A Book Review - The Girlfriend by R.L. Stine (Point Horror)

Not much to say about this. I seem to remember it as being quite good, yet this time I found it barely readable. There were things that I liked about the book - I liked Scotty and Lora's relationship, and the way they were different from your average teens, and I like the premise of the novel - but it was let down by Scotty being such a...well, I was going to use an alternative word for "cat" but I'll stick with "wimp".

In The Girlfriend, Scotty - the boy next door with the perfect life - has the perfect girlfriend, but when she goes on vacation he meets another girl and takes her out a few times. Then she goes all bunny-boiler on him, having decided that he's hers now. And Scotty spends the rest of the book alternately trying to avoid her, trying to tell her he doesn't want her, and running from (what he thinks are) her intimidating older brothers. While simultaneously lying to his girlfriend Lora about having ever met Ms bunny-boiler, and trying to placate Ms bunny-boiler so she doesn't tell Lora.

Oy veh. What a balancing act.

I want to sympathise, I really do. I've been in Scotty's situation, and it's not fun. But while I want to sympathise, I want even more to give him a kick up the backside and tell him to stop lying and stop pandering to the stalker, and tell her to take a hike. Several times during the book, he talks to her on the phone, or goes over to her house, to tell her that he can't see her anymore. And each time he goes away convinced that she's got the message this time, and won't be any more trouble. Uh, no. That's not how lunatics work, Scotty, and I'd expect even a teenage boy to be aware of this instead of being so naïve as to think that politely (or even impolitely) asking a crazy person who's obsessed with you to please leave you alone will make them do so.

What would I have done? First real instance of unhingedness, I'd have gone to my girlfriend and told her the truth, or perhaps an edited version of it. I might not have said that I'd taken this other girl out because she was hot and I was bored and lonely - I'd probably have said I felt sorry for her because she was new in town and didn't seem to have any friends - and I knew it was a stupid thing to do, and I'm sorry. Then I'd have flipped Ms bunny-boiler the bird, said, "Good luck with blackmailing me now," and then if she continued stalking me I'd have told my parents and the police. Simple.

Of course, eventually Scotty has to come clean, which he should have done to start with, because you can't let a situation like that go on indefinitely. Either someone finds out, or you end up a statistic on Unsolved Murders.

Teenagers. *eyeroll*

Verdict: An interesting premise, let down by a hero with no spine or common sense.