This HaBO request is from Laura and she wants to find this YA/Teen romance:
This is a teen romance that I probably read in my high school years, which would have been 1987-1991. I’d guess it was published anywhere from 5-10 years before I read it. It was a thin book, mass market paperback, and I’d expect it was part of a teen romance series. Maybe something like First Love from Silhouette, but I haven’t been able to figure out the title by looking at that or other similar series.
Main character (MC) is starting high school. Her brother is older than her – probably a junior or senior, and his girlfriend (who is, of course, very popular) has been mentoring the MC so she can be popular, too. This primarily seemed to focus on grooming and having the “right friends” (what else would be important?).
Grooming tips included rolling her hair around empty orange juice cans, so it was smooth and not frizzy ,and learning how to do her makeup.
The “right friends” meant, of course, popular friends, not really the MC’s best friend, who happened to be overweight (THE HORROR). It is VERY judgmental of weight problems – in one scene at some fancy event/party, the MC’s mother says to MC’s best friend that what best friend is wearing “disguises her figure well.”
So, MC starts high school and all is going swimmingly, except somehow she ended up in drama class instead of the elective she was supposed to take. Or maybe she didn’t get a part in the play but ended up on the crew? She ends up doing the lighting with a Cute Boy – I remember they had to cut gel so lighting could be colored for specific scenes. Unfortunately, Cute Boy is not in the right crown. But he’s SUPER NICE. He brings her an orange (?) soda one day when they’ve been working, and it was so good because she didn’t realize how thirsty she was.
At the end, the play is put on, it was a success, and MC+Cute Boy are together and MC+Best Friend are all friendly again and older brother + girlfriend and MC’s parents are letting MC do her own thing.
Has anyone else read this teen romance?
I have no clue what this book’s title is, but I’m betting it might be from the late 60s or early 70s because orange juice cans as hair rollers was a thing during that time. Also, using beer as a setting “gel” when wrapping hair around those juice cans. Ah, the memories…. *shudder* There is Not. Enough. Money. In the World to get me to time-travel back to then. Not even to give my teen self some much needed advice! 😆
Never used beer as a gel, but did use juice cans back in the day. Only way to get large enough rollers to relax naturally curly hair, at a time when long and straight was the in do. Of course, living in Florida, straight lasted about 5 minutes. Eventually I grew up, wised up, cut it all off, let it curl and never looked back.
I’m with Silver James. This sounds like a Betty Cavanna or a Rosamond du Jardin—something written much earlier that kept getting reprinted with new covers. The horrors of being overweight were a subtext that ran through most of those books; however, the heroine being part of the crew and not on-stage? That has a more modern feel.
I’m not sure that my big sister is not STILL using those juice cans. My little sister brought shame on the whole family by telling older sister’s boyfriend the torture Debbie endured to try to look alluring for him. He was appalled!lol! And Betty Cavanna–I had forgotten all about her! But isn’t she pre juice cans? Thanks for the memories. I hope someone knows the book!
Unfortunately, I can’t remember the title, but I think I read the HaBO back in the day. Scholastic Books and others published series where manners, grooming, makeup, and wardrobe tips were dropped throughout the stories. Maintaining that trim figure was important, too. It may be another series, set in California, but there was one book that taught us that movie stars were just regular folks. Janet Lambert is another author who came to mind.
Dippity-Doo was our neighborhood hair potion of choice, with huge plastic rollers. The older sister of my best friend worked at a beauty salon and scored us the professional stuff.
My older sister still laughs about the times she ironed her hair to make it straight because that’s what everybody was doing back then. Her hair was already perfectly straight. Now she would kill to have curly hair.
Don’t know the book, either, but certainly remember juice cans and gelatin being used to curl and set hair. I would have been a total grooming/fashion failure back then. Thank goodness I can get away with yoga pants and pony tails in my “mature” years and no one gives a damn.
Dippity-Doo & Coca Cola cans!
In case anyone is wanting to revisit their past via search engine, I believe it was Betty Cavanaugh and Rosemary duJardin… 🙂
My first thought when I read the title was that this was something to do with Donald Trump’s hair…
@Ann: it’s definitely Betty Cavanna. I read enough of her stuff in my early teens to know:
https://www.amazon.com/Betty-Cavanna/e/B001HD1IG4
However, du Jardin wrote under several names, so I may have used one of her alternate names. I read WAIT FOR MARCY among others when I was young; it had been written in the 1940s but republished in the early 1970s (yay, scholastic books!). My 12-year-old self was puzzled about things like the Stork Club and references to Sherman Billingsley.
I too remember the giant roller era–with great pain. I have lopsided hair: a little wave on one side, a little more on the other. Sadly the fashion was for dead straight hair, so I tried using the giant rollers/juice cans, but
always ended up with the weirdly placed dent in my hair that signaled the true fashion flummox. Then there was my flirtation with bangs (now known as a fringe), a thing you really can’t have when your hair has the noncommittal wave. Hot tip of the time: tape your bangs down after you shampoo for a straight-edged fringe. Invariably ended up with flippy ends. Sigh. Adolescence is not for the faint of heart.
I stand corrected, @DiscoDollyDeb. It turns out that memories from circa 1969 aren’t the most reliable–who knew? Wait for Marcy was my gateway to these books, as I recall; I bought a copy at the Scholastic book fair at school, I think. I remember a white dress w/tulle skirt complete with silver sparkles that she wore to prom? some other climactic dance?…
OMG! How did I forget about Rosamund du Jardin!?!
My mom used to put those huge purple rollers in my hair for special occasions (70s). By the time the mid-80s rolled around, I used hot rollers to smooth my frizz. Finally, I realized my “frizz” was caused by attempting to blow dry my hair straight, and if I left it alone–with some help from the newly emerging products–I had the perfect, natural spiral curls. I’ve been a curly girl ever since.
I would have guessed a Sunfire book I have in my basement, but I agree the details lead to a story from an earlier time period.
OMG, I took that link to Betty Cavanna on Amazon. I have a hardback copy of A Girl Can Dream that was my mom’s. She gave it to me to try and get me to stop reading her Harlequins. It’s missing the dust jacket. I loved that story.
You guys are the best for triggering happy memories!
I LOVE Rosamond du Jardin, I’ve probably read Practically Seventeen more times than any other book! I just googled to see the original publish date, and it was 1949-I first read it in the 60’s, and it seemed deliciously retro to me at that time. A few years ago I ordered all her books from Image Cascade Publishing (now it looks like amazon has them)-I was so excited that I could get them. I used to scour used bookstores and garage sales for them, but never found any. They are definite comfort reads for me.
Wish I could help with book in question!
Oh, my, does this discussion bring back memories! My older sister used the orange juice cans and she ironed her hair. I did neither. But I did (briefly) rat my hair for height. That had to be about 1966 or very early 1967, because I remember having bangs at the time, but by fall 1967, when my 7th grade school picture was taken, I had grown out my bangs down as far as my chin, and I didn’t cut them again until 1978, when I went for the Farrah Fawcett haircut. That didn’t last long because it was so high maintenance, and I grew the layers back out again. I next cut bangs in 1986, and I still have them, although I wear them pushed to the side, because I have naturally curly hair and bangs WILL NOT stay put, and they curl up on the ends with even a smidgen of humidity. Shoving them to the side makes it marginally less obnoxious…. I had completely forgotten about that scotch tape trick. I might have to try it. 😀
Sorry, I have no clue what book the original poster is looking for.