Review: "What Janie Found" by Caroline B. Cooney

What Janie Found by Caroline B. Cooney
Published 2000
★★★

The conclusion of the series—well, it was, until someone decided it would be a good idea to revive this series and upend everything we knew about the characters in books 1–4. But we're pretending that book 5 doesn't exist, so...the end of the series.

In What Janie Found, Janie finds some information that could put her face-to-face with her kidnapper. And because Janie is a teenager and impulsive and not great at making plans, she decides that the thing to do is make that happen—to visit her brother in Colorado and, hopefully, get some answers to the questions she still has. (Spoiler alert: Janie doesn't actually have much by way of questions. She wants to know what happened, sure, but the guesswork that has been done over the previous books basically answers that.)

This is the series book that I read the fewest times as a kid—once or twice—and my strongest memory is of the red cowboy boots Janie ends up with. I'd forgotten quite a lot about the book, which was nice (felt a little more like a new read than the previous books of the series), including just how dreadful Steven's girlfriend is. (Maybe worth noting that Steven is willing to break ties with someone who is a little too interested in his family history, while Reeve's much bigger betrayal is still reverberating and everyone is still actively trying to forgive him...though to be fair, Janie has a much, much greater history with Reeve than Steven does with Kathleen, and everyone else wants Reeve to be redeemable as well.)

Janie's not the brightest bulb in the box in this book. A lot of her decisions about Hannah, and trying to find Hannah, are suspect. What staggered me, though, is that she willingly leaves her (adoptive) father in hospital to go on this adventure even though it's not clear whether he'll live or die. This is a man she loves dearly, even if their relationship has gotten more complicated by the revelations of the past few books, and as an adult...I can't imagine willingly putting myself that far away from a parent whose survival was so uncertain. It's just...you can imagine a version of the story in which her father dies while she's chasing ghosts, can't you? And where she has to reckon with the fact that she was chasing those ghosts instead of being there at the end.

Ah well. At any rate, a satisfying enough conclusion to the series. Off I go to find the next childhood reread...

Review: "The Voice on the Radio" by Caroline B. Cooney

The Voice on the Radio by Caroline B. Cooney
Published 1996
★★★

Ah, yes. Book 3, in which Reeve proves that he is slime. In the earlier installments of this series, Janie discovered that she had been kidnapped as a child, went to live with her biological family, went back to her adoptive family...and now is navigating a long-distance relationship with Reeve, who has against all odds made it to college. The trouble is, the thing that interests Reeve most is the college radio station—and when he can't think of anything to say on air, he takes the juiciest story he can think of: Janie's. And he spills it to the world. Without changing a single name or detail.

Here's the thing: Reeve messes up here, big time. More than, I think, a 'good guy' of a contemporary YA book would be allowed to—this is such a staggering violation of Janie's trust and privacy that it's sort of hard to fathom. Even when listeners rave to Reeve about how well he's described things, how they'd recognize Janie if they saw her on the street (Janie's defining physical feature is her hair, which every single book of the series obsesses over), Reeve doesn't stop; when shit hits the fan, he decides that he'll have to drop out of college to stop himself from continuing to share all the intimate details that Janie and her family trusted him with.

So Reeve is scum. And in a contemporary book, I think he'd probably be the Wrong Guy of the book, the Boy Next Door Gone Bad, and there'd be another boy waiting bashfully in the wings to sweep in and make Janie see that there was someone else all along. But...in this series, he manages to stay in the picture, and even as I think Reeve is scum...I also think that's one of the most realistic things about the series. Because: teenagers do stupid things. (Adults do stupid things too.) And sometimes that's a reason to cut ties—and sometimes people do, and sometimes people don't, and the fact that Janie still loves Reeve, can't separate this awful thing he's done from pretty much every previous memory of him, makes their relationship so much more complex.

This is also the book in which we start to see a bit more of one of Janie's brothers, who were relegated to side characters in book 2. Everyone's growing up a bit, I guess. Except Reeve. Not my favorite of the books, but messy in an interesting way.

Review: "Whatever Happened to Janie?" by Caroline B. Cooney

Whatever Happened to Janie? by Caroline B. Cooney
Published 1993
★★★

Book 2! In The Face on the Milk Carton, Janie Johnson discovered that she was actually Jennie Spring...and in Whatever Happened to Janie?, she's forced to reckon with the truth of her identity when she is sent to live with her biological family.

This was the book of the series that most fascinated me as a kid, I think partly because I also had Twice Taken, in which Brooke discovers that she's actually Amy—the victim of a parental abduction—and is sent to live with her biological mother. (Oh gosh, I'm going to have to reread that now too. I loved that book.) That's a single book rather than a series, and plotwise it has the most similarities to this book, with the girls living with the parents they were taken from and having to wrestle with complex and messy feelings and new lives that they neither asked for nor particularly want. Twice Taken always struck me as markedly more realistic, for a number of reasons, but I was also fascinated by just...the physical differences between Janie's life as a Johnson and her life as a Spring, I guess. Cooney is really good about bringing in specific details about objects to give the reader more of a visual, and even years later I think of Janie squashing her life into her newfound sister's room and the personalized 'Jennie' objects that her family has gotten for her (and that she doesn't want).


The ending of the book is not, I think, super realistic—again, I think Twice Taken had it more right there. But as a nostalgia read? This holds up.

Review: "The Face on the Milk Carton" by Caroline B. Cooney

The Face on the Milk Carton by Caroline B. Cooney
Published 1990
★★★

Was anyone else obsessed with this series as a kid...? I read books 1 and 2 numerous times, book 3 at least a couple of times, and book 4...probably only once, actually. (And then book 5 came around and was so wildly inconsistent with the rest of the series that I'm pretending it doesn't exist for this reread. Probably. I'm not very good at sticking to 'I do not need to read this' resolutions, so...)

Anyway, 1990 kicked off this series about Janie Johnson, a high school student with for all intents and purposes a perfect life—until she picks up a milk carton and sees that the missing child printed on it is none other than herself. (The cover is a bad representation of this, because Janie's single defining feature is her masses of red hair—I'm surprised to see how few of the various covers of the book take note of that hair.) And this new knowledge turns her life upside down, because if she's not actually Janie Johnson but Jennie Spring, then...who are the parents she grew up with? Are they her kidnappers? And what does she do with this information?

YA of the 90s was so different than it is today—today, Janie would have a side plot about her dream to be a photographer or a fashion designer or a writer; she'd have creative ambitions and an interest in travel and probably be a lot wittier. But I kind of love that in the 90s, she's just, like...interested in weddings and clothing and doing the minimum required to get by. She's nice enough but rather spoiled and not that deep and doesn't really...mind. I read so many of Cooney's books as a kid (literally, all of them that I could get my hands on—planning to reread the Time Travelers series next), and despite the sometimes-grim content, this series still leaves me with a feel-good sense and an obsession with some of the details. Janie's red cowboy boots from book 4? Yes please.

Review: "From the Ground Up" by Noell Jett

From the Ground Up by Noell Jett
Published March 2022 via Thomas Nelson
★★

Jett grew up without a lot of money but with a whole host of religious restrictions, and when that particular form of religion fell out of the picture, things got harder for a while—and then she learned to monetize her life and build her dream house out of sponsorships and sponsorship money.

I read this because I enjoy house-building adventures as long as they're vicarious, and I also have an interest in cult memoir. Unfortunately, though this might be a good book for someone looking to be an influencer, it wasn't really the book for me—there's actually startlingly little about the house (I learned that there are porcelain counters and a brick accent wall, and...that's about it), which would interest me, but lots and lots about how to put your life on the Internet to get brand deals, which...doesn't interest me. I think part of this is because the book deal came about because someone reached out to Jett about writing a book, which is to say that the she took an opportunity that came to her rather than knowing that she had a story to tell in book form and telling that story. And obviously there's nothing wrong with that and she's found her readers—but it results in a different sort of story, and I ended up not being the reader for it.

I suspect, having read this, that the other book Jett got out of that collaboration might have more details about building the house, but I'm here for story rather than how-to, so I don't think I'll go looking for that one.

Review: "The Yacht" by S.L. Goodwin

The Yacht by S.L. Goodwin
Published January 2024 via Avon
★★★

It's supposed to be a fun weekend with friends—a yacht, a New Year's Eve party, plenty of booze and laughter to go around. But for Hannah, who is by far the least financially successful of her friends, things go sour almost immediately when she realizes how little friendship the others are actually willing to offer...and then things get much, much worse when the moored yacht is set adrift. Without any fuel. And they're out to sea, with no communications and very little food and a storm on the way, and the bodies start to pile up...

I love me a good locked-room mystery, and you can't get much more locked room than a boat out to see with a trapped group of passengers. That said...my favorite mysteries are the ones where I'm scared for the characters: scared that they won't survive. I like being devastated when characters I've connected with turn up dead. (I'll take it up with my imaginary therapist, I promise.) That's a lot harder to do when all or almost all of the characters prove themselves to be utterly dreadful people, mostly right away—because in that case I just start rooting for them to die sooner rather than later, and that's not nearly as fun.

The book did keep me guessing; I had some ideas (some better than others) but didn't know how things would turn out until, well, they turned out. A couple of things stretch the bounds of the imagination (how the survivors survive, for example), but I do like not being able to predict how things went down, or will go down, until they're revealed. The book didn't give me the yikes I had hoped for (I was sad about literally none of the deaths), but it was a fun read for a miniature reading rut.

Review: "Do I Know You?" by Sadie Dingfelder

Do I Know You? by Sadie Dingfelder
Published June 2024 via Little, Brown Spark
★★★★

Dingfelder knew she wasn't great at remembering faces—but mistaking another man for her husband at the grocery store (there's a whole thing about peanut butter) was one of the clearer clues that she just might have something more going on than a bit of spaciness. And so began a quest to figure it out: a seasoned reporter, Dingfelder reached out to scientist after scientist running studies on the brain to learn more about face blindness and other associated conditions...and to get herself into those studies to see where those conditions fit into her own experience.

I spent a fair amount of time, while reading, trying to come up with a fitting word for the book's tone, and for now at least I've landed on punchy. Dingfelder brings a lot of energy to the project, and although the book is full of research, it's never dry. The tone wasn't 100% for me—personal preference—but the science is fascinating and more than makes up for it. If you haven't heard of face blindness (prosopagnosia), have a look at some photos of people you recognize...and then flip those photos upside-down and see if how much more difficult it is to recognize them. There's science behind why some people can recognize other people instantly, even if it's been years, and others struggle to place the face of their own family member (guess which camp Dingfelder falls into)—and a lot of that science is worked into the book—but at its core, what you need to know is that it's not as simple as having a bad memory for names.

Face blindness sounds lonely to me. I've only met one person who identified as having it (though probably I've known other people with some degree of face blindness, whether or not they were aware of it), and I don't know what her experience was like (though I will be recommending this book to her!), but it sounds like something that can be really isolating without the sorts of tricks that Dingfelder learned along the way. But it's not all loneliness (and for all that I said that the tone wasn't always my personal preference, this bit made me giggle):

"I hardly remember anyone from school anymore," I say. "Honestly, I don't even remember your kids' names, or how old they are, or what you do for work, or where exactly you live."

"You've always been like that," Brown Anne says.

"No one expects you to remember things," Red Ann says. "We expect you to tell good stories."

My heart floods with joy and gratitude. These guys really know me! And while the facts of their lives slip through my fingers, I know them too—amorphous things, like the cadence of their speech, the kinds of drinks they will order, and how they will respond to my stories about learning to drive. (Red Ann: concern for my safety; Brown Anne: concern for other people's safety.) (loc. 1989*)

A very quick read for those who are insatiably curious about medical curiosities...or just insatiably curious in general.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

*Quotes are from an ARC and may not be final.

Review: "Bird Milk & Mosquito Bones" by Priyanka Mattoo

Bird Milk & Mosquito Bones by Priyanka Mattoo
Published June 2024 via Knopf
★★★★

The tap water in my current, grown-up family home is also hard, reminiscent of that summer. I use a built-in water filter most of the time, but if I ever make the lazy mistake of not wanting to walk downstairs, one sip from the wrong faucet takes me right back to the half-finished bathroom in Delhi, its tiny window, a spindly ray of sunlight worming its way through chemical clouds to illuminate one corner of that cursed space. (loc. 2255*)

There's a book that I've been meaning to read for a while, titled Home Keeps Moving—it's about growing up as a third-culture kid. The title seems apt for Mattoo as well: growing up in Kashmir and London and Saudi Arabia and the US, home kept moving. Home was meant to be Kashmir, where her parents were working from a distance to build a home and a life to move back to—but conflict devastated the region and devastated their chances of calling Kashmir home again. So home kept moving.

Mattoo writes early on about thinking that she could not be a writer because that conflict in Kashmir was not the story she wanted to tell: ...I didn't write at all, about anything, for a long time. I didn't know I was allowed. Brown pain, I learned as a small child in Western libraries, was interesting. Brown joy, brown ennui, spunky brown girl detectives—nowhere to be found. So, even though I worshipped books, I thought writing them was for other people. (loc. 234) So this is not a book about that conflict, but rather an exploration, in essays, of a childhood in and between places and an adulthood figuring out how to settle into her skin.

It took me a while to get into this, largely because it's marketed as a memoir and so I was expecting a more...oh, not a more linear narrative necessarily, but I didn't realize until well into the book that I was actually reading a collection of (mostly but not entirely chronological) essays. Still memoir, sure, but memoir-in-essays just requires a slightly different brain space. But with expectations adjusted, it's a beautiful work—Mattoo is so simultaneously unapologetic and wry about herself as a child in particular, describing herself as smart and stubborn and uncompromising in ways that did not always make her life easy. Some of the essays are better fits for me than others (I do tend to prefer those ones about childhood, though the way Mattoo talks about her family pressing her now-husband-then-boyfriend about marriage makes me laugh, because my Indian boyfriend's parents do the same thing on the regular), but they're exacting and with a wonderful sense for story. Well worth the read.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

*Quotes are from an ARC and may not be final.

Review: "Part of Your World" by Abby Jimenez

Part of Your World by Abby Jimenez
Published April 2022 via Forever
★★★

She's a doctor, and the next face of the hospital her family has built over generations. He's a small-town carpenter/mayor/BnB manager. Their lives shouldn't intersect...but they do.

I read a preview for this a while back and was entertained enough by baby farm animals and the promise of grilled cheese that I picked up the full version from the library. It's a solid story, but it ended up being not quite what I was looking for—I think I was expecting something a little lighter (baby farm animals and grilled cheese, dammit), but there ends up being a whole host of heavy themes: Alexis has a difficult family; Daniel has a difficult family; Alexis is dealing with the fallout of an unhealthy relationship; Alexis's friends are...not always exactly the friends you would want; there's a secondary character in a very abusive relationship; and so on and so forth. And the thing is, that's not a <i>bad</i> thing: yes please to more complex themes in romance! But I could have done with one fewer here (maybe taking out Daniel's family storyline?), and also the loss of the woo-woo stuff, because I lose interest the second things turn supernatural.

That said: it's good writing and interesting characters, and I'll keep the rest of the series in mind when I'm looking for something lightish but not too fluffy. But...next time, if grilled cheese is promised, I'd like some really elaborate descriptions, please. Hold the tomatoes.

Review: "The Secret of the Attic" by Sheri Cooper Sinykin

The Secret of the Attic by Sheri Cooper Sinykin
Published 1995 via Scholastic Inc.
★★★

I've been doing some quick childhood rereads recently, and this cropped up. I don't remember the plots of this series terribly well, but the covers give me this sweeping sense of nostalgia, and I hoped that maybe I'd remember more upon reading. That wasn't really the case here, but you never know—maybe one of the later books (the cover of Cowgirl Megan gives me some of the strongest nostalgia of the bunch, though Keisha the Fairy Snow Queen isn't far behind) will deliver.

The Secret of the Attic was published in 1995, and it's definitely a reminder that diversity in books at the time was, like...one of them is blonde! One of them is a brunette! One of them is a redhead! One of them is Black (African American, in the 90s)! And they don't all celebrate the same holidays—one of them is Jewish, and one of them celebrates Kwanzaa! I'm now wondering whether this book is partially responsible for my brief confusion as a kid about Kwanzaa; all the Black kids I knew (in my racially-and-socioeconomically-but-not-otherwise-very diverse elementary school) celebrated Christmas, but I remember being very confused by that because the message I'd gotten from books and, I think, school was that Black people didn't celebrate Christmas because they celebrated Kwanzaa instead. (It is obvious to me now that these things are not mutually exclusive, but at the time...)

The other thing of note now, which I certainly wouldn't have noticed at the time, is that it's actually pretty creepy that a bunch of kids meet a strange woman who is so enthusiastic about them going to play in her attic. Granted, the book takes pains to make it not creepy—the kids regularly check in with their parents, who are familiar with the strange woman—but even so, I hope that if someone had told me to run along and play in their attic when I was a kid I'd have maintained a healthy level of suspicion...? On the other hand, I hope even as an adult that a magic attic will crop up and I'll get to have a bunch of random adventures, so.

Review: "The Nature of Disappearing" by Kimi Cunningham Grant

The Nature of Disappearing by Kimi Cunningham Grant
Published June 2024 via Minotaur Books
★★★★

Emlyn is at her best in the wild—she has rarely been as much at peace with people than she is out in the wilderness. Her friend Janessa was an exception, but that relationship is over; her boyfriend Tyler was another exception, but that too is over. At least—those relationships were over until Tyler reaches out, asking for help. Janessa is missing...and Emlyn is his best bet to find her again.

This is something of a slow burn of a book, sliding between the here-and-now of Emlyn and Tyler's hunt for Janessa and the years beforehand—before Janessa took Emlyn under her wing, before Emlyn and Tyler found each other, before it all fell apart. Parts of the mystery are hinted at for the reader to guess before Emlyn does, but there are a lot of ways the story could turn out, which is satisfying; I guessed at some of it, especially as the story went on, but several other outcomes would have been realistic too.

The characters are satisfying, and there's something about Janessa and Emlyn's friendship that I think will resonate with a lot of readers—loving each other fiercely but Emlyn feeling that she's always in Janessa's shadow. (Their relationship is way more interesting than Emlyn's more predictable route with Tyler.) In places I'd have liked more from Janessa, who pretty much does everything with a bang but whom we of course only understand from Emlyn's perspective.

I'll leave it there because the details of the relationships are best unfolded with the pages of the book—but this was a satisfying read.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

Review: "Kissing Girls on Shabbat" by Sara Glass

Kissing Girls on Shabbat by Sara Glass
Published June 2024 via Atria
★★★★

Growing up in a Hasidic community in Brooklyn, Glass knew what her life would look like: she'd marry a man, get the level of education their rabbi (or, maybe more to the point, his rabbi) approved of and no more, be permitted to use birth control only in rare occasions, and keep her body and hair covered. For the rest of her life. She also knew what she wanted: to earn a PhD, to have some small freedoms to make choices for herself, to have a say in the number and timing of her children, and to be allowed to love a woman.

I've read enough about conservative religion in various forms to be unsurprised by a lot of what Glass writes about, but there are still things that...well. "As a bride you have special mercy on your wedding day," Mrs. Levenstein, my bridal instructor, said as we sat at the folding table in her husband's study. "You can ask God for forgiveness, and he will wipe your slate clean, anything you have ever done wrong will disappear." (loc. 371*)

At the time, Glass used this as permission to do forbidden things in advance of her wedding, but I'm fascinated for other reasons. First, the idea that this bridal instructor was running a successful business from her home—but the study was still considered her husband's study. Not theirs, let alone hers. And then there's this idea of wiping the slate clean; I'd love to know how widespread that is in Judaism (it's not something I've ever heard, but then, I'm not super well read on Judaism), but also...I want to know what kind of mental gymnastics it requires to both place a premium on women's 'purity' and to say that marriage will wipe away any sins. I sort of imagine that neither one's betrothed/husband nor one's rabbi would be likely to be so forgiving?

Or: After a few more awkward phone passes, a call to Mrs. Levenstein, and another call from the rabbi, we arrived at our answer. We had not had marital intercourse last night. False alarm. (loc. 493) There's a lot of context to that quote that I'm leaving out, but the short version is that when everything is regimented, down to when you and your husband can and cannot physically touch, conversations get awkward. Glass describes living in some ways outside the law—because Hasidic law was stricter, and more specific, and it didn't really matter what the secular courts said if the rabbinical courts had different opinions.

We were under a town-wide internet ban. As the internet became a standard feature of modern life, the rabbis decided that it was for the secular world, not for us. In special cases, such as for work purposes, one was permitted to use the Yeshiva Net provider, which allowed access to "whitelisted" websites. I had a dial-up DSL connection monitored by Yeshiva Net, which meant that when I first wanted to access the Rutgers University Library website, the Gap, or Children's Place, I had to call the Yeshiva Net office to ask them to allow those sites. When I called to ask if I could add Google to my list, the sleepy male voice at the other end said, "Mrs. Schwartz, many people find that to be a strong temptation. We don't allow search engines." How could I admit that I wanted to explore more temptations? He would ask to speak to my husband. (loc.1656)

The ways in which the community operated outside the law come to define huge portions of the book, because according to Hasidic law (or the local interpretation of it), pushing the boundaries could lead to the loss of Glass's children—and it's only late, late in the book that she starts to understand that there's a whole 'nother set of laws out there, ones where your rights are not determined by whether or not you keep every strand of natural hair under your wig.

There's a lot to say here that there just isn't space for in this review. I'm reminded a bit of Brazen, but with Glass seeking to unpick her layers of trauma and reaction rather than just to shock the reader. It's a fast and fascinating read, and I'm glad Glass refused to accept that the status quo was the only way to go.

A note on Israel: This is a book that is, unsurprisingly, heavy on Judaism. It takes place almost entirely in the eastern US. Israel is mentioned a handful of times—Glass had family there, and she spent some time there as a young woman. It's not discussed in any detail. I read a revised ARC, so I can't speak for the earlier version, but Glass includes this paragraph in the author's note at the beginning: Please note that this manuscript was written prior to October 7, 2023. There are references to Israel throughout this manuscript, and those references do not and cannot communicate the full context or complexity of that date. Nor to they communicate my feelings about what has taken place in the days, weeks, and months afterward. My heart breaks for the people of Gaza and the victims of October 7. (loc. 58) I am taking that at face value for the sake of this book and looking elsewhere for my reading on Israel and Palestine; however, it may not be enough for some readers, and if that's you, I recommend passing on this book.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

*Quotes are from an ARC and may not be final.

Review: "Bearing My Seoul" by Taryn Blake

Bearing My Seoul by Taryn Blake
Published November 2021 via Gold Apple Books
★★★

In 2008, Blake took a leap: she'd always wanted to live abroad, and so she packed up and moved to Seoul to teach English. She didn't speak Korean and wasn't a trained teacher—but Seoul sucked her in, and a planned year turned into more than five.

Bearing My Seoul is a collection of linked essays, though they're interconnected enough that I wouldn't recommend dipping in and out; better to read the book straight through as a memoir. Blake brings a lively energy and sense of humor to the book, plus a valuable directness—I was especially curious about this book because so few of the American-moves-abroad memoirs that I've read (and...I've read a lot of those...) have been from the perspective of a Black woman, and what people see and assume when they look at you is going to have a fundamental impact on your experience in a given place.

I'd love to see a full memoir version of this experience—the current version is quite slim, and with more fleshing out and details we'd get a richer experience. But it pushed me through a bit of a reading slump, so I can't be disappointed!

Review: "Duecentomila" by Kai Fig Taddei

Duecentomila by Kai Fig Taddei
Published April 2023 via Playwrights Canada Press
★★★★

Estranged family and religion and sexuality and gender and good intentions that aren't always enough: this was a quick read of a play, but it packs a punch. In Toronto, Kate is eager to connect with her Italian cousin—eager to make another queer connection, and eager to, perhaps, claim a side of her identity that she finds more exotic. In Florence, Eli is really just trying to get by—not the easiest thing when you suspect that your gender will result in your eventual consignment to hell.

This is probably a little exhausting to watch (thanks, Kate), but in a good way—Kate means well, but for all that Eli is worried about hell, well...for Kate it's more of a 'the road to hell is paved with good intentions' sort of thing. The choice to write this as a play is interesting, though, because I can just as easily imagine it as a young adult novel, what with its themes of growing up and coming out and messing up.

Review: "The Verdict" by Kate William (created by Francine Pascal)

The Verdict by Kate William (created by Francine Pascal)
Published 1993
★★★

Who ever would have expected it...? The golden girl of Sweet Valley is on trial—for manslaughter. (Note that this review contains spoilers for a decades-old book; you have been warned. Also, it's wicked long. You have been warned again.)

I'm deep into this miniseries reread, and nothing makes sense anymore. Well, actually, a couple of things do make more sense—I've read enough other reviews to learn that yes, the ill-fated Jungle Prom was covered in another book, just not one from the main series. I've also, unfortunately, read enough other reviews to have some sympathy for Jessica, sociopathic as she is; an argument can be made that she's traumatized and devastated by both grief and guilt and lashing out and really does not have anywhere near the support she needs. There's also an argument to be made that when she talks about what Elizabeth deserves, she's projecting—talking about herself. "You know, I never did understand what you saw in Elizabeth," she chattered on. "I mean, even before she started wrecking people's lives and killing people, she wasn't exactly a prize. Everyone always thought she was so sweet and good, but I knew her—I knew the real Elizabeth. And she's cold and selfish and conniving. She uses people to get what she wants and then twists it around to make it look like she was doing them a favor." (126)

Oh man. Now I want to write a paper. It's probably just as well that I'm not in grad school anymore and can't torture my classmates with this sort of thing.

But also...do remember that she spiked Elizabeth's drink at the dance, which is why Elizabeth was driving drunk when Jessica's boyfriend Sam was killed; nobody else knows this, and Jessica is willing to see Elizabeth go to jail for it.

"You know, the way everyone's acting," she remarked after a while, "you'd think they felt sorry for Elizabeth, like she didn't even do anything—like she's the victim instead of the criminal."

"She's not a criminal," Todd snapped.

Jessica stared at him. "You're not coming to her defense, are you?"

Todd looked down at his right hand, which had tightened into a fist, crumbling the cookie he held. "I. . . no, I just—"

"Because she wouldn't appreciate it, Todd—take my word for it." Jessica's voice grew cool. "And I don't appreciate it, either. It makes me feel like, like—" Suddenly her eyes brimmed with tears. "Like you don't care about what I'm going through." A sob caught in her throat and she ducked her chin, hiding behind a curtain of hair so the kids at nearby tables couldn't see her crying. "I thought—I thought you were on my side now."

Todd put a hand on Jessica's arm. "Of course I'm on your side," he said quietly. "But that doesn't have to mean . . ."

He didn't finish the sentence, but it was easy to guess what he'd been planning to say. "Yes, it does," Jessica said, her voice quavering with intensity. "You can't have it both ways, Todd. You can't be on her side and also on mine. You have to choose, and you did choose," she reminded him. She placed her hand on top of his and smiled up at him, her eyes still sparkling with tears. "Right?" (23)

Back to the A plot. The expensive lawyer Ned Wakefield hires to defend Elizabeth basically gives up when Elizabeth says that she doesn't know how she got drunk...so Ned decides to take on the case himself. With only, apparently, his undergraduate-student-of-a-son as legal support. Never mind that there's no indication that Ned has ever practiced criminal law. Never mind that his son doesn't practice any kind of law. There's nothing a Wakefield can't do!

Now, the expensive lawyer's strategy was to get frustrated when Elizabeth can't remember anything, and give up. Ned's strategy is...to get frustrated when Elizabeth can't remember anything, and get increasingly grim about the outcome. Here are some things Neddy boy doesn't do: he doesn't seek out potential witnesses from the dance who might have seen Elizabeth and Sam drinking (orrrr seen their drinks being spiked). He doesn't find some sort of investigator or expert to examine tire tracks to figure out whether there might have been another car. He doesn't have the Jeep Elizabeth was driving examined to see if there are clues (or excuses) there. He doesn't do a single thing that a semicompetent lawyer (or, for that matter, police officer, but we all know the Sweet Valley police are beside the point here) might think of to defend his daughter...except tell her to try harder to remember.

(Have I mentioned that it's been a bare few weeks since the accident, and Elizabeth is already going to trial? Aside from the unusually fast justice system in Sweet Valley, Ned also doesn't try to buy more time.)

Regardless, the trial takes place. Lizzie's in trouble because Ned's only strategy is to hope she remembers something that will save her. But wait! A surprise witness! One who claims total responsibility! (And who sobs with apology for Elizabeth and Ned...but not for, say, the parents of Sam, who is dead.) Instant freedom for Lizzie, with only a slap on the wrist for intoxication. (Guys, I don't think this is...how it works? Like, she was still involved in a deadly car crash, and still intoxicated, and Jessica has remained mum about the whole reason Elizabeth was intoxicated—so there's no reason for the judge to think that Elizabeth didn't get smashed, get in a car, smash said car up of her own volition.)

The surprise witness is called Gilbert Harding, by the way, and I'm only noting that because he has never shown up before, as far as I know never shows up again, and makes for a very convenient scapegoat here.

Meanwhile, we have B plots: there's Jessica's continued pursuit of Todd (and Todd's continued idiocy); there's the way everyone still thinks that Bruce's love interest is a tramp ("Why should you be sorry?" Jessica asked Amy. "Pamela's a tramp and that's all there is to it." (56)) and the shock that Lila, of all people, is the one to defend Pamela. There's Lila meeting her mother after fourteen years. And of course there's Margo.

Here's Todd and Jessica:

Abruptly, the song he and Jessica were dancing to faded into something new. The tempo downshifted; the beat became pulsing and slow. Jessica's eyes locked onto Todd's and she drew closer to him, wrapping her arms around his waist, her body swaying seductively.

Any illusions Todd might have had about this being a harmless, platonic evening flew out the window. He was holding Jessica in his arms—the moment couldn't be more romantic. And the worst part was he was enjoying himself. This wasn't playtime; this wasn't "therapy."

My God, how can we be doing this? he wondered as Jessica raised her face to his, her eyes glowing as soft and bright as the stars overhead. Tonight of all nights? Todd's feet faltered and even though Jessica's body was warm against his, he shuddered as if from a sudden chill. We might as well be dancing on Sam's grave, he realized. And Elizabeth . . .

"Kiss me," Jessica whispered, her arms tightening around him.

Obediently, Todd bent his head, pressing his lips lightly against hers. He intended the kiss to be brief, but somehow he found his mouth lingering on Jessica's. The slow passion of the music seemed to hold them together, melding their bodies into one. The kiss grew deeper, and longer. . . . Finally, Todd abandoned himself to it. The kiss was tangible and real, something they both could feel and understand—something to hold on to in all the heartbreaking confusion that swirled around them. (29)

Now...I get that they are hormonal teenagers who have been going through the wringer. But don't let's forget that Jessica is throwing herself at Todd to punish Elizabeth for drunk driving; don't let's forget that Todd, who professes to love Elizabeth and want to be back in her good graces, hasn't so much as reached out to Elizabeth to see how she's doing. Todd's bright ideas: first, run to Elizabeth and Jessica's brother and tell him that he's been cheating on Elizabeth with her twin but wants Elizabeth back:

"So, what do you think I should I do?" Todd asked. "Do you think there's any hope? Do you think Elizabeth would ever take me back?"

"I really don't know," Steven admitted. "You say you love her, but is there any reason she should believe you?" (54)

And second, he writes Elizabeth a (presumably dramatic) letter asking her to forgive him. This is not a bad idea in and of itself—it gives her time to think it over, as Todd notes—although I'd argue that they're due for a whole lot of conversation before forgiveness comes into play. (It's not even about dating Jessica, although there's an argument to be made that he's functionally cheating on both of them throughout the course of all this—it's the complete abandonment of Elizabeth when things get rough.) But Todd has learned nothing about Jessica over the past 96 books, so...he assumes that if he drops it through the mail slot, this won't happen:

Jessica leaned back against the wall and stared blankly at the letter lying in her palm. After a long moment, she laughed out loud, amazed by Todd's stupidity. "Did he really think I wouldn't see this?" she asked the empty hallway. (66)

Oh, Todd. Let's hope he's pretty, because he sure is dumb.

Bruce proves that he is a human manifestation of toxic sludge. I guess that isn't all that surprising, but he hits new lows in this one. Here he is, perpetuating the same falsehoods that have already made Pamela's life hell at her old school:

Then Bruce laughed, his attitude shifting abruptly to one of mock insouciance. "Besides, I got what I wanted out of Pamela—the same thing every other guy's gotten from her. I can live with that." Jumping up from his chair, Bruce strode from the room. (59)

And here he is again, showcasing his 'wit':

"Heading home already, Pamela?" he heard himself call after her. "Why not stick around school a little longer? You could catch the tail end of football practice, or do you like basketball players better?" Pamela turned back toward him, her eyes stricken. For some reason, her pain only egged Bruce on. "No, let me guess," he drawled. "You'd rather sit in on a faculty meeting—you're ready for some older men."

Laughing at his own wit, Bruce climbed into the Porsche and started the engine. He didn't give Pamela another glance—that was part of her punishment—but as he backed out of the parking space, he couldn't help glimpsing her in the side mirror. In the instant before he roared off, leaving her standing in a cloud of dust, he could see the tears streaming down her face. (78)

Later Bruce realizes that, oh! Pamela might be a slutty slut, but he's also a slutty slut, so he probably shouldn't be judging her so harshly, because double standards and all. Honestly, it's almost worse that Pamela's reputation is down to a smear campaign built on falsehoods, because even as Bruce realizes that Double Standards Are Bad, Who Knew?, and even as Pamela falls gratefully into his arms (ffs, Pamela, hold out for someone who hasn't spent the last three books denigrating you because he thinks you're not a virgin)...the book is still perpetuating those double standards, no? Pamela has a reputation, the book assures us, but she isn't actually a slutty slut. She's worthy of redemption. She's worthy of yet another boy who has treated her terribly! What joy for Pamela.

Lila's mother Grace is still around, and Lila is happy as a clam about it and scheming to get her parents back together. She barely blinks when she learns that her mother grew up rich but her father is a butcher's son—she and her father really don't talk, huh—or when her mother tells her that her father basically lied his way into declaring Grace an unfit mother and keeping her from even having visiting rights because she was unhappy in their marriage. I mean, okay, Lila's shocked for a second. And then within the next two pages all is forgiven, and she's scheming a happily-ever after for her parents. (Her mother has terrible taste in men; don't ask me about the boyfriend she's brought back from France.)

And Margo: she's scheming and steaming her way to Sweet Valley, her mental-health symptoms getting less consistent by the book (at a guess, they're based on schizophrenia and/or multiple personality disorder, but let's not insult people who have those disorders by pressing that association). We learn that the brother of one of her recent victims is on her tail...and Margo becomes ever more convinced that Elizabeth's life should be hers.

Review: "Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous" by Mae Marvel

Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous by Mae Marvel
Published June 2024 via St. Martin's Griffin
★★★

Since graduating from high school, Katie has moved up in the world—made a name for herself as an actress, earned more money than she'll ever need, and more recently started to make a name for herself as a director too. Meanwhile, Wil has been quietly humming along in Wisconsin, having put her dreams on hold and never picked them up again. She's TikTok famous, making out with new people regularly on the Internet, but her plans (law school, for example, or living somewhere other than Wisconsin) haven't materialised, and she's not in a rush to change that.

But Katie's dreams—so tangible, and so close—are being consistently undermined by her ex, the truth about whom she's kept secret for years. And Wil's dreams aren't gone, but she's buried them deep. And when Katie comes home for the holidays and stays awhile, suddenly they're each in a position to help the other...

This was a lot of fun to read. The book is navigating and balancing a whole host of different things: Katie's career, Wil's double life as a TikTok sensation, #MeToo (though not in so many words), being a woman in Hollywood, grief, and on it goes. (Also: very, very vocal and—more to the point—eloquent cats. I am not convinced.) Their relationship, as it develops, is not without its difficulties, but I always appreciate it when those difficulties are more external than internal—that is, in this case, there's very little 'if we'd just had an honest conversation the book would be over already' and a great deal more 'even if our relationship is straightforward privately, it will be complicated publicly'. Both of them roll with it, which is also very satisfying.

A couple of quibbles: first, at times it felt like Wil was only becoming fully formed as the book went on—she gets more butch, I think, and while it's possible that I just missed the clues, it felt like something that was only solidifying for the author as time went on. Second, while the supporting cast is generally fab, I wouldn't have minded seeing some more complexity from them—they tend to be either diverse, liberal, smart, compassionate Wunderkinder or (admittedly and fortunately rarely) Just Generally Bad. And not to complain about having diverse/liberal/smart/compassionate Wunderkinder around...but I suppose it stays a bit surface. Finally: Katie Price is an odd choice of name for a character who is an actress when there is already a real-life person by the same name who has worked very hard to be in the public eye.

Altogether lively and on point, though. 3.5 stars and would read more.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

Review: "The Invention of Romance" by Conni Massing

The Invention of Romance by Conni Massing
Published 2017 via Playwrights Canada Press
★★★

A quick play read: I was intrigued by the description, about Kate (the play's heroine) curating "a museum exhibit about the history of romance and love", but it turns out that other than a few surprise references to Eleanor of Aquitaine there's very little about that history and quite a bit about Kate going on disappointing online-dating dates and expressing very basic views about the greatest romantic movies of all time. (Pretty sure by "of all time" she means "that came out during my formative years", but okay.)

Ultimately, this felt a lot like a romcom, just in theatre form rather than cinema form. That's fine, of course, but neither what I was really expecting nor what I'm really looking for in plays. (But then, not what I'm usually looking for in movies, either!) Perhaps a better fit, to read or to watch, for those more invested in romcoms.

Review: "We Are Mayhem" by Beck Rourke-Mooney

We Are Mayhem by Beck Rourke-Mooney
Published March 2024 via Feiwel & Friends
★★★★

Bird has always been too much: too big for gymnastics, too different to fit in easily at school. And now, with a move to rural New York, the way forward seems even less certain...until Bird meets someone who offers a new way out: stop trying to fit in. Start taking up space.

As far as wrestling goes, this gets a relatively slow start: wrestling isn't something Bird has even considered when the book opens; the bigger concern is becoming a cheerleader so that Bird has a chance of fitting in and flying under the radar. It's a while before Bird is able to entertain the prospect of giving up her quest to fit in. But when that does happen, somehow even I started getting invested in the wrestling outcomes—never mind that they're all fixed; it's sort of fascinating to think about all the choreography and considerations that go into the outcomes and the storyline.

What I liked best, though: This is not a typical city-girl-struggles-against-small-town-attitudes story. Bird is struggling with suddenly being in a small town, yes, but with parents are as liberal as they come, and as Bird starts to get to know some of the side characters, it becomes clearer that they have more depth, and more willingness to accept new things, than she would have expected. It was nice to not be able to properly predict how things would turn out—I mean, it's YA, so generally things are going to turn out fine, but there were a lot of directions this could have taken, and it is flipping fabulous that none of those directions were romance. Would happily read more from Rourke-Mooney.