom married Watson.  I doubt it was intentional, but it would be cool if it was.

• The other thing that bothers me about Patrick is how he tries to act like nothing happened.  Everyone makes mistakes in life, and I think they should be able to redeem themselves. However, they need to acknowledge that they did something wrong and apologize for it.

• Zoey says she knows Patrick has changed, but I would still have a hard time marrying (and having kids with) someone who had walked out on their family like that.