"Finally I managed to whisper, 'You mean you're getting married?'" #30 Mary Anne and the Great Romance

Argh! Now my scanner is working, but my photo program isn't! So, if I can get things together, I'll put up the pic. Otherwise, it's over at the Dibbly-Fresh gallery.

I have mixed feelings about this book. It's pretty important in the land of BSC, but it's definitely not one of my favorites. What other union is as important as the Spier/Schafer marriage (not counting the Brewers!)? Who else got married during the run of the series? Mrs. Barrett and Boytoy, Dawn's dad and Carol the Hair Queen, and I feel like there should be one more couple. But I digress.

Mary Anne and Dawn are sitting at Dawn's house one night because their parentals have gone out together again. They're trying to watch a Hayley Mills marathon on TV, but they lose interest pretty quickly. They're hanging around in Dawn's room and Mary Anne starts to think about her own house and her own room and how lucky she is to have lived there her whole life. The phone rings, interrupting Mary Anne's thoughts, and they talk to Kristy for a while.

A few days later, Richard suggests to Mary Anne that she invite Dawn over for dinner since Sharon's working late. During dinner, Richard tells the girls that Sharon's birthday is coming up and he'd like to have a small surprise dinner for her. Dawn seconds it, and they make plans to have the dinner the night before her birthday. Richard says he'll have a client of Sharon's call Chez Maurice to make a reservation, but instead of the client, Richard, Mary Anne, and Dawn will be there instead! Mary Anne and Dawn make all sorts of plans for the dinner, like balloons on the chandelier above their table, champagne in a bucket, roses, you get the picture. Later on, Mary Anne and Dawn are discussing gifts to give to Sharon. Dawn's going to get her a day-planner (watch out, it'll end up in the vegetable crisper!) and Mary Anne says she'll get a nice pen for the planner. Dawn shoots it down--"she'll just lose it." Mary Anne says she saw a pin shaped like a cat. "Forget it, Mom doesn't like cats." Mary Anne starts to get a little cheesed, and I don't blame her. You know, for Mary Anne being so meek and spineless, she sure gets mouthy in this book. Finally she decides on a charm of a class ring, since Sharon never got one in high school.

At the dinner, the surprise goes as planned. The waiter disappears to get the dessert menus, but he brings back a cake instead. Sharon's relieved no one's singing "Happy Birthday" to her, but as she blows out the candles, she notices the diamond engagement ring slipped over a candle. Mary Anne and Dawn are gobsmacked that their parents are getting married! How could they not notice? They do ask a bunch of questions, and get told that Richard and Sharon just want a JP wedding without a reception, just the family going out to eat together afterwards. They're disappointed, but deal.

A few more days later, Richard invites Sharon and Dawn over for dinner so they can talk wedding plans. Mary Anne and Dawn go off the deep end with suggestions for a formal wedding with tuxes and flower girls and white orchids. Richard and Sharon talk them out of that, but compromise to have a very small church wedding, with a dinner afterward at Chez Maurice. After dinner, Mary Anne and Dawn are still talking about wedding plans in Mary Anne's room, when Dawn drops the bomb that the Spiers are moving to the Schafers' house. Mary Anne freaks out because she didn't know and Sharon and Dawn make a quick getaway. Richard explains that since they're the smaller family, it makes sense for the smaller family with the smaller house to move into the bigger family's bigger house. [I call shenanigans on that: the Hobarts will move into the house pretty soon, and they're a family of six.] She finally accepts it.

Wedding day! Mary Anne wears Dawn's Laura Ashley dress, and Dawn has a new Laura Ashley "hip sailor dress." Richard has a new suit, and Sharon wears a pale pink drop waist dress with beading. Claudia comes over to help Mary Anne get ready. She French braids Mary Anne's hair, and puts makeup on her. Which Mary Anne eventually cries off. After Claudia leaves, Richard comes in and gives Mary Anne a present: the pearl necklace that belonged to her mother. Richard was going to wait till Mary Anne turned 16, but decided his wedding day was somehow more appropriate.

The ceremony goes off without a hitch, except the Pike triplets. They're Jeff's guests for the wedding, and they are giggling over a "scantily-clad" angel in a stained-glass window. And of course, Mary Anne cries off all her makeup.

At the dinner afterwards, Mary Anne and Dawn are talking about how they're going to spend one last night at Mary Anne's house before she officially moves out. Jeff is going to the Pikes' and Richard and Sharon are having their wedding night at the Strathmore Inn. The girls are interrupted by Sharon calling out for all the unmarried girls--she's gonna throw the bouquet!

And that's where it ends.

Subplot: It was kinda hard not to mention the subplot in the above description. It's about the Arnold twins (and sibling rivalry in general), and how they're constantly fighting. Turns out, now that they have their own personalities and clothes, they need their own rooms to go with them. Carolyn is getting chummy with Haley Braddock and Vanessa Pike, and Marilyn desperately wants to be friends with them too. Carolyn tells Marilyn no way, so Marilyn makes up her own friend, Gozzie Kunka. As soon as Carolyn, Haley, and Vanessa agree to let Marilyn play with them, Gozzie disappears. There's an issue with Karen and Emily Brewer too, which is resolved in ten pages.

WTF Moments:
*While at the surprise birthday/engagement, Sharon says they discussed engagement rings, and they didn't want new wedding rings. Excuse me?? Were you planning to wear the wedding ring that someone else gave you? Or not wear one at all? Does not compute. If my husband suggested not getting wedding rings, I would've run for the hills.

*First appearance of Charlie Thomas' new secondhand car. Which he picked out on his own, with only his brother Sam for help. Yes, without parental input. Um, when my two older kids got their first "nice" cars (their real first cars were both junkers) we researched for weeks and worked out budgets and shopped around. I can't believe that Charlie went by himself at seventeen to buy his first car. Hey Charlie? You just got screwed.

*The BSC doesn't realize that Marilyn's friend Gozzie doesn't exist until page 126. Took you long enough, Super Sitters.

Continuity Issues:
*Mary Anne talks about the discovery of their parents dating in high school. She says Dawn realized it when she was unpacking. I'm pretty sure Mary Anne was right there with her.

*In Mary Anne's description of the BSC members' duties, she says Kristy's never missed a meeting. In #4, Kristy purposely missed a meeting to go hang out with the Shalliber twins. But in context, Mary Anne was talking about Dawn being the alternate officer and how Dawn's never been president because Kristy's never missed a meeting. So this one is borderline continuity.

*Bad editing: M&Ms being M and Ms on one page (twice) and M&Ms on the next page.

Other Notables:
*Some foreshadowing about Mary Anne thinking she's never had to move or live in a different house. [See paragraph 2]

*A Claudia outfit! And, really, it doesn't sound too bad.

*Mary Anne rates herself as a 6 or 7 on the fashion scale. She rates Kristy a 2, Stacey a 9 1/2, but Claud gets a 10! No one else gets a rating, even Dawn and her California Casual ensemble.

*First appearance of Dawn and Jeff's dad's girlfriend Carol. Meh.


I haven't decided which book to do next. A few weeks ago, I had planned to do this one and then #31, bang, bang, just to get them over with. I guess it'll be #31 or #57, which I just got. I might just surprise everyone with a V.C. Andrews post too. (I did say I wasn't going to go to work very much this week!)