all teenagers scare the living shit out of me

Deceptions
December 1984

Has Elizabeth found a new love?

A tangled web...

  Elizabeth Wakefield is stunned when Nicholas Morrow asks her for a date. A newcomer to Sweet Valley, Nicholas is fabulously wealthy and extremely handsome. Even though Elizabeth would never cheat on Todd Wilkins, her steady boyfriend, Nicholas is so attractive and sincere that she agrees to go out with him just once.
  To make matters worse, Jessica, Elizabeth's scheming twin, announces that Nicholas Morrow is the boy for her. Suddenly Nicholas is the only thing on Jessica's mind. Elizabeth is terrified to think what will happen if Todd or her twin finds out about her date with Nicholas. But who can keep a secret from Jessica Wakefield?

  Deceptions is actually mostly forgettable. All you need to know is that Elizabeth is guilted into a dinner date by Nicholas Morrow and wacky hijinks ensue. Seriously, that's all this book is, and no amount of fantastic lip gloss is going to change that. With that said, here are the details.
  The book picks up before the previous one ends. It's a bit of a retelling of Nicholas meeting Elizabeth for the first time, but without Liz getting these loud Klaxon warning bells in her head. It's a completely different tone from the last book's version of these events and it is so not flattering to anyone involved. For as rich and as good looking as Nicholas is, he should not have to resort to emotionally blackmailing someone into going out with him, but that's essentially what happens. Using twisty-Jessica logic, he asks Liz out, and when she points out that she's flattered, but also dating Todd and is in no hurry to shake up that relationship, he pushes on. She says no, again, that it would not be fair to Todd, and Nicholas outdoes himself with the single best bit of logic EVER. He counters that it's hardly fair to him if she turns him down. And Liz... falls for it. Liz, honey, the next time someone tries to outfox you with this type of logic, the correct answer is that Todd is your boyfriend and you don't have to be fair to Nicholas at his expense. But she agrees to the dinner date, telling herself that it's really nothing. Dinner. Between two friends. Despite the fact that one of these "friends" is trying to be more than that. Riiiiiiight.
  Naturally, there are complications. For one, Jessica is still head over heels over the boy. She's been like that since she found out about him, which was what, two books ago? Three books hung up on one guy is pretty impressive, even if the first book only introduces the infatuation at the very end. Jess keeps going on and on and on about Nicholas, and Elizabeth is feeling so guilty about accepting his invitation that she keeps snapping Jessica's head off. Luckily for Liz, Jessica is pretty self involved and doesn't suspect the connection. However, when Jessica gives Elizabeth the perfect opportunity to help squash her feelings for Nicholas, Elizabeth choses not to seize it. Instead of saying that Nicholas is a bit overbearing and totally illogical, or any of the millions of things she should be able to come up with, even if she's lying, she assures her twin that Nicholas seems perfectly lovely. IDIOT.
  Then there's the little matter of Todd. While Nicholas is following Elizabeth around all night at her "Yay, I'm not kidnapped anymore" party, Todd realizes Nich has a thing for Liz. Being the jealous couple that they are, Todd growls a bit and tells Liz that he wishes Nicholas would shove off and die in a nice [cuz he's rich, after all] grave and leave the Valley alone. Okay, so I exaggerate, but he's no fan of Nicholas, and Elizabeth freezes. She should tell Todd about her "friendly" dinner, but doesn't. She can't, she reasons, so she'll keep it a secret and he'll never know, and Jessica will never know, and it'll all be fantastic. Right, sure, whatever you say, sunshine.

   Our B story pops up fairly quickly. Elizabeth notices Jessica pouring on the charm and immediately becomes suspicious of her twin, seeing as Jessica isn't known for being nice to the geeks of the world, of which Randy Mason definitely is. She chitters and trills away about computers and when confronted about it, Jessica points out that if Randy knows anything, it's computers, and since Nicholas works for his father, a big computer corporate type, then obviously Nich is only interested in girls who are also big on computers. I follow the logic for the most part, but I did need it explained, seeing as I'd forgotten this bit.
  Randy also knows his math, and as Jessica learns all Randy has to teach about the tech side, she puts in a bid for some help in math. We're not told how successful he is, because Jessica then schemes to have him hack into the school's new computer and change her failing grade to a C-. She's not greedy, she just wants the bare minimum needed so that she won't fail and be kicked off the cheerleading squad. Confusion reigns, seeing as she's still on the squad at the end of the book, so I guess Randy's tutoring helped and she could have had a test big enough to raise her grade to a C- on it's own.
  Thing is, after Randy changes her grade, Jessica immediately blows him off. He takes her home and then proceeds to call. A lot. Seems he got cold feet and went back to change her grade back to what if should have been, but they'd changed the access code and it looks like someone is up shit creek without a paddle. Swim, Randy, swim! Figuring it's best to throw himself on the mercy of the court, he's going to go confess before they hunt him down. He asks Jessica, who is really Elizabeth on the phone, to come with him. Elizabeth promises Jessica will be there, and then drags her twin to campus so she can find a way to get Randy out of trouble. Jessica falters in the charm and resorts to tears, but Elizabeth begs for mercy and cries as well. Because LIZ steps in, Chrome Dome doesn't suspend the kids. WTF? I want that kind of power.
  Interesting parallel can be drawn there. Both Randy and Elizabeth are sweet talked into doing something they know is wrong by someone with more charm than should be legally allowed. Randy tries to rectify his mistake and even comes forward, even though it's not a given that he'd be caught anyway. He accepts his punishment and is willing to go down alone if absolutely necessary. He did the crime and all that, and he's willing to own up to it.
  Elizabeth, however virtuous she's been sold as up til now, will not come clean to her boyfriend or her sister, or hell, even to Nicholas. Enid points out that if she's going to go on the date with Nicholas, she has to tell Todd because secrets like this are HORRIBLE for your relationship. She brings up the Ronnie fiasco again, but still, she does have a point. But Elizabeth never does. She rationalizes that things are going to well, or that they haven't really talked, and she doesn't want to spring it on him. She knows she's doing something wrong and doesn't want to get in trouble for it. Egads, she might be human after all. Thing is, it's annoying when you hold her up to Randy and compare. Hers is the lesser of the two evils, she could easily explain it away, and yet she doesn't even try. With Jessica, I can empathise. She definitely falls under the "tis better to beg forgiveness than ask permission" category, both in how she lives her life and how you should act around her. But Todd? Yeah, would have dealt. Maybe.

  But she doesn't tell him, and instead Elizabeth and Nicholas finally head out to the Cote d'Or, an expensive restaurant an hour away. Thing is, any idiot could see where this was going. The whole reason Elizabeth agreed to a Sunday dinner was [her parents don't feed her on Sundays?] because Todd's family was celebrating his mother's birthday. Yup, that means that while out on her date with Nicholas, she runs into Todd as his family is leaving the restaurant.
  So she does the only thing she can do. She pretends to be Jessica. Nich understands, but Todd is a bit thrown since he was sure it was Elizabeth. Still, racked by guilt over the fact that he can't even tell his girlfriend from her identical twin, he heads over to the Wakefield home to apologize to Liz. Maybe to make out a little, if he's lucky. Jessica answers the door and it becomes immediately apparent what the hell happened. Todd shares with Jessica and both are livid. Todd informs Jessica that he's going to break up with Elizabeth and that they are so over. Jessica fumes until Elizabeth comes home.
  Jessica pounces on Elizabeth and rips her a new one, and it's kind of fun to watch, since Jessica doesn't often have the moral high ground. Jess then mentions, at the end when she's forgiven Elizabeth, that their mother called and that Tricia is getting worse. Liz feels bad, but cannot concentrate on that as she's still so worried about Todd.
  Todd blows Elizabeth off at school and after school, Collins assigns Elizabeth a fantastic story for the Oracle. She's to cover the basketball game that night. She tries to weasel out of it, but can't. So she goes and sulks and cries and Todd is sucking so bad that people are one step away from booing him. At halftime, Nicholas shows up, realizes what he's done, gives a damn, and stalks Todd in the locker room. He explains that he guilted Elizabeth into the date and that the whole time she was all, "But I'm in love with Todd!" Todd cheers up and goes back out to win the game. Yay?
  Elizabeth doesn't know what changed Todd's game, so she decides to skip the after party at Cara's and walk home. Before she makes it too far from the parking lot, Todd grabs her, kisses her silly, and explains why he stopped with the sports suckage earlier. They're happy and kiss some more and then go to Cara's. Shortly thereafter, Cara pulls Liz aside and tells her that Alice called. Jess and Elizabeth go to Cara's father's study and call home. Turns out that Tricia's turn for the worse is heading straight for death.
  Eeep!

Trivia:

• The Droids wrote a song about Elizabeth. This is incredibly cheesy and a bit painful to read about, even though it's really just a throwaway paragraph, if that.


• As of this book, Robin and Allen are still together. Aww.


• Elizabeth likens Nicholas to Adonis, and when Jessica doesn't get it, she has to explain the reference to her twin. Tee!


• Alice Wakefield is on vacation this week, so the Fiat is at Elizabeth's disposal. Y'know, since Jessica keeps racking up tickets and her parents don't trust her behind the wheel.


• The Cote d'Or is a fancy restaurant located in Malvina, which is about an hour away.


• The Morrows [well, Kurt Morrow's company] donated a computer to the school, which Elizabeth wrote a story on, calling computers and such the wave of the future. This is mentioned so many times I thought there was going to be a quiz on it afterward.


• Todd and Elizabeth see Teenage Terror on their date.


• When Liz is sneaking out to see Nicholas, she lies and tells Jessica she's going to see Enid.


• Nicholas and Elizabeth both love Hemingway.


• Dinner: Smoked salmon. tournedos Rossini with puffed potatoes, haricots verts, and desert is the wild-strawberry souffle. Which Nicholas orders as Elizabeth is busy being impressed by the 'still warm rolls' and rosettes of butter.


• Speaking of dinner, Nicholas is wearing an ascot.

Quotes:
"Well, he's on his way to tell Mr. Cooper what he did. And you're going with him."
Jessica shook her head. "I can't. I'm really awfully busy right now." Jessica gives somehow the best and worst excuse ever, all at once. p71


137:
"Nicholas Morrow!" she scolded him gently. "Honestly, I've been looking absolutely everywhere for you. You know," she added, tilting her head coyly, "there must be a hundred and thirty-seven people waiting to meet you." p13
"Oh, Randy, what can I do? If I don't pass, my parents will ground me for a hundred and thirty-seven years. And I can't be a cheerleader." p62
"Good old Rollins," Jessica scoffed. "Honestly, Liz, I don't know what you see in her. Enid Rollins is about one hundred and thirty-seven different kinds of nerd." p90
"You must be kidding, Todd! You mean to say you still can't tell the difference between Liz and me?" She wagged a finger at him coyly. "Wait until I tell Elizabeth. Then you'll be in trouble. About a hundred and thirty-seven different kinds." Liz, pretending to be Jessica while on a date with Nicholas. p 101


  This book aside, I've almost always had a thing for Nicholas. I don't know why, as they spend so much time making the poor guy such a jackass at times, but maybe it's because the guy's got so very few friends, and the one person you'd think they'd immediately hook him up with as a friend [Steven Wakefield] is a no show. They make such a big deal about them both being big brothers of the slightly overprotective, overbearing variety that you'd think someone in ghost writer world would sit up and say, "Heyyyyyyyy..." I can see why they didn't, what with Steve angsting and Nicholas surely angsting later on, but still. Wait, no, no I really can't. That alone would give them something to bond over, though I guess by then, Steve is supposed to be mostly over it. Right. Mm.

  Upon re-reading this one, I'm struck by something. The ghost writer apparently missed the memo that went out after Robin Wilson got skinny. This book she's written pretty much exactly like she was in her chubby days, sans the food she was always munching. She's just too, too much over the top and excitable and it's just weird, seeing as skinny Robin was always more subdued and likely to be plotting your murder. Weirdness in the tone of the book. You don't notice it as much halfway through, but that's because you keep waiting for this friggin' infamous date to happen. I'm not sure if it's because we move away from people that make the tone-shift so obvious, or if this was somehow written by two different people. Because really, the saccharine levels are so high that I think I might need to check with my doctor about finding myself diabetic and heading for a coma.
  I can't say I'd recommend this to anyone who hasn't read it and wonders if they should bother. The actual date doesn't happen page 91, which isn't so bad, it's just that reading all that waffling back and forth, given that she has more than a week to wait until the actual date is a bit painful. It has it's moments, I suppose, but it's nothing that dances on it's own and makes it completely fantastic one way or the other. Though reading about the "computer wave" made me laugh and would probably slay any computer geek.

Superficially, the French cover is making my eyes water, and not from amusement. :P And I'm torn, do I include the various color variations they went through when re-releasing the books, when they went bar as opposed to the classic circle? As it is, I try to only go with the ones I've seen/own/or obviously pictures of a real book and not just some promotional thing on amazon.

all teenagers scare the living shit out of me

Deceptions
December 1984

Has Elizabeth found a new love?

A tangled web...

  Elizabeth Wakefield is stunned when Nicholas Morrow asks her for a date. A newcomer to Sweet Valley, Nicholas is fabulously wealthy and extremely handsome. Even though Elizabeth would never cheat on Todd Wilkins, her steady boyfriend, Nicholas is so attractive and sincere that she agrees to go out with him just once.
  To make matters worse, Jessica, Elizabeth's scheming twin, announces that Nicholas Morrow is the boy for her. Suddenly Nicholas is the only thing on Jessica's mind. Elizabeth is terrified to think what will happen if Todd or her twin finds out about her date with Nicholas. But who can keep a secret from Jessica Wakefield?

  Deceptions is actually mostly forgettable. All you need to know is that Elizabeth is guilted into a dinner date by Nicholas Morrow and wacky hijinks ensue. Seriously, that's all this book is, and no amount of fantastic lip gloss is going to change that. With that said, here are the details.
  The book picks up before the previous one ends. It's a bit of a retelling of Nicholas meeting Elizabeth for the first time, but without Liz getting these loud Klaxon warning bells in her head. It's a completely different tone from the last book's version of these events and it is so not flattering to anyone involved. For as rich and as good looking as Nicholas is, he should not have to resort to emotionally blackmailing someone into going out with him, but that's essentially what happens. Using twisty-Jessica logic, he asks Liz out, and when she points out that she's flattered, but also dating Todd and is in no hurry to shake up that relationship, he pushes on. She says no, again, that it would not be fair to Todd, and Nicholas outdoes himself with the single best bit of logic EVER. He counters that it's hardly fair to him if she turns him down. And Liz... falls for it. Liz, honey, the next time someone tries to outfox you with this type of logic, the correct answer is that Todd is your boyfriend and you don't have to be fair to Nicholas at his expense. But she agrees to the dinner date, telling herself that it's really nothing. Dinner. Between two friends. Despite the fact that one of these "friends" is trying to be more than that. Riiiiiiight.
  Naturally, there are complications. For one, Jessica is still head over heels over the boy. She's been like that since she found out about him, which was what, two books ago? Three books hung up on one guy is pretty impressive, even if the first book only introduces the infatuation at the very end. Jess keeps going on and on and on about Nicholas, and Elizabeth is feeling so guilty about accepting his invitation that she keeps snapping Jessica's head off. Luckily for Liz, Jessica is pretty self involved and doesn't suspect the connection. However, when Jessica gives Elizabeth the perfect opportunity to help squash her feelings for Nicholas, Elizabeth choses not to seize it. Instead of saying that Nicholas is a bit overbearing and totally illogical, or any of the millions of things she should be able to come up with, even if she's lying, she assures her twin that Nicholas seems perfectly lovely. IDIOT.
  Then there's the little matter of Todd. While Nicholas is following Elizabeth around all night at her "Yay, I'm not kidnapped anymore" party, Todd realizes Nich has a thing for Liz. Being the jealous couple that they are, Todd growls a bit and tells Liz that he wishes Nicholas would shove off and die in a nice [cuz he's rich, after all] grave and leave the Valley alone. Okay, so I exaggerate, but he's no fan of Nicholas, and Elizabeth freezes. She should tell Todd about her "friendly" dinner, but doesn't. She can't, she reasons, so she'll keep it a secret and he'll never know, and Jessica will never know, and it'll all be fantastic. Right, sure, whatever you say, sunshine.

   Our B story pops up fairly quickly. Elizabeth notices Jessica pouring on the charm and immediately becomes suspicious of her twin, seeing as Jessica isn't known for being nice to the geeks of the world, of which Randy Mason definitely is. She chitters and trills away about computers and when confronted about it, Jessica points out that if Randy knows anything, it's computers, and since Nicholas works for his father, a big computer corporate type, then obviously Nich is only interested in girls who are also big on computers. I follow the logic for the most part, but I did need it explained, seeing as I'd forgotten this bit.
  Randy also knows his math, and as Jessica learns all Randy has to teach about the tech side, she puts in a bid for some help in math. We're not told how successful he is, because Jessica then schemes to have him hack into the school's new computer and change her failing grade to a C-. She's not greedy, she just wants the bare minimum needed so that she won't fail and be kicked off the cheerleading squad. Confusion reigns, seeing as she's still on the squad at the end of the book, so I guess Randy's tutoring helped and she could have had a test big enough to raise her grade to a C- on it's own.
  Thing is, after Randy changes her grade, Jessica immediately blows him off. He takes her home and then proceeds to call. A lot. Seems he got cold feet and went back to change her grade back to what if should have been, but they'd changed the access code and it looks like someone is up shit creek without a paddle. Swim, Randy, swim! Figuring it's best to throw himself on the mercy of the court, he's going to go confess before they hunt him down. He asks Jessica, who is really Elizabeth on the phone, to come with him. Elizabeth promises Jessica will be there, and then drags her twin to campus so she can find a way to get Randy out of trouble. Jessica falters in the charm and resorts to tears, but Elizabeth begs for mercy and cries as well. Because LIZ steps in, Chrome Dome doesn't suspend the kids. WTF? I want that kind of power.
  Interesting parallel can be drawn there. Both Randy and Elizabeth are sweet talked into doing something they know is wrong by someone with more charm than should be legally allowed. Randy tries to rectify his mistake and even comes forward, even though it's not a given that he'd be caught anyway. He accepts his punishment and is willing to go down alone if absolutely necessary. He did the crime and all that, and he's willing to own up to it.
  Elizabeth, however virtuous she's been sold as up til now, will not come clean to her boyfriend or her sister, or hell, even to Nicholas. Enid points out that if she's going to go on the date with Nicholas, she has to tell Todd because secrets like this are HORRIBLE for your relationship. She brings up the Ronnie fiasco again, but still, she does have a point. But Elizabeth never does. She rationalizes that things are going to well, or that they haven't really talked, and she doesn't want to spring it on him. She knows she's doing something wrong and doesn't want to get in trouble for it. Egads, she might be human after all. Thing is, it's annoying when you hold her up to Randy and compare. Hers is the lesser of the two evils, she could easily explain it away, and yet she doesn't even try. With Jessica, I can empathise. She definitely falls under the "tis better to beg forgiveness than ask permission" category, both in how she lives her life and how you should act around her. But Todd? Yeah, would have dealt. Maybe.

  But she doesn't tell him, and instead Elizabeth and Nicholas finally head out to the Cote d'Or, an expensive restaurant an hour away. Thing is, any idiot could see where this was going. The whole reason Elizabeth agreed to a Sunday dinner was [her parents don't feed her on Sundays?] because Todd's family was celebrating his mother's birthday. Yup, that means that while out on her date with Nicholas, she runs into Todd as his family is leaving the restaurant.
  So she does the only thing she can do. She pretends to be Jessica. Nich understands, but Todd is a bit thrown since he was sure it was Elizabeth. Still, racked by guilt over the fact that he can't even tell his girlfriend from her identical twin, he heads over to the Wakefield home to apologize to Liz. Maybe to make out a little, if he's lucky. Jessica answers the door and it becomes immediately apparent what the hell happened. Todd shares with Jessica and both are livid. Todd informs Jessica that he's going to break up with Elizabeth and that they are so over. Jessica fumes until Elizabeth comes home.
  Jessica pounces on Elizabeth and rips her a new one, and it's kind of fun to watch, since Jessica doesn't often have the moral high ground. Jess then mentions, at the end when she's forgiven Elizabeth, that their mother called and that Tricia is getting worse. Liz feels bad, but cannot concentrate on that as she's still so worried about Todd.
  Todd blows Elizabeth off at school and after school, Collins assigns Elizabeth a fantastic story for the Oracle. She's to cover the basketball game that night. She tries to weasel out of it, but can't. So she goes and sulks and cries and Todd is sucking so bad that people are one step away from booing him. At halftime, Nicholas shows up, realizes what he's done, gives a damn, and stalks Todd in the locker room. He explains that he guilted Elizabeth into the date and that the whole time she was all, "But I'm in love with Todd!" Todd cheers up and goes back out to win the game. Yay?
  Elizabeth doesn't know what changed Todd's game, so she decides to skip the after party at Cara's and walk home. Before she makes it too far from the parking lot, Todd grabs her, kisses her silly, and explains why he stopped with the sports suckage earlier. They're happy and kiss some more and then go to Cara's. Shortly thereafter, Cara pulls Liz aside and tells her that Alice called. Jess and Elizabeth go to Cara's father's study and call home. Turns out that Tricia's turn for the worse is heading straight for death.
  Eeep!

Trivia:

• The Droids wrote a song about Elizabeth. This is incredibly cheesy and a bit painful to read about, even though it's really just a throwaway paragraph, if that.


• As of this book, Robin and Allen are still together. Aww.


• Elizabeth likens Nicholas to Adonis, and when Jessica doesn't get it, she has to explain the reference to her twin. Tee!


• Alice Wakefield is on vacation this week, so the Fiat is at Elizabeth's disposal. Y'know, since Jessica keeps racking up tickets and her parents don't trust her behind the wheel.


• The Cote d'Or is a fancy restaurant located in Malvina, which is about an hour away.


• The Morrows [well, Kurt Morrow's company] donated a computer to the school, which Elizabeth wrote a story on, calling computers and such the wave of the future. This is mentioned so many times I thought there was going to be a quiz on it afterward.


• Todd and Elizabeth see Teenage Terror on their date.


• When Liz is sneaking out to see Nicholas, she lies and tells Jessica she's going to see Enid.


• Nicholas and Elizabeth both love Hemingway.


• Dinner: Smoked salmon. tournedos Rossini with puffed potatoes, haricots verts, and desert is the wild-strawberry souffle. Which Nicholas orders as Elizabeth is busy being impressed by the 'still warm rolls' and rosettes of butter.


• Speaking of dinner, Nicholas is wearing an ascot.

Quotes:
"Well, he's on his way to tell Mr. Cooper what he did. And you're going with him."
Jessica shook her head. "I can't. I'm really awfully busy right now." Jessica gives somehow the best and worst excuse ever, all at once. p71


137:
"Nicholas Morrow!" she scolded him gently. "Honestly, I've been looking absolutely everywhere for you. You know," she added, tilting her head coyly, "there must be a hundred and thirty-seven people waiting to meet you." p13
"Oh, Randy, what can I do? If I don't pass, my parents will ground me for a hundred and thirty-seven years. And I can't be a cheerleader." p62
"Good old Rollins," Jessica scoffed. "Honestly, Liz, I don't know what you see in her. Enid Rollins is about one hundred and thirty-seven different kinds of nerd." p90
"You must be kidding, Todd! You mean to say you still can't tell the difference between Liz and me?" She wagged a finger at him coyly. "Wait until I tell Elizabeth. Then you'll be in trouble. About a hundred and thirty-seven different kinds." Liz, pretending to be Jessica while on a date with Nicholas. p 101


  This book aside, I've almost always had a thing for Nicholas. I don't know why, as they spend so much time making the poor guy such a jackass at times, but maybe it's because the guy's got so very few friends, and the one person you'd think they'd immediately hook him up with as a friend [Steven Wakefield] is a no show. They make such a big deal about them both being big brothers of the slightly overprotective, overbearing variety that you'd think someone in ghost writer world would sit up and say, "Heyyyyyyyy..." I can see why they didn't, what with Steve angsting and Nicholas surely angsting later on, but still. Wait, no, no I really can't. That alone would give them something to bond over, though I guess by then, Steve is supposed to be mostly over it. Right. Mm.

  Upon re-reading this one, I'm struck by something. The ghost writer apparently missed the memo that went out after Robin Wilson got skinny. This book she's written pretty much exactly like she was in her chubby days, sans the food she was always munching. She's just too, too much over the top and excitable and it's just weird, seeing as skinny Robin was always more subdued and likely to be plotting your murder. Weirdness in the tone of the book. You don't notice it as much halfway through, but that's because you keep waiting for this friggin' infamous date to happen. I'm not sure if it's because we move away from people that make the tone-shift so obvious, or if this was somehow written by two different people. Because really, the saccharine levels are so high that I think I might need to check with my doctor about finding myself diabetic and heading for a coma.
  I can't say I'd recommend this to anyone who hasn't read it and wonders if they should bother. The actual date doesn't happen page 91, which isn't so bad, it's just that reading all that waffling back and forth, given that she has more than a week to wait until the actual date is a bit painful. It has it's moments, I suppose, but it's nothing that dances on it's own and makes it completely fantastic one way or the other. Though reading about the "computer wave" made me laugh and would probably slay any computer geek.

Superficially, the French cover is making my eyes water, and not from amusement. :P And I'm torn, do I include the various color variations they went through when re-releasing the books, when they went bar as opposed to the classic circle? As it is, I try to only go with the ones I've seen/own/or obviously pictures of a real book and not just some promotional thing on amazon.