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\\#16 Rags to Riches;
Janitor Two: Hi. Janitor One: Hi. Janitor Two: Hi. So, book? Janitor One: Yes, book. Rags to Riches. Janitor Two: Shall I? Janitor One: Yes. Janitor Two: Roger, a poor little boy with a dead mother, discovers (in the previous book) that he is, in fact, related to one of the richest families in Sweet Valley. He goes off to live with them--said family including Bruce Patman--and things just get worse and worse. At first, he is merely uncomfortable, then he begins to feel like his entire "old" life is not worthy of his new, "Patman status." This insecurity bleeds over into his relationships and, with some help from Jessica, he nearly breaks up with Olivia. In the end, Uncle Hank fixes everything, puts his wife back in her cage, and Jess gets to grovel for seconds at the country club party. Everyone's happy. Janitor One: Cool. Janitor Two: What do you think of the plot? Janitor One: I like it. Roger is a sincere and easily relatable character. He's more real than most Sweet Vallians. He's not gorgous, he's not rich, he's not all that popular, and then suddenly he's thrust into that world. And his reactions to everything are beleivable. Janitor Two: This has nothing to do with anything, but did you notice how Roger got shorter and grew back some of his baby fat from the cover of Racing Hearts to the cover of Rags to Riches? Janitor One: No, but I'll look at that the next time I look at my books. Janitor Two: K. And yes, I agree with you. Janitor One: I do notice, Bruce dyes his hair all the time. It can be anything, black, brown, dark blond.... Janitor Two: The plot of the poor orphan suddenly becoming rich is very used, but Roger puts a twist on it with his attitude and lovablity. Hehe. Bruce is fickle. He's like Madonna.... Janitor One: Yeah. Hehe. Can you see him dancing around in a pointy bra singing, "Papa Don't Preach..." Janitor Two: Hehe. Oh, what would ol' Hank do then? Janitor One: Drop dead of shock. And then Marie would beat Bruce with a broom for killing his father and then have a maid clean it up. Janitor Two: Yeah.... Janitor One: And then the two of them would sit, eating tea and crumpets. Janitor Two: Hehe. Janitor One: Hehe. Janitor Two: I just have to say, Bruce's mom has major character continuity issues through the series, and this book really highlights them. In some books, she's the very picture of a lovely wife and mother who is nothing but elegant and kind. In others, she's petty and cold. Still later, she seems down right unbalanced..... Janitor One: Yeah. She's such a bitch in this book. Janitor Two: She threw in the "evil stepmother" element that every fairy tale needs. Janitor One: It is a rags to riches tale. There must be a villain. Janitor Two: Yep. Speaking of villians, let's move right into characters and look at Jess. If nothign else, she was good in this book. She really worked the crowd over. Janitor One: This is Jess at her most manipulative. Janitor Two: Yes. Janitor One: And ol' Liv and Rog play right into her hands. Janitor Two: They couldn't have made it easier for her if they tried. Roger: "Gee, I think Jess is trying to make you think you aren't any good so I'll fall in love with her and give her all my money. We better break up now. Sorry, Liv. It was real." Janitor One: Hehe. But for some reason, I enjoyed reading about Jessica in this book, perhaps because of her link with Marie. Like Marie had "hired" her for the part. Janitor Two: Yeah. I liked the way those two interacted with each other. There's Jess in twenty years... Janitor One: Scary thought. Janitor Two: Yes... Janitor One: I think that's her just without the rich part. As much as she wants to be rich, i just don't think she'll ever get there. Janitor Two: No. It would be wrong. Umm, let's list mains to go over....Marie and Jess, we covered. Roger, Liv, Bruce.... Anyone else? Janitor One: :P Liz, if we want to include her. But she wasn't a main character, she was just the largest of the supporting cast. Janitor Two: Ok. We'll play with her too. Let's get her out of the way. She was stupid and annoying like always. She was there just to convince Olivia to go to the party. Janitor One: That's the only role she played, and she did it succinctly. Janitor Two: She could have been a prop like a talking cardboard tree towards the back of the stage and accomplished as much. Janitor One: Olivia wouldn't have been able to tell the difference. Janitor Two: Nope. On to Olivia. She annoyed me in this one at times, but I also found this to be her most endearing book. I can sympathize with her plight. Janitor One: Yeah. She didn't know how to react to Roger's new status, but she accepted it with open arms. It's just when Jess started screwing with her.... Janitor Two: She's very emotional, though. Janitor One: But I am too. Except I'm demanding. She's not. She's a nice person. Janitor Two: I think she has something that makes her perfect for the story. If there wasn't, she wouldn't have worked as well. Janitor One: Not nearly. Janitor Two: I love the party scene where she's got her two plates of food and her weird clothes... Janitor One: Hehe. Me too. Janitor Two: I like the tennis scene, too. I think it's the fact that her and Roger are so trusting that makes the book so great. They really are just little pawns being pushed around by Jess and Marie. Janitor One: It's hilarious. Janitor Two: I like the part where Jess basically comes out and tells Bruce that she wants his help screwing with Olivia's head and he just sort of smirks. Janitor One: Bruce is such lovely guy. He knows what Jess is. Janitor Two: I love Bruce. Janitor One: I love him too. Who doesn't love Bruce? Janitor Two: Lila. Until they get into college... ^_^ Janitor One: Hehe. Janitor Two: I liked when Henry put the muzzle back on his bi-- Umm, wife. That was a cool note to end the book on. Janitor One: Henry's so cool Janitor Two: Yeah. Janitor One: There is a reason why Alice fell in love with him! Janitor Two: He's all jovial and laughing... He'd be a cool uncle to have. Janitor One: He's such a jerk in the the two Wakefield Family Sagas. I guess he mellowed out a bit as he got older. Do you think Bruce will do the same? Janitor Two: Umm...........maybe. Depends on who he marries. If she's nice, he'll stay mean. If she's as bad as his mother, he'll have to lighten up to compensate. Janitor One: Well, he probably marries Lila.... So I guess he will lighten up. ^_^ Janitor Two: Hehe. Yeah. Lila's good for him. She won't hesitate to kick him when he needs it. Janitor One: *Where* he needs it. ^_^ Janitor Two: ^_^ Janitor One: On to ol' Rog. Janitor Two: I love Roger. If Bruce and Roger were both dangling off a cliff and I could only save one of them from being impaled on jagged, pointly rocks hundreds of feet below, it would be a hard choice to make. Janitor One: I'd pick Bruce, I think. Janitor Two: I think so too. Like they say, only the good die young. If Bruce died and Roger lived, we'd be killing centuries of established philosophy. Janitor One: Hehe. Janitor Two: Roger's character...he is very believable. I like who he is, where he goes through the course of the book, and how he changes. All his changes are subtle and guided, but you can see him easing into his new life enough to try and make it work with the old. If you didn't see him getting more comfortable with himself and his surroundings, the ending where he stands up to the people at the party wouldn't have been very believable, or as satisefying. Janitor One: He's a very real person and I've always liked that about him. He wears glasses! There's, like, only three other SV people I can think of off the top of my head that wear glasses. He's very open, he doesn't try to hide things, except maybe how he's feeling if he doesn't want to upset anyone. He's a sincere and nice person. His character is explored nicely througout the book, and he goes through a lot, and changes because of it. But he doesn't change who he is. Janitor Two: He is very cool. He should have been more main in the entire series.... Janitor One: Yeah. Really. Janitor One: Oh, there was also the subplot with Regina, which played Liz and Todd's part some more. Janitor Two: Yeah, Liz and Todd...the very image of trust to contrasted the turbulant world of a newly-discovered millionaire debutant. It was just there for filler. Janitor One: We should go over it. Janitor Two: K. On to the subplot. It was stupid. Lila's stupid too. Janitor One: Yeah. In this book she is. But the subplot is worth something. Janitor Two: Yeah, about fifty pages of mind-numbing crap. Janitor One: It adds focus to Regina, who hadn't been in the books much since her initial appearence, which *DUNDUNDUN!* makes Bruce notice her. And then we have the immortal love affair of Bruce and Regina. Janitor Two: ..................It would have been better if Bruce had just crashed his car like he did for Terri, but whatever makes you happy. Janitor One: Yeah, it would've been better, but still. Janitor Two: Hmm, we disagree on something. Neat. Janitor One: I sort of did like lila getting told her face wouldn't look good on film, though. That was funny. Janitor Two: That was sort of worth all the extra stuff...... Janitor One: But Liz and Todd we could've done without. Janitor Two: Yeah. I think it was throwing Liz and Todd into it that made it annoying. Janitor One: Yeah. Janitor Two: I mean that one day down town, Lila was there, Regina was there, Todd and Liz followed along, and Caroline just happened to have a doctor's appointment... I know we lean heavily on coincidence in our little world, but we never suggested we were trying to be believable..... Janitor One: I don't know, I've actually had stuff like that happen. Janitor Two: Really? Janitor One: Not as many people, but still. Janitor Two: Well, there was one time half the Bartz family was shopping at Hanaford's on the same day.... We saw a few aunts and uncles, some cousins, and a set of grandparents... It was a regular family ruining (*typo) by register 3. Ruining... Hehe. Reunion. Janitor One: That's funnny. Ruining?... You're ruining the register! Janitor Two: Hahahaha! Janitor One: I bet Caroline didn't really have a doctor's appointment. she was just following Liz and Todd around hoping to find dirt about sv's perfect couple. Janitor Two: Probably. They shoudl do a "Caroline's Secret Diary." Janitor One: Hehehe. Janitor Two: Ok. Favorites.... Janitor One: Ooh.... Janitor Two: Bruce agreeing to play tennis with Roger and Olivia. As much as I love Roger, Bruce stole the golden moment in this book. He's such an attention hog.... Janitor One: Lila getting told she had a flat face. The first dinner with that obnoxious couple. Roger overhearing Marie on the phone with the Mrs. Obnoxious Couple. And yeah, Bruce agreeing to play tennis is definitely a top one. Janitor Two: Lots of goodies here. Janitor One: Yep. Janitor Two: My final rating--and I'm pulling out Roger heads for the special occassion--is four and half Rogers. It loses a half for an annoyign filler. Janitor One: Hehe. I give it five Bruce heads (not taking off anything for the annoying filler because it's an early book, and all the early books have annoying fillers), because I read it in one sitting. And when I read an SVH book in one sitting, it's good. ^_^ Janitor Two: ^_^ |
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