Southern Fried Makeover

Clueless #19

by Carla Jablonski

It's a clothes encounter of the ethical kind.

Bronson Alcott High has been invaded--by Gigi Rabinowitz, the new transfer student from Georgia. Gigi is looking to take over some major turf--like Murray, De's Known Boyfriend. And, segue--where did Gigi get her sense of style It's as Jurassic as her attitude toward boyfriends. Now De declares all-out war, and it's not civil.

But the invasion sensation sees new worlds to conquer. A TV exec is scouting for high school veejay talent, and Gigi figures that with Cher as her image consultant she'll be the belle of the music video ball. Dilemma! Cher doesn't want to help her t.b.'s enemy, but De's cool--as long as Cher doesn't exchange Gigi's grievous garments for tasteful togs. In fact, she wants Cher to make Gigi look like her usual heinous self, only worse. Cher wants to stay loyal to her best bud, but if she doesn't turn Gigi into a Betty, will everyone think she's lost her makeover touch?

160 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published April 1, 1999

About the author

Carla Jablonski is the author and editor of dozens of best-selling books for teenage and middle-grade readers. She grew up in New York City, where she attended public schools and the Bronx High School of Science. She has a BA in anthropology from Vassar College and an MA from NYU's Gallatin School, an interdisciplinary program for which she combined playwriting, the history of gender issues in 19th Century Circus, and arts administration. "I wanted to write the play, contextualize the play, and learn how to produce the play for my degree," she explains. "I think I may have been the happiest graduate student at NYU -- I SO loved working toward my thesis."

While still in graduate school she supported herself as the editor of The Hardy Boys Mysteries. "When I interviewed for the job they asked me if I'd ever read the Hardy Boys as a kid. 'No way,' I scoffed. 'Those are BOY books! It was Nancy Drew for me!' Luckily my future boss had a sense of humor. She hired me after I promised I'd read the books if I got the job."

She has participated in the renowned Breadloaf Writers' Conference as well as Zoetrope's All-Story highly competitive writing workshop held at Francis Ford Coppella's resort in Belize. She has taught writing for the children's market, as well as "cold-reading" skills for teachers as part of Project:Read. Several of her books have been selected as part of the Accelerated Reader's program.

She continues to work freelance as an editor for publishers and for private clients, even as she writes novels and creates new series. She also has another career (and identity!) as a playwright, an actress, and a trapeze performer. "I try to keep the worlds separate," she explains about her multiple identities. "The different work I do has different audiences, so I want to keep them apart. But they're all me -- they're all ways of expressing what I'm thinking and feeling -- just in different mediums."

Reviews

[Priscilla King · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a Southerner, I don't believe the character Gigi is really from any part of the South, not even Atlanta. I think she was based on Helen Andelin's "Fascinating Womanhood" groups, a California phenomenon, plus a back-story that doesn't quite explain...Helen Andelin did preach antifeminism at women, but she was old, and they asked. She did not walk into a high school cafeteria, on her first day as a student, and leap up on a table and start yelling at the queen of the twelfth grade that she's not treating her boyfriend right. Gigi Rabinowitz, whose parents are determined to force her to be Cher Horowitz's new best friend, is not from the real world, but if she were, she'd be from some obscure place in the Midwest. Atlanta would be where she went for the cosmetic surgery.

But comedy is what this series is all about, and though Carla Jablonski lacked H.B. Gilmour's inspiration she did have a clever idea: The kids are competing for a TV hosting job. Cher and De recuse themselves, the better to launch Cher's career as a Hollywood beauty consultant. They're tempted to sabotage Gigi's video, because Gigi is so awful and so many of their friends are in the competition...but then, too, there's the consideration that if Gigi gets the job she won't go to their school next term. In the end the whole Clueless Crowd learn a serious moral lesson--without spoiling the laugh-out-loud quality of their series.