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#27 – Lovestruck

* Photo credit to The Closet *

Let’s chat about the front and back cover to Lovestruck. I think I could write a thesis-sized commentary on the outside of the book alone, but I’ll try to abridge it for those who are on the go.

First, I think it’s safe to say that Ken Matthews does not look lovestruck. In fact, this is actually how boys look right before they dump you. This should probably be the cover for He’s Just Not That Into You. Ken also appears to be in his early thirties. Does the artist, James Mathewuse, know what teenagers look like?

That broad hanging off Ken’s neck is Suzanne Hanlon, and you can tell she’s so refined and cultured—as the book keeps telling us—by the strand of pearls around her neck. Undeniable class! If you haven’t already guessed thanks to blatancy of the front image, the back cover tells us that Suzanne and Ken are polar opposites: “Suzanne likes poetry, gourmet food, and art films, while Ken’s idea of a good time is listening to rock ‘n’ roll and eating pizza. Two people couldn’t be more different.” THEN we get this gem: “Elizabeth Wakefield knows that snobbish Suzanne is wrong for Ken.” Because she is one of Jesus’s descendants and knows everything that is right in this world. FUCK OFF, LIZ! But she won’t listen.

So everyone is STILL talking about the Sweet Valley Centennial and its game and picnic, all of which was first introduced to us nearly ten books ago. They’re really letting this thing linger. Why are we still talking about this? Freaking Todd was forgotten faster than the centennial.

Everyone’s counting on quarterback Ken to win The Big Game against the Palisades Pumas. But if Ken flunks his next English assignment, he can’t play, so here comes Liz Wakefield to the rescue. She calls Ken and offers to help him write a short story, and when he asks where she heard about his problem from, Liz is like, “It doesn’t matter,” like it’s none of his business, and yet it’s HER business to get into his. If that made sense. In short, Liz is really pissing me off and the first chapter’s not even over.

Liz’s idea of helping Ken is to lend him a short story—complete with her notes and an outline—that she wrote about a boy who just moved to Sweet Valley. Christ. Do they even consider the world outside the golden walls of their town? She says, “I’m a little funny about my short stories… I’ve never shown one to anyone.” Writing for the school paper is different than writing fiction, so then WHY does everyone insist that she’s such a great writer if they don’t even know? Oh, because she’s a Wakefield, so everything she does must be glorious.

As mentioned previously, Ken is all wrapped up in Suzanne and is all hot for her “poise.” Ashamed of his English grade, he doesn’t tell Suzanne that he’s in danger of failing and instead goes over to Suzanne’s house for dinner and feels all awkward, a la Roger Barrett Patman: He initially thinks the butler is Suzanne’s dad and frets that he’s holding his fork differently than everyone else. The Hanlon family is actually sort of cool; they at least have more of a personality and are less bitchy than Marie Patman, which ain’t sayin’ much but still.

Obviously, Suzanne’s always out to change Ken, so it’s hard to see why she’s into him in the first place. She forces him to listen to Mozart, drags him out to see foreign films (which only perplex him) with her shitty hipster friends, and has no respect for his love for football. (So why date a football player? But I guess I could see the hotness potential in dating a football hero, and she’s got the right idea: It’s quarterback or nothing.) The truth is that everyone keeps insisting Ken’s not a moron, but all his inner thoughts are sort of…dumb. Sorry, Ken. But he wins points for trying to be into the shit Suzanne likes.

There’s a “literary evening,” brought to us by Suzanne, worked into the story that’s basically pointless and does nothing but inflate Liz’s ego. Twenty-five people show up, which I guess is a good turnout, considering it’s poetry, and high school poetry at that. A bunch of kids read some really dreadful, “deep” poetry that makes Liz snicker: “She knew how much the poem must have meant to the girl, but it just seemed silly.” To make matters worse, everyone loves Liz’s fucking poem, with its “strong and touching” images. GROSS.

In the end, Ken is so preoccupied with impressing Suzanne and trying to live up to her boring standards that he has no time to write a short story and ends up submitting Liz’s work—creatively titled “The New Kid” (srsly)—as his own, and everyone shits a brick over how good it is, inadvertently validating how GOOD Liz is as a writer. HATE. The Oracle plans to run the story in the centennial issue without Ken’s consent, which is sort of wrong and unethical but whatever. Liz sees the story, realizes the troof, and then confronts Ken, who has Atlas-sized guilt to begin with over the whole thing. This spurns Ken to write a story of his own, for real real.

Ken delivers his short story to The Oracle to have it replace the first one, and even though he’s not a writer, it’s soooooooooo good. Ken gets called to Principal Cooper’s office and they let him off the hook with a “C” and tell him he can still play in the game. But Suzanne puts a damper on Ken’s joy by telling him that he’s humiliated her in front of all her friends. In short, he’s a fake and a phony and she wishes she’d never laid eyes on him. But everyone else in the world understands, so Ken really doesn’t give a crap.

The Gladiators win The Big Game and it’s all due to Ken. Afterward, Suzanne approaches him with apologies and he forgives her. But immediately afterward she starts bossing him around again, saying that he needs to accompany her to a history lecture instead of going to the oh-so-immature picnic. But Ken gets a clue and shuns her: “You see, Suzanne, history lectures bore me, art films bore me, your friends bore me, and, if you want to know the truth, I guess you bore me, too.” YA BURNT!

And now to give props when props are due: Bruce Patman, the president of the Sweet Valley Centennial Student Committee, put Jess in charge of putting the picnic together, and Jess is actually sort of awesome in this story. A myriad of problematic issues come up, including that she learns that there will be no caterer on the day of the picnic, but she really pulls through: She makes jillions of PBJ sandwiches and brings out tons of chips, and then hides in the bushes, fearing that the crowd will tar and feather her for not delivering on the burgers and hotdogs. But Bruce gives her kudos for cutting down the food bill to less than seventy-five clams, and she “humbly” accepts the crowd’s applause.

Other Notes:

  • Okay, there’s a SV Centennial Student Committee, but I don’t see any Adult committee doing any work…
  • At one point, Liz basically tries to drown herself so she won’t have to deal with Jess talking about the picnic. This is not hyperbole.
  • Liz agrees to man the kissing booth at the picnic and smooches more than 150 dudes, which is the most un-Liz thing I’ve ever heard. Then again, that’s just what she wants us to believe!
  • We gain some writing tips from the ghostwriter, via Mr. Collins!: “When you review your writing, make sure you’ve said what you want as simply as you could.” This explains a lot.
  • The Dairi Burger has a centennial special: a soda, fries, and burger for 100 pennies. Now I see why everyone loves Sweet Valley so much. (BTW: A moment of empathy to the poor cashier who has to count all that.)
  • Liz takes it upon herself to “break up” and referee Jess and Lila Fowler’s bitchy albeit good-natured banter. Is there anyone’s butt she’s not up?
  • To no shock, the Droids perform at the picnic. Is Sweet Valley really that devoid of other bands and musicians? Is it really possible that no teenager at SVH is just like, “Let’s, like, be in a band together?”

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