My wee book blurbs of 2022

When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill

The Mass Dragoning of 1955 was when 300,000 women turned into dragons and its aftermath is seen

through the eyes of Alix, a young girl who lost her aunt to it. 

Ducks by Kate Beaton

This is the story of Beaton’s time in the old sands in Canada where she worked after university to pay

off her loans. It’s not an easy read, but so beautiful and powerful - hilarious one minute and heartbreaking

the next. 

Firekeeper's Daughter by Angeline Boulley

[This is the goodreads blurb, I just couldn’t make it sound as good as it is, in my own words!]

As a biracial, unenrolled tribal member and the product of a scandal, Daunis Fontaine has never

quite fit in—both in her hometown and on the nearby Ojibwe reservation. When her family is struck by

tragedy, Daunis puts her dreams on hold to care for her fragile mother. The only bright spot is meeting

Jamie, the charming new recruit on her brother’s hockey team.After Daunis witnesses a shocking murder that thrusts her into a criminal investigation, she agrees to

go undercover. But the deceptions—and deaths—keep piling up and soon the threat strikes too close to

home. How far will she go to protect her community if it means tearing apart the only world she’s

ever known?

[I listened to the audiobook.]

All About Me by Mel Brooks

Oh come on, you know who Mel Brooks is… This is his life. 

The Easy Way to Stop Smoking by Allen Carr

Want to quit smoking? Let Allen Carr remind you how shitty it tastes, how stupid you look doing it

and how it will surely kill you eventually. It worked for me!

[I listened to the audiobook.]

The Getaway by Lamar Giles

After a never-quite-defined apocalypse, Jay’s life at the Karloff Country resort goes from fantastic to

terrifying. Think Disney World with torture and slavery. I know, it’s kind of a jump, but Giles piles on

the suspense and just edges into where your disbelief knows it is being suspended, but buys in anyway.

Not So Pure and Simple by Lamar Giles

When Del joins a purity pledge to get together with his crush it is horrible planning, but it puts him in

contact with a group of kids who are desperate for his knowledge of sex. It is hysterically funny and

Giles understands that even though people claim religion as their reasoning for doing hurtful things, it

isn’t the fault of the faith, but how it is misunderstood. My favorite YA book I read this year!

[I listened to the audiobook.]

Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry by Joya Goffney

Quinn’s book of very honest, very embarrassing lists disappears and an anonymous account posts

one of her lists on Instagram. She has to get help from an unexpected ally because the perpetrator

says they will  post more if she doesn’t bend to their blackmail and “face her fears.”

Fly Girl by Ann Hood

This is a memoir of life in the air written by novelist Ann Hood who was a stewardess from 1978-1986

and whose first book, Somewhere Off the Coast of Maine (which I also adore) was written while she

was working for TWA. 

Bloomsbury Girls by Natalie Jenner

Three very different women work at a bookstore in London in 1950 and a rare book and their friendship

changes their lives in delightful British ways. 

Red, White and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston

The son of the first female president of the USA falls hard for Prince Harry, I mean Prince Henry, or

England. It’s a delightful, gay rom-com that kept a smile on my face the whole time.

[I listened to the audiobook.]

Little Thieves Margaret Owen

Vanya is an excellent thief who is just trying to get by after leaving the horrible family for whom she

was a maid. She is the goddaughter of Death and Fortune, but they are no help at all when she is cursed

by another god and has to accelerate her already perilous plan to make her own way in the world. 

[I listened to the audiobook.]

The Maid by NIta Prose

Molly is a maid who loves her job and is great at it. The fact that she is neuro-atypical helps her

navigate her work beautifully, but it plays hell with her interpersonal relationships when she finds

a dead body in one of her rooms. 

Malibu Rising by TaylorJenkins Reid

The four kids of Mick Riva have been deserted by their father and lose their mother to alcoholism

when they are way too young to be on their own. They seem to have rallied and Nina, the oldest,

is now a very successful model married to a tennis superstar. The story of their growing up, as

well as the ramp up to what we know is a blow-out party and a huge fire, is told as they move

through one day in August, 1983. 

[I listened to the audiobook.]

Ain't Burned All the Bright by Jason Reynolds, illustrated by Jason Griffin

A graphic novel that had me crying my eyes out in Wormtown Brewery. The story of a Black

family during covid all trying to do their best as the world seems to be freaking out all around them. 

Joy of Quitting and My Begging Chart by Keiler Roberts

Roberts illustrates things that actually happen to her throughout her days. And she is hysterically

funny, even when writing about her parenting struggles and her live with MS. 

Kaiju Preservation Society John Scalzi

Once again, I am depending on Goodreads to entice you in a way I can not. 

“When COVID-19 sweeps through New York City, Jamie Gray is stuck as a dead-end driver for

food delivery apps. That is, until Jamie makes a delivery to an old acquaintance, Tom, who works

at what he calls "an animal rights organization." Tom's team needs a last-minute grunt to handle

things on their next field visit. Jamie, eager to do anything, immediately signs on.

What Tom doesn't tell Jamie is that the animals his team cares for are not here on Earth. Not our

Earth, at least. In an alternate dimension, massive dinosaur-like creatures named Kaiju roam a

warm and human-free world. They're the universe's largest and most dangerous panda and

they're in trouble.”

It's not just the Kaiju Preservation Society that's found its way to the alternate world. Others

have, too--and their carelessness could cause millions back on our Earth to die.

The Golden Hour by Niki Smith

In the aftermath of a school shooting, Manuel finds solace in photography and new friendships. I love

the way this book shows how the lives of kids who live in the country and town kids have such different

lives even as they interact with each other in school every day. 

This Time Tomorrow by Emma Straub

On the night before she turns 40, Alice travels in time back to her 16th birthday. And then she learns

how to do it over and over! The time travel part is delightful, but it is her relationship with her dying

father that pushes this over the edge into one of the best time travel books I have ever read. 

Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas

Yadriel is a true brujo who can summon ghosts and (hopefully) set them free. But because he is trans,

his family insists that he has to be a bruja and focus on healing the living. Well, the spirits agree with

Yadriel, but when his cousin is murdered and he accidentally summons the wrong ghosts, it becomes,

well, a fantastic story!

[I listened to the audiobook.]

Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles

It’s 1954 and Emmett just got out of juvie and has gone home to pick up his recently orphaned little brother to start a new life in California. But two of his buddies escaped from the work farm when he was released and are now making that plan impossible. In the best possible way.

My Top 21 of 2022

It is shocking to me that I actually got this written! I realize now that I spent more time on getting the illustrations to look just right than I did saying what most of the books are actually about, so I will attempt to blurb them and post a link at the end when I get around to it. But at least the headers look pretty!

Let’s start with my bread and butter, which is YA. All of my favorites were read in the service of the Mass. Teen Choice Book Award. I listened to Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas, Firekeeper's Daughter by Angeline Boulley, Little Thieves by Margaret Owen and  Not So Pure and Simple by Lamar Giles on audio.  I started the first two before and they just didn’t grab me in print , but on audio they were amazing. Little Thieves was fantasy and not my usual cup of tea but again the audio performance hooked me. I am not picking favorites, but I will say that I would have loved Not So Pure and Simple in any format. What the hell, I am picking favorites. It was my favorite YA of the year!

Lamar Giles also wrote my favorite horror book of the year (okay the only horror book I read, but I loved it) in The Getaway. Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry is a delightful realistic fiction book about a girl who makes lists and lies to her parents. Wow, did that bring back my adolescence for me! 

I read a lot of graphic novels, memoirs and nonfiction this year but only two made me weep in public while I read them - The Golden Hour by Niki Smith is probably more middle grade than YA, but it was spectacular. And Ain’t Burned All the Bright is only 10 sentences long, but it hit me as hard as anything else I read this year.

For adult books, let’s start with the ones that everyone loved. 

My book club girls made me read Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid, they all read it for their summer reading selection and adored it. I listened to it in the car and found myself actually going the speed limit just so I could hear more of the story. I also listened to Red, White and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston which I had tried to read in print and given up on. Well, shut my mouth, because the audio was adorable. 

I remember reading Amor Towles Rules of Civility at Disney World way back when it first came out and wishing for the lines to be a bit longer just so I could read more. (Okay, that is a lie, but it really made the waiting more pleasurable.) I lost my mind recently when I found out that A Gentleman in Moscow is being made into a Showtime series starring Ewan McGregor. But his newest The Lincoln Highway was even better than those two. It was my first summertime novel and it just carried me away. Nina Prose’s The Maid was hugely popular when it came out, and I finally got around to it this summer, too. 

Some possibly lesser known novels I loved were The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi, When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill and This Time Tomorrow by Emma Straub which could be considered science fiction. Or maybe fantasy. Do dragons count as fantasy if they are a metaphor for feminists? You wouldn’t think giant monsters and repetitive time travel would be the sort of thing that would make me weep. Well you would be wrong! I also loved Bloomsbury Girls in spite of not having read, and having no intention of reading, The Jane Austen Society. But it took place in a London bookstore after WWII so I adored it. The setting reminded me of 84 Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff which is one of my all time favorites. 

I read far more memoirs this year than I usually do. I listened to Will Smith, Randy Rainbow, Simu Liu, Molly Shannon, Harvey Fierstein, Tom Felton, and Hannah Gadsby read their stories and I really enjoyed all of them. But the two memoirs that I actually read in print were so good that I actually read them in print! I have adored Ann Hood since I read Somewhere Off the Coast of Maine over and over as a college student instead of the books I was supposed to be reading for school. Fly Girl, her story of being a stewardess was an absolute delight and also far more moving than I would have expected. All About Me by Mel Brooks was a no brainer. I knew I would love it the minute I heard it was coming out. Other than my dad, no other person has had more of an impact on my sense of humor than Brooks. My first PG movie? Young Frankenstein! My first R movie? History of the World Part Two! His book did not disappoint. 

I also read two graphic memoirs that were off the charts spectacular.Keiler Roberts shares her journal with the world through her cartooning and while I absolutely loved her newest The Joy of Quitting, the last page of My Begging Chart made me laugh louder than anything else I read this year. She writes about motherhood and disability and friendship and marriage with complete honesty.  Ducks is Kate Beaton’s memoir of when she went to work in the Canadian oil fields to pay off her student loans. It was my favorite book written for adults that I read this year. 

And finally, honorable mention goes to The Easy Way to Stop Smoking by Allen Carr. I listened to it VERY LOUDLY at 2x the speed and it was basically a middle aged Englishman SCREAMING at me about how stupid smoking is. Well, I listened to it in August and haven’t smoked a butt since, so I am a big fan. 

My first books this year are both fantastic - I just started Tiffany Jackson’s The Weight of Water on audio and it is scaring the hell out of me already. And Steve Martin’s graphic memoir Number One is Walking - illustrated by Harry Bliss - is simply adorable. I’m looking forward to another year of great books!

If you want to read some little blurbs of the books - you can read them here - http://deepvalleyconfidential.blogspot.com/2023/01/my-wee-book-blurbs-of-2022.html

2022 Reading Stats

Happy New Year and welcome to my breakdown. Don't get excited - I mean my breakdown of what I read this year.

I read 106 books between January 1 and yesterday and I didn’t even have to do that thing that I usually do where I go to the public library and get 20 picture books the week between Christmas and New Years to goose my number over 100!

I think the reason is that I have been listening to audiobooks in the car. Learning that I could speed them up has been a game changer. I start at 1.25 and as I get into the story I speed it up until the reader’s voice gets too weird. Usually 1.5 or 1.75. I got Harvey Fierstein up to 2.0 and he still sounded like 3 packs of smokes a day. The man is a national treasure. 

Here are my stats - 

Familiarity

• 98 new books

• 8 rereads

Format

• 34 audiobooks

• 72 print books

• 0 ebooks

Reading  level

• 0 picture books

• 5 children’s or middle grade books

• 44 adult books

• 57 YA books

Type of content

• 62 standard fiction

• 10 graphic nonfiction/biography/memoir

• 12 graphic novels

• 11 memoirs

• 7 nonfiction

• 4 novels in verse

Age of books 

• 18 published pre-2000  - all were beloved re-reads, Janet Lambert or instructions for a better life

• 10 published between 2000-2019

• 78 - published in the 2020s - Thanks, Mass Teen Choice Book Award!

I read 32461 pages which means I averaged 89 pages a day. I was surprised to see that I was pretty consistent in how much I read each month. If you want to peruse the whole glorious spreadsheet feel free - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-NlPVKSKC4L42RhhLb7NSZBzxUUx5tq_dtmRzrcAO1s/edit?usp=sharing

No one cares about this part so I am going to post it now and then post my top 21 - stay tuned!

SPRING FEVER by Janet Lambert

 We are back in Patty and Ginger land. Or as I like to think of it - Ginger and Patty land. Because Patty is a dud and Ginger is everything good about teenage girls. 

There is a big dance coming up at the club and Spark Plug has a tux! He hasn't asked Ginger yet, but we are all a-twitter hoping he does. 

Patty is now dating Bill Somebody, the BMOC of Cheltham high school. And she is very excited about the extremely skanky dress she purchased for the dance. Her parents, however, are not pleased and even though they won't discipline her, they will fight (An ashtray is smashed!) with her to show their displeasure. 

Patty runs away to Ginger's, you know, across the back yard. And she becomes Ginger's problem. There is a lot of Ginger pining for Spark Plug, there is a bit about (fat) Mary Lou conspiring to get a date in spite of her fatness. She is introduced as she is having a second dish of ice cream. Catty, Janet, very catty. Mary Lou also has squinty eyes and is very nosy about other people's business. I am Mary Lou all over. 

Maybe this dance is for graduation? Sparky is graduating and he is very disinterested in what that entails. He doesn't want to send his invitations out because he feels like that is just a way to get people from out of town to buy him presents, and he has everything he needs. SO noble.

There is a sweet bit from Ginger's father's perspective about watching his little girl go to her first dance. The sweetness is destroyed by hurricane Patty who is enraged when she learns her mother has altered her dress to make it less skanky. Ginger and Sparky go to the dance, but Patty is nowhere to be found!

It turns out that she has blown off Bill (nice, on the night of his senior prom-like-thing) and is running away to Philadelphia. She gets on the wrong bus , of course, and is terrified in the city. A man actually pulls his car over and asks if she wants a ride! Shocking! 

She gets to the hotel Belfort and sticks out like a sore thumb. The clerk can spot a runaway a mile away and he has a daughter Patty's age so he offers to let her snooze on the couch in his office while she waits for her father. She says she missed her flight home from boarding school and her father's coming to buy her some clothes. Her story reeks of BS.

Everyone convenes back at home and the parents start calling hotels. Ginger tells Sparky, "I'm never going to be so stupid again. I'm never going to let Patty put it over on my and make me feel sorry for her. When we get her back, I'm going to tell her the facts of life: parents run the show." Sadly, this is information that Patty will continue to ignore for at least two more books... She also takes the opportunity to tell him that he is taking her to the junior-senior dance. He accuses her of thinking they are going steady and she is as horrified as he is. Going steady is WRONG!!

The Palmers head out to Philly to get Patty.

The next morning Mary Lou calls to interrogate Ginger who doesn't spill the tea. She tells her parents "If anyone asks for me, tell them I've gone off in my space ship." Yes, we are in the space age now!

It turns out that Sparky has an offer on Beauty, his beloved car. He invites Ginger to come out and meet with the guy. Not for her company but because he thinks the guys will try to shake him down for the story of what happened to Patty and he can't be bothered. 

SO they are off to the lands of the rich Mr. Clivesdale - who has a MAID! Sparky is talking bugs and motors and Ginger has to explain that bugs is a slang term for germs. Here's a tip Janet - if you have to explain the slang to your audience, it probably isn't worth including. 

Sparky takes Mr. C for a drive and Ginger hangs out with Steve. She deconstructs his history a bit - from Patty's steady to Sparky's henchman. He is P&G's age and Ginger thinks that he and Mary Lou are going to be the only ones left in the crowd when Tim and Sparky go to college and Patty is sent to bad-girl boarding school. 

Tim joins the conversation and when Ginger rebuffs his talk of Patty he changes the topic to how cool and funny Mary Lou is. Well, all right, Tim! Way to appreciate the fat, funny girl!

On the way home Sparks says he got a prime offer to think about. Ginger is a little sad, things are coming to an end, Beauty and the boys will be gone in the fall. They try to cheer her up with ice cream. Tim intimates that he will be proposing to her in 5 years. Although he also mentions that Spark was named "most likely to succeed" in the yearbook, so it is unlikely that she will choose a rich hottie like Tim when a future world leader will surely someday go through puberty and notice her. 

Turns out he has been offered a job taking care of Mr. C's cars down at the shore for the summer. Ginger overhears and is heartbroken, 

Next morning Ginger goes to pick up Patty to walk to school. Her parents are fighting about her and she asks Ginger if she is a delinquent. Ginger says, "You don't care how many people you hurt, just as long as you get your own way. But that doesn't make you a delinquent." Just a shitty person...

When Patty asks what makes a delinquent, Ginger has an answer ready. "Skipping school, stealing, lying, and - ewll, smooching with boys. You're awfully boy-crazy, Patty, but you don't - you don't smooch, do you?" Wow, there's a lot to unpack there!

Patty says, "No, Tim kissed me once - sort of, and Bill keeps trying to, but - I don't smooch, Perse, truly I don't." And Ginger buys that line of hooey. It turns out that Patty's parents took her to Bill's to apologize the night before and he was basically like, "I'd love to stay and hear you debase yourself, but I've got a date." And he left. HA!

When they get inside, Ginger runs gossip-blocker for Patty. She's a dear. After school they go to the malt shop. Ginger attempts to teach Patty how to be a decent person but eventually gives up. Mary Lou and Jane show up and Mary Lou tries to get the goss, but Patty shuts her down. She makes it about the dress and they get talking about lipstick, earrings and clothes and ML gives Patty the earrings she just bought as a little "sorry for delighting in your drama" present. 

On the way home Patty talks about how she is going to be a good girl now. "You told me that I'm not one of those delinquent girls that you read about in the newspapers - defying their parents, and getting into trouble, and making all the headlines - so I've got to prove it." 

Janet says it nicely, "The long, tiring day hadn't been wasted. Patty had come to her senses at last, and Ginger was proud to be the one to see it happen. That she had played a large part in bringing it about didn't enter her mind." 

Spark Plug is hanging out near the house and he still has Beauty! Ginger is still pissed that he hasn't said anything about the summer job and basically tells him that she knows, but he is clueless. 

Cleaning up from dinner, Sparky talks to his mom as much as his repressed future-engineer soul will let him. He wonders what to do about Ginger being mad. He goes over and of course she forgives him without him even having to say anything.  At one point she says, "Oh, Spark Plug, you're always way out in space." Apparently, space was a big deal in 1960. 

Sparky asks her to keep an eye on his mom and dad while he's at college. He is a boy who loves his parents, and America. He says, "There's that subject you and I were talking about the other night and never did finish, The American family - parents and kids. I suppose Mom and Dad feel as if they've finished their job on me and have taken me as far as they can, that whatever I am I am, and have grown up to be. Unhuh. That's not true. I'm molded, sure. But you know something? Everybody who has ever figured in my life, will affect my future." And then he offers Tim as a suitor even though "Jealousy had bored into [his] chest for more than 24 hours."

Ginger can't resist bringing up Tim's offhand five-years-from-now proposal. She assures him that she isn't interested in. And he rewards her by telling her that he is going to stay home and work at the bowling ally with someone called Styx. He sounds shady...

Spark makes the interesting observation - "It's queer...that we grown up and get to the age where we hide our feelings." Ginger doesn't comment but ends the book by saying, "Will you give me a ride." But in a completely wholesome, non-smoochy way. 

This book had some interesting plot points - Sparky graduating and giving up Beauty and Patty being horrid, but rereading, there is a lot of filler. Still, it is fun to hang with this crowd and look at Janet's ham-handed treatment of juvenile delinquency. I can certainly take three more volumes of these wacky kids. 

THE STARS HANG HIGH by Janet Lambert

 

Oh my gosh, it's been so long since I read this that I don't even know who is on the covers? Definitely Bitsy, probably Susan. Maybe the boy is Keith Drayton, Alcie's brother in law. I must get to writing these recaps sooner. I am definitely losing the narrative thread!

So this is a big slice of Susan going to the Orient with her dad because she will never have a life of her own and Bitsy wanting to be as wonderful as Susan, but also being lonely.

There are two suitors for Susan - the aforementioned Keith and the wretched Bobby. I'm about 5 books ahead now and I have to say that I have forgiven Bobby for most of his wretched youth.

So Keith is crazy about Susan, but respectful and patient. Bobby wants what he wants when he wants it and he even pressures Bitsy into spying on Susan for him. And he finagles his way into a tour with some big muckety-muck so that he will be near Susan and her father on their trip.

While Susan is gone, Bitsy takes over her bookstore job and really jazzes the place up. Keith becomes a confidante to her and she ends up learning to make friends with some of the girls from school. She is lovely, but her personality has been going through an awkward phase. She gets up the gumption to invite a classmate, Anne, over for a visit over the weekend. Vance, Bitsy's otherwise wretched brother, is charmed. 

Speaking of charm, Bitsy tells Mrs. Jeffers, the bookshop owner, that her store lacks it and offers to update it. It takes some doing, but Jeffers eventually comes around. 

One interesting tidbit is Anne's back story, "I'm an only child...My mother's been quite sick, so I had to come to boarding school. She's in a sanitarium. Being mentally ill is just like having any other kind of sickness, you know." This seems very forward thinking for 1960.

Bitsy invites Anne to Alcie and Jonathan's for Thanksgiving and Anne teaches her to dance. Keith is there as well and they have a nice conversation.

Then we switch to Susan and her ship is coming it, and she dreads the fact that Bobby will probably be there. She meets a nice new grandma who is coming to Japan to meet her son's Japanese wife and their new baby. There is a bit of Lambertian propaganda about accepting this mixed marriage which is frankly, lovely.

But then Bobby shows up and spoils the mood. He has bought pearls for Susan which is quite the wrong move, and frankly, way too thirsty.  She declines the gift. He takes her to a geisha house for sukiyaki and there is a lot of Bobby being microagressive. 

Then we are back to Bitsy and the bookstore's grand re-opening where Vance is slightly less of a jerk and kind of saves the day. Keith shows up and starts calling BItsy Doll and it is creepy in a Bobby-like way. 

Then we whiplash back to Susan and her father is very ill in Hong Kong. Bobby steps in and helps out and begins his much needed redemption. There is also another bit of propaganda about how Communism feeds on hunger and how Americans have to educate and feed the poor people in third world countries to help their standard of living rise to keep them from becoming reds. He talks the General into going home where he can recover properly.

Bitsy finds out they will be home for Christmas and she is trying to hold everything together at home and deal with Susan's boyfriend drama with Keith. She's a busy little beaver. Ellen starts calling her "lovey" which she adores because it puts her on par with Susan. 

On the trip home, Susan and Bobby have a come to Jesus moment where she confesses she finally loves him back, but she hates the idea of being an Army wife, but she will hitch her star to his wagon nonetheless. And then he says he will quit the army and go into business for her because he pretty much sucks at the army. 

Bitsy spends the last chapter feeling bad for Keith, but recognizing that she is a bit player in that bigger story. Then there's some weird stuff with naming stars and blowing kisses and it ends. 

This wasn't one of my favorites, although I liked Lamberts little bits of social commentary and I found the travel parts interesting. And I liked Bitsy's growth arc. Okay, maybe I did like it after all!

BOY WANTED by Janet Lambert

 

Ah yes, BOY WANTED, the cry of my youth...

Well we are back with Patty and Ginger and Janet is here to show us the Goofus and Gallant of teenagerdom, circa 1959. If she is this concerned in '59, I can't wait to see what she makes of 1968! I have some friends who read a couple Lamberts and then stopped and I have to wonder if the magic of her early books will be all worn off when we get to her later work. Regardless of her propensity for propaganda, she sure can spin a yarn. 

Well we jump right in with Patty being awful about Mary Lou. Mary Lou is fat and will look horrible in a wool skirt and middy blouse (I think anyone would) and her attitude has nothing to do with the fact that ML beat her out for vice president of the class. 

Patty is jonesing for a letter from Tim, who she met in WE'RE GOING STEADY but who has, lucky for him, gotten away from her. She is also awful about Ginger, who is her rock, and always picks her last to come over after she has tried the popular girls. 

Patty's big brother Douglas makes the mistake of saying that Ginger has personality and Patty takes it as a personal affront. When Ginger comes over she makes a big deal about it and they decide to list their positive attributes. Patty has a million things she thinks she is good at, but Ginger is stumped. Nice girls don't love themselves, I guess. The decide they're both fine and give each other nicknames - Ginger is Personality and Patty is Plus. Weirdos. 

So the gist of the story is that Tim is coming back. Patty has been pining and he has promptly forgotten about her, although he remembers Ginger was fun. In other news, Ginger is pining for Spark Plug, the Kenny Jenkins of her life. (Kenny Jenkins was the adorable motor head who lived next door when I was in middle school and high school and was 2 years older than me - fantasy fodder for sure...) And there is a mean teacher named Mr. Stillman who is a complete pill.

Well, it turns out that Mr. Stillman's wife is quite ill and he has small children so Ginger takes it upon herself to bring him food every night. Spark Plug helps her. They are so nice! Meanwhile, Patty is trying to get Tim back without looking like she is trying and also while maintaining her hold on popularity. He is resisting, somewhat to please his parents, somewhat because Patty is below the line of the Vicki Mendoza Diagonal. Patty is blaming Ginger for this because she can't possibly see any flaws in her own behavior. 

They make up after Patty's usually ineffectual parents make her stay home from a party. She apologizes in the most condescending way in front of Ginger's mom and Mrs. Johnson CLEARLY hates her guts, but is too polite to say. 

Ginger gets a dog, her parents hope it will help her be more independent of Patty. Of course Patty resents the dog. His name is Shadow and he sounds kind of boring, but I prefer him to Patty. Patty decides to punish Tim for "fluffing her off". Ginger points out that Spark Plug fluffs her off all the time and she doesn't care. That's the way boys are. (Did you know Quincy Jones produced that song?? I did not...) Patty says (and I quote) "And why should you care" Spark Plug's a square. He doesn't do big things. He's not an athlete." Harsh, Pat.

So Patty gets a date with Bill for the football game. And there is a delightful part where she is chatting with him and is both deep and self deprecating and I can see how, combined with her prettiness, that would be an intoxicating cocktail for a boy. She is thrilled to be dating a much older athlete. And Spark Plug tells Ginger she has a permanent seat in Beauty, the car he has been obsessively fixing up forever. 

So both girls end the book on a happy note. And I am sure they will stay that way. Just kidding. I assure you that having nearly completed SPRING FEVER, Patty becomes even more of a toxic Tammy.  But for now we will leave them happy. In the meantime, I will be back soon with THE STARS HANG HIGH where Bobby Parrish takes advantage of an elderly man's ill health to try to trick Susan into marriage. I am sure it will go swimmingly. 

FOR EACH OTHER by Janet Lambert

Well, I have to say that these are not the best covers I've seen in the Lambert revue. And the characters on the cover, who I can only assume are Josie and Scott, look far older than they should. Although Josie's hair looks great in the paperback version!

But let's back up.

We are back with the Campbells! The parents are intellectuals, who can't manage money at all and think it is perfectly fine to dress their children in rags and raise them on an old Chinese junk. The oldest, Sandra, is probably 18 or so and she is a beauty. She has a devoted beau, Jay, who is hoping to get her to accept his proposal. Her being in Haiti and him being a college student in the states isn't as much of an impediment as you would think because he's filthy rich.  Josie is about 15 and full of fun. She is a "bloom where you are planted kind of gal, and she is blooming. They have a younger brother, Tenny, who just rolls with the punches like a champ. 

 As the book opens, Josie is hanging around imagining things when she meets day-tripper Scott Maitland. He is the whitest boy in all of Haiti. He wasn't supposed to visit the island, but he has been over protected and is rebelling, albeit somewhat ineffectually. 

I had intended to research Haiti's "bloody struggle to become a republic, its ups and downs through the years when it was preyed upon by different political groups, and ending with the dissension and intrigue in its present government." But I did not, because Janet summed it up there. And I'm in this for the interpersonal relationships, not the politics. 

But I will point out at one point when Josie is talking about how the wealthy Haitians send their kids to school in France, she says they do it "Because French is Haiti's national language and because - well, many of them are almost white, and they feel that we still draw a color line." Which is a delicate way to say it in 1959. She is quick to mention that Sandra has a Haitian friend who was offered a wonderful job in New York, so clearly it isn't a problem.

Well, Scott gets a wee bit stranded and is a wee bit annoying, but Josie tries to make the best out of it. She takes him to see a voodoo ritual which they view as pure entertainment, but Lambert has an insightful bit where Scott is all riled up from the voodoo and Josie knows that it is just the thrill of the unknown and he will come down shortly, and he does. 

Drama erupts when Josie is overheard saying what a dud Scott is, and he overhears it. And agrees. But they make up. The Simpsons, who own the hotel where everyone is staying, have their study broken into. Nothing much comes of it. 

Then all hell breaks loose and the Campbell kids, Scott and Jay are sent to the states on their own. Josie spends much of my goodwill by sneaking a bunch of kittens onto the plane.

They end up at Jay's parents' house and we learn that Scott had been ill, but also had an older bother who had died of polio, which was one of the reasons his parents were so overprotective. That and his propensity for getting stuck in island nations during a violent coup. 

Jay's mom tries to give them some dresses that cost the current equivalent of nearly $300! That seems quite excessive. Sandra won't take them because until she is married she will pay for her own dresses, or at least her parents will. 

Jay sweet talks Sandra into taking his grandmother's engagement ring so that they can get married soon and go to college together. They're BABIES!! Josie reads some stuff to Sandy that she wrote about their parents for when they get homesick and it smartens her up and she plans to return the ring in the morning. 

And it ends. 

Honestly.

That's it. 

I really liked the Haitian setting and the look at the difference Lambert displays between tourists and people who stay in the place long term. As a person who likes to stay somewhere long-term-ish, rather than do touristy things, I appreciated it. And there was some real tension in the kids getting out of the country. But the interpersonal stuff didn't grab me. We KNOW Sandy and Jay are going to end up together and now that Scott has declared Josie to be his person, there's probably going to be another set of soulmates to keep together. 

Although I just pulled the next Campbell installment FOREVER AND EVER off the shelf and apparently they are moving to Crawfordsville and will have some adventures there. So you never know if Scott will return, or be forgotten. I look forward to seeing how Janet describes Crawfordsville. I have been there a few times, sure, it is 60+ years after the books were written, but how much could it really have changed?

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this, but I thought it would have stuck with me more than it did. Maybe that's just the Campbells. The settings are so unusual that the stories don't have to be too compelling. Or maybe I am dying to get back to Patty and Ginger and their crazy teenage wilding. Or to see if maybe Bobby Parrish does the right thing and lets Keith have Susan. So much to find out!

GOING STEADY chapters 8-12

 

CHAPTER 8

All of a sudden there's a rash of clubs like this town has never seen. Patty is asked to join most of them, but she feel like she and two of her going steady friends, Jane and Phyllis, call themselves The Independent Three and think they are better than everyone else, even though "Spark plug called her 'a dope' and Tim had said she was 'pretty but stupid'." Ouch!

Well, tragedy strikes and Steve's appendix needs to come out and now Patty doesn't have a date for the hayride. (More shades of FIFTEEN! How convenient for teen fiction the appendix is.) She tries to get Ginger to find her a date, completely turning her back on the sanctity of the going steady as soon as it is inconvenient!

Doug and Mrs. Palmer have words about how spoiled Patty is wherein Douglas says to his mother, "I don't dig you." to mean he doesn't understand her.  Oh Janet, you're so hip! When she tries to comfort her daughter later, Patty tells her she isn't going steady anymore. Someone should tell Steve, once he is out of the near embrace of lady death!

CHAPTER 9

We switch to Bonnie's point of view as she heads to the drugstore to meet Douglas. She meets up with a friend, Madia, who is stalking her steady Bud. Bud is secretly dating Joan. Oh, it's a mess! After she and Doug watch the standoff, they start arguing about who is in the wrong. Janet gets in some anti-going-steady propaganda. Bonnie, as usual voices it. "These years are the last ones we'll have before we get responsibilities, so perhaps they ought to be kept free and full of fun." So wise.

When the kids get home, Mrs. Palmer is on hand to pound the lesson in further. " Going steady is a shaky bridge. It isn't anchored to marriage, or even to a recognized engagement. It's so awfully hard to walk on, especially if your companion decides to turn back and you're left along. You can't turn back when you're married." Oh dear, someone had best tell her about divorce!

Doug tries to write a letter of apology for being "a heel." But when he goes to call her, she is running down the hall of the house to apologize to him. Now THESE crazy kids just might make it work. 

CHAPTER 10

And now we are in Jane Palmer's head. She is bemoaning her lovestruck son and her daughter of whom she says, "If her grades weren't average, I'd swear she's a moron. And even so, I can't see where she finds time to study and. make good marks - dancing all afternoon, playing records and hanging on the telephone all evening, plus writing in her diary. That diary, by the way, is the worst piece of drivel I've ever read." Spying, Jane?  Not okay!

But as the Palmer parents discuss the state of their daughter, Mr. Palmer lays down some wisdom on why teens worry about stupid stuff. "Well, those are their problems. They can't worry about taxes - they haven't any. They haven't a washing machine to break down, either, or a big deal that has to go through if they're to meet their payroll. Girls have school, boys, other girls, clothes and parents to worry about. Boys, high school boys, like Doug, have all those, plus another big one to boot - how to get enough money to take a girl out." He's right, it IS harder for boys! Except the being a second class citizen thing for the girls. 

Then we shift to Bonnie and Doug who are helping Maida get over the duplicitous Bud by setting her up with the stalwart Boyd Freeman, self made man and student at Temple. There is some interesting stuff about the status difference between Maida, raised by her widowed mother and Bud's side-piece Joan, the banker's daughter. But mostly it's about mustering your wits and standing in your own defense. 

CHAPTER 11

On the way to school, Patty is nervous because she is now NOT going steady and feels like she is on the outs with her friends who Ginger describes as "a bunch of goony girls you never did like and who neck right in front of everyone." Oh my heavens, so salacious! 

As they leave their locker, Patty sees Tim and trues to figure out why she is so drawn to him, "He had fudgy hair, yes, and he wore slacks instead of cords, and was almost a junior. He made up nick-names like 'Ginger-cookie' and 'Merry Christmas', but he didn't know the difference between straight white teeth and ones with braces on them." So he's not...shallow?

After school, Patty and Ginger go to the treehouse which is where Ginger likes to sit when Patty is off being social. She eats cake and stalks Spark Plug. Ginger litters some wax paper, kind of going all AMERICAN BEAUTY with it. Patty realizes Ginger is warm for Spark Plug's form and tells her that he must think she's a square because she sits in a treehouse eating cake. 

Patty falls down the treehouse ladder and it brings the boys running. We learn that Patty will flirt with anything and Spark Plug's real name is Elston. When Tim and Patty go off to take care of her tree wounds she learns that he was sent away because he was going steady and my goodness, going steady is bad. Tim and Patty decide to be confidential friends and he says she has a lot of common sense. But I've read BOY WANTED already and I know that is completely untrue!

CHAPTER 12

It turns out that Patty has made the gossip column of the high school paper and it's AWESOME!! "What little freshman is rolling her big blue eyes in another direction now? And why doesn't the guy know enough to carry her books like his predecessor used to?  Sh! She's the little sister of a big shot, and the new fellah's a foreigner in these here parts. Give her time to train him." Doug says he wanted to scrap it, as the editor of the paper, but "other kids get razzed, why shouldn't [Patty]." He has no idea her social stock just rose a ton due to that mention.

Doug and Mrs. Palmer chat about the [minor] changes in Patty and consider it a victory over the evils of going steady. And yet the last sentence is Patty answering the phone, "Then she rolled over on her back and held her breath while she waited for Tim's answer." Same old Patty...

We will be back with these wacky teens after a trip to Haiti with the Campbells. See you there!

WE'RE GOING STEADY chapters 5-7

CHAPTER 5:

We're back and Patty's lipstick is on point. Dark enough to be interesting, but not so dark as to cause trouble. And Bonnie has taught her how to apply it so she doesn't look skanky. She meets Steve to walk to school and he sweet talks her. But she is pissed. She spent all day Sunday waiting for him to call and he was in Philly with his folks. She acts highhanded and then picks away at his cheerleading skills. Wow, Patty, way to drag a fella to his knees. They plan to meet for lunch.

After school, Patty and Ginger are at Ginger's and we hear of two people who will play a larger part in the Patty and Ginger saga - Spark Plug, Ginger's neighbor who is a motor-head junior grade with a carburetor where his heart will be and Mary Lou whose defining characteristic is that she is fat. And single. Yes, in this particular crowd I am definitely the Mary Lou.

Mary Lou is starting a club and having a slumber party to kick it off, but Patty can't join. It's a Girls Who Don't Go Steady club. Miss Maxwell, their homeroom and Latin teacher is sponsoring it. It's a movement! At this point we find out that the Palmers are Republicans and Ginger's parents are Democrats, but they're both Presbyterians (of COURSE they are!) so it's okay.

They have a fight about the "frumpy club" and as things are escalating, Tim comes to the door bearing flowers. Patty thinks it's a "date" but he's all like, "Who dates in the afternoon??" and says he saw Steve "hot-footing to the dancing joint" meaning the teen center, and assumed Patty would be there like the steady-going ball and chain she is. She haughtily says she doesn't go there every day and Ginger does not roll her eyes on the outside but they are opened wide in amazement of this bald faced lie. She invites Tim to Spark Plug's to work on the car. Patty goes home regretting her life choices. 

CHAPTER 6:

Patty heads home feeling unwanted only to find her brother and his girl being all weird and writing stuff. Douglas busts her chops about talking to Tim and she points out that he and Bonnie seem to have an open relationship. Oh Patty, you don't even understand what it is like to be on their level!

When Mrs. Palmer comes in, Bonnie goes bonkers telling her that Douglas has been offered a job writing editorials for the local paper. Doug tries to give Bonnie credit, but she won't take it because he is the MAN. But she says she imagines that someday they might "have permanent seats on a panel show." Which seems adorable. But the gender role stuff is so prevalent, "When I get going, I'll do a woman's column and leave the political and psychological end to him," she says of her own future journalism career. 

Apparently the Doug and Bonnie beat is the mind of the teenager. Doug has a column ready to go - "What the Young Fry Think About" and from the way Bonnie is acting it is not going to make Penny happy. However he has"some others ready. One on the importance of going out for sports, one on having a hobby, and a feminine slant on filling your time that Bonnie's working on." Is it just me or do these sound ripe for an MST3K makeover?

Patty leaves the room and Janet Lambert steps in, with Bonnie as her hip, young mouthpiece and gives a speech about how stupid going steady is. She nails it. "They're just out for the thrill." is as sexy as it gets, but the subtext is there. Doug informs his mother that the tack everyone should take is to press on Patty how important it is to be connected to Steve at the hip and Steve's essential dullness will take care of the rest. Along with some good old fashioned shunning. 

Mrs. Palmer - who surely has a rich full life outside her children's', but not in this book - talks with Patty in the kitchen about that old, fat Mary Lou's party. But there is no sympathy there. And what is worse, Steve has an itching issue so he might not be available for dates this weekend. Oh well, sickness and health, right Patty?

Finally Mary Lou calls, explains that the cool teachers are helping with the celibacy club, and it is going to be cool and exclusive, like a sorority! Patty is flummoxed and says, to her mother, "Something's wrong somewhere...Because Mary Lou's a square. Not much of one, but sort of. She's fun, but she's fat.  And Ginger has braces on her teeth. Not a single girl in our own special little crowd ever has real dates but me, so they're trying to make me think I'm wrong." And frankly, I am kind of impressed that Janet lets her main character be this much of a bitch. Her mother refuses to get drawn into her drama and you think that would be a clue. But Patty is just swirling in her own head. 

CHAPTER 7

Patty is hiding her disappointment at being left out by hanging out with Steve 24/7. Her parents miss her friends so much that when Ginger, Tim and Spark Plug show up on Sunday, they practically throw together a pop-up rave. They pull out records and give up two dollars worth of fruit for the cause! Then they decide to go to "the club" for dinner and leave the kids the house. Mrs. Palmer knows it will be trashed tomorrow but the cleaning woman will be coming so she can take care of it. You know, if it weren't for that dud, Patty. I might enjoy being Mrs. Palmer. 

There is good, wholesome, Sloppy-Joe-fueled fun going on. News of a hayride is bandied about and things are awkward for a minute until Ginger fixes is so that some steady-going girls are allowed to attend the GWDGS Club event, like missionary work. There is some gross talk about selling off girls to the highest bidder that is reminiscent of Jane Purdy's ill-fated kiss in FIFTEEN.

The Palmers come home and Patty is so excited about the hay ride. She nearly gets her dad to spring for some new pajamas, "the kind with silk slacks and a quilted silk jacket?" But her mom says Christmas is coming and the jammies can wait, but in the meantime Patty can borrow her read silk set for the slumber party after the hayride. 

Patty is ecstatic and calls her parents "cute" over and over and Mrs. Palmer thinks, "Please try to find some other work with which to express your feelings for us. Sometimes I think I'll scream if you call me 'cute' again." But she doesn't say it because she doesn't want to spoil Patty's happiness with criticism. I feel you, Mrs. Palmer. I really do!

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