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Sweet Valley High #69
Friend Against Friend
Betrayed ...
Andy Jenkins and Neil Freemount have been best friends for years. They hang out together, double-date, and help each other math their homework.
But bully Charlie Cashman sets out to make life miserable for Andy, just because Andy is black. First Andy finds trash in his locker. Then his girlfriend is taunted, and he is pushed around in the school parking lot. Neil wants to help his best friend, but suddenly Andy turns against him, and Neil doesn't know why. The two boys are about to face the greatest challenge of their lives. Can their friendship survive the test?
Andy Jenkins and Neil Freemount have been best friends for years. They hang out together, double-date, and help each other math their homework.
But bully Charlie Cashman sets out to make life miserable for Andy, just because Andy is black. First Andy finds trash in his locker. Then his girlfriend is taunted, and he is pushed around in the school parking lot. Neil wants to help his best friend, but suddenly Andy turns against him, and Neil doesn't know why. The two boys are about to face the greatest challenge of their lives. Can their friendship survive the test?
138 pages, Unknown Binding
First published January 1, 1990
19 people are currently reading
344 people want to read
About the author
Francine Pascal
1,139 books1,849 followersFrancine Paula Pascal was an American author best known for her Sweet Valley series of young adult novels. Sweet Valley High, the backbone of the collection, was made into a television series, which led to several spin-offs, including The Unicorn Club and Sweet Valley University. Although most of these books were published in the 1980s and 1990s, they remained so popular that several titles were re-released decades later.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
July 28, 2021
I read this via Kindle Unlimited.
I have to really remind myself sometimes that these books were written in the 80s and society has come a lot further since because man, Neil's white saviour complex was super prominent in this one and it really annoyed me in many places. Andy is being targeted by Charlie Cashman, who is really just a piece of work and Neil wants him to report it but he doesn't want the trouble. Which of course, brings trouble. Neil starts oddly hanging about with Charlie because their fathers work together and starts excusing the racist things his own father says. He even ends up hitting Andy at one stage because he thinks Andy is lumping him in with racist Charlie. It's basically a book of Neil being annoying.
I have to really remind myself sometimes that these books were written in the 80s and society has come a lot further since because man, Neil's white saviour complex was super prominent in this one and it really annoyed me in many places. Andy is being targeted by Charlie Cashman, who is really just a piece of work and Neil wants him to report it but he doesn't want the trouble. Which of course, brings trouble. Neil starts oddly hanging about with Charlie because their fathers work together and starts excusing the racist things his own father says. He even ends up hitting Andy at one stage because he thinks Andy is lumping him in with racist Charlie. It's basically a book of Neil being annoying.
November 27, 2012
A difficult one to rate, this. "Issues" SVH, as started to happen at around this number. A heavy handed and incredibly well-meaning look at racist harassment, from the POV of a boy who becomes resentful that his openly persecuted friend (to the point of what is extreme violence for SVH)isn't sufficiently grateful for his well-meaning support. The POV character eventually becomes drawn into violence against him himself, and it's all surprisingly downbeat and depressing, as well as not entirely credible.
The thing is, the understanding of racism in this one, while again, really well-meaning, comes across as really clueless. I'm not entirely sure we're not supposed to agree that Andy is being "just as racist" as the boys bullying him. And there's so much invisibility of the white characters while the others are delineated carefully "a pretty black girl" and so forth. There's even Jane Elliott's blue eyed/brown eyed experiment conducted in the most simplistic way, in which we're meant to feel particularly bad because Jessica was made uncomfortable for a little while.
Still, the motives are good, and the lack of any carefully tied up happy ending is surprising. And who expects subtelty and sophistication from SVH anyway?
The thing is, the understanding of racism in this one, while again, really well-meaning, comes across as really clueless. I'm not entirely sure we're not supposed to agree that Andy is being "just as racist" as the boys bullying him. And there's so much invisibility of the white characters while the others are delineated carefully "a pretty black girl" and so forth. There's even Jane Elliott's blue eyed/brown eyed experiment conducted in the most simplistic way, in which we're meant to feel particularly bad because Jessica was made uncomfortable for a little while.
Still, the motives are good, and the lack of any carefully tied up happy ending is surprising. And who expects subtelty and sophistication from SVH anyway?
August 10, 2020
This was the most cringeworthy SVH I've read yet- the series tries to tackle a plot line about racism, a la a 1980s Afterschool Special, except... these books have been low key racist every time a nonwhite character has been in any of them, and THIS IS A VERY BAD IDEA. The story is that roughneck student Charlie Cashman (whose dad is openly racist against his Black boss) decides to start picking on science whiz Andy, who is apparently the only black male in Sweet Valley, at least the only one ever mentioned in nearly 70 books. The pranks escalate to physical violence, and then Andy's friend (Penny's boyfriend) Neil gets in on throwing punches at Andy because he's mad at him for being an overbearing, fragile white dude and not giving the kid some damned space when he needs it. The book was difficult to read, and.... lord is it bad. Even worse than the one with Sandy's parents trashing Mexicans because at least her dad didn't clock Manuel in the face for being brown. Ugh. One star.
March 22, 2025
Friend Against Friend
Nell is staying after school to work on his biology project with his friend Andy. Andy is one of the top science students and one of SVH’s few black students.
Liz tells Penny about an idea she had for the newspaper-a survey that asks the student body what they’d change about the school. Olivia says she’d ban Pi Beta Alpha because she’s against inclusivity. Elizabeth tho is a little surprised and thought the answers would be more basic.
Andy and Nell work on the project. They wrap up their work and head out, but when they get to Andy’s locker it’s trashed and there’s a note. “Go back to Africa where you belong.” Andy just blows it off and lets it roll off him like whatever, but Nell is appalled and wants to report it. Andy takes the passive approach.
The next day Nell (unable to keep it in) tells Penny and she just says it’s Andy’s call. Nell would rather hang out with Penny longer, but he has to go to a family picnic with his family and the Cashman’s. So apparently being a racist run in the family. Mr. Cashman first starts bitching about how the new supervisor actually expects him to be on time (does he not realize what color his skin is) “What you talkin bout Willis?”. That is actually his name.
He says the only reason he was even given the position is because of the affirmative action program. But the crazy part is Mr. Freeman is just as big a racist as Mr. Cashman. Nells father gives some bs about how not all blacks are bad but affirmative action isn’t fair. When they leave Nell heads to his room shocked about the ugly truth, he learned that afternoon.
In class it’s announced that Andy won a scholarship so Nell and Andy plan to take out Tracey and Penny to celebrate at a movie and dinner. Elizabeth gets some feedback from her article. Naïve Liz who with her tunnel vision of Sweet Valley High being this perfect fairy tale land of sunshine and rainbows is taken aback that actual problems exist in her world.
The couples go out to eat and it’s cool until later in the parking lot Charlie gets in Andy’s face. Andy again is passive, and Charlie tells him the only reason he got the scholarship is affirmative action. Andy again walks off and goes to get Tracey (who’s inside the Dairi Burger). When they get back, Tracey’s car tires are flattened. Nell offers to take her to work.
The next day Andy is upset because he had to pay 45.00 to get Tracey’s car paid and plus, they won’t have it ready until later. Nell even feels like he should offer to pay Andy some money. Instead he tries bring up Dr. Martin Luther King which is the WRONG thing to do. Andy gets irritated, but Nell continues to push him to take some kind of action. Andy basically tells him he’s not new to this (happened to him in junior high) and this is his way of handling it. Andy tells him he doesn’t need help from SVH’s white principal (Mr. Cooper), and avoids him the rest of the day. Nell gets upset and thinks Andy doesn’t have the right to take it out on everyone and treat him like Charlie just because they happen to both share a skin tone.
Later on, he finds Penny and Elizabeth and confides in them. Again, Elizabeth is disturbed. Nell actually compares how Andy’s treating him to how Charlie’s treating Andy. Umm yes and no. Nell wants to have Andy’s back but he’s frustrated that he’s taking out his anger on him.
Liz talks to Jessica but she doesn’t quite see the difference between racism and elitism and starts talking about Lila and Bruce and how they get more advantages. Not the same thing! She even points out how “lucky” they are. Liz says because they are lucky, they have a responsibility to help those that aren’t. Jess just says Andy should ignore Charlie.
Nell is all in his feelings when he’s called to dinner. His Dad is in a funk because Willis is supposedly lording his position over Mr. Cashman (who’s frankly sounding like a little punk with all this whining and carrying on. I just wanna tell him to shut the hell up and grow a pair). But who should stop by but Charlie?
Charlie (tired of his ol punk ass father) suggests they go for a ride. They ride for a lil but the worse they do is stop by Chrome Dome’s, blow the horn, then leave before the comes to the door. (I’m surprised it wasn’t a WHOLE lot worse and Charlie didn’t suggest they go “have some fun” meaning go harass the 3 black students at SVH). Charlie suggests they do it again when he drops Nell off. Nell feels guilty for hanging out with Charlie.
Nell tries to be nice to Andy the next day but when he see’s him talking to Charlie (who invited him to Secca Lake to party but he refused) he tells him he can’t have his cake and eat it to0. It’s him or it’s me. Nell gets mad and tells him he can’t tell him who to be friends with and Andy leaves .
Penny looks through some suggestions at school and finds one about how anyone who isn’t “a real American” doesn’t need to be at SVH and she throws it away. She decides that the lurking racism spreading through the school needs to be exposed
Nell is confused. The black boss fires Mr. Cashman YAY Andy is still being cold to Nell, and Penny encourages him to keep reaching out to Andy. Nell invites him out later with him and Penny. After class Charlie trips Andy and he snaps and jumps him in the hallway. Mr. Collins breaks it up and sends Charlie to the principal office. He then pulls Nell to the side and asks if he knows anything about it and Nell confesses it’s racial. Instead of -oh I don’t know REPORTING THIS TO THE PRINCIPAL- Mr. Colins just tells Nell to tell him if Charlie gets out of hand again.
See there it is-proving Andy’s point-. And this is a TEACHER! Again, Andy tries to invite him and Tracey out with him and Penny and he tells him “Good day sir!” Penny and Nell instead go to the movie and Nell just can’t concentrate on it so they leave. Outside he sees a confrontation-some thug shaking up Andy’s Dad’s car-. They drag him out the car and jump him until he’s unconscious. Charlie sees Neal and encourages him to get some licks in and he balls up his fist and all his frustration and anger over Andy’s rejection swirl in his head. He swings on Andy then runs off shocked at himself. He gets in his car, drives off, and then pulls over to pukes. He can barely look at Penny because the guilt is eating him alive.
Jess wants to start a petition and Liz suggest a racism awareness program. In sociology class the teacher to teach them about racism takes the light eye colored people and the dark eyed colored and separates them. He get’s the dark-eyes to treat the light-eyes like ish for the whole class. They get kinda carried away with it showing how easily it is to discriminate. Jessica is angered by the experiment and thinks about how wrong it is to discriminated against people for a minor reason.
Nell skips and goes home to find his Dad who treats him to a football game. At the game, he tells Neil he heard about what happened but he knows his heart was in the right place. Neil is stunned by his idiot father and instead of going home with his father goes over to Andy’s house. But he can’t quite tell him the truth, because Andy wants them to go back to being friends (he thinks he saved him).
The next day there’s a discussion at lunch about who gets more advantages and each of the opposite sex think the other opposite sex. The boys blow it off that girls’ sports get less attention and money. And also the suggestion of a girl trying out for Quarterback.
Charlie finds Neil and blackmails to give Andy another dose of ass whoop or an anonymous note will appear at the police station. This makes Neil tell Andy the truth. But he still puts it off. Neil tries to find out if he knows and he says it was Charlie and he’s getting what came to him by everybody giving him the cold shoulder.
At the awards event, the Principal gives a speech about intolerance and Andy gets the award and a standing ovation. He then tells Andy and Penny what he did. She runs off upset. Later though he comes to the rescue of Andy when Charlie and his thugs again try to beat up on him again. Neil stands by him and tells him if they try to beat him they’re gonna have to beat both of them. But even in doing this they know it can never be the same between them.
Penny contemplates what Neil did and wonders if she should give him and second chance. It ends with Liz and Penny hoping that the anonymous note from the girl that said girls should be allowed to try out for Quarterback will try out because the current one is failing his classes.
My Thoughts:
Wow! This was a tricky subject to touch on in this series. I was kind of surprised that they went there. Despite that it has covered racism before with characters like Manuel and Jade’s grandparents. Although that was prejudice because they worked doing laundry.
I agreed with Olivia for the first point. High schools should NOT have sororities. Mine didn’t have one, and I didn’t even know this was a thing. College ones are bad enough. But then even if you took away Pi Beta, even groups like the cheerleading squads discriminate. If we go back to the beginning of the series you see the results of what this did to Annie Whitman.
I even wish Valentine’s Day could be outlawed and wiped off every calendar in the word for this fact alone. It’s also the reason I closed my Facebook account. So in anyway that it can be eliminated in schools and cause less hurt and harm to the unfortunate ones who don’t get included in these groups or treated badly because of it.
As for Andy, let me start by saying that from his description if Sweet Valley High was rebooted today (and with all the reboots today this very might happen) I know the PERFECT actor to play him.
Now as for Charlie, maybe we should have let him get his ass beat in the book where he owed that guy for gambling debts. It was amazing to me that when it was Charlies butt on the line in swoops Elizabeth and Jeffrey. However, in this case, where is Elizabeth (or anyone for that matter) when *Andy* has gotten dragged out his car and beaten bloody? And it puts a VERY sour taste in my mouth of this series because “Savior Liz” when it’s anyone else has not hesitated in interfere in all the other students’ situations. But when it’s the BLACK student. That’s why I don’t think this is a subject they needed to touch.
I was happy that Charlie's dad got fired. GO WILLIS! And I’m not one to support someone lording their position over anyone, but COME ON! Are we really all that upset about Mr. ASS man getting fired?
Nor was I that happy that “Mr. Wonderful Redford” (Collins) just blows off the incident when Neil tells him Charlie jumped Andy because he’s a racist. Mr. Collins after being told this should have found Andy AND Charlie and took them to Chrome Dome and asked Andy was this true. Then Charlie should have been expelled from SVH and told there’s no place in SVH for racists.
And WTF kind of father tells you it’s unfair to kick a man while he’s down, but they understand that they’re heart was in the right place? Neil’s father needs to be fired also. As a matter of fact let’s take all the sorry ass males in this series and dump them on a unknown island somewhere never to be read about again. I seriously doubt like for Jessica and Winston someone would try that hard to find them all.
This class room experiment with setting the dark eyes against the light eyes (which is a GREAT title for a Goosebumps book by the way) was… It was an interesting attempt and while I DO like that the teacher put the dark eyes over the light ones, it just DID not cover the pain, and the anger blacks have gone through with racism and discrimination all throughout the course of history. The light eyes might have felt anger for a minute, but when class ended guess what? Everything went back to the way it was. The racism we face is a daily occurrence and it isn’t over in 1 hour-or however long this class was-.
And then words and actions are just one part of it. The light eyes didn’t get the physical end of it like Andy did and the teacher should have followed up with that exercise of clips of police brutality against us and how we were attacks with clubs, hoses, and dogs way back when. Then thrown in some clips of us being beaten with whips and chains back in the days of slavery. There was a movie that the name isn’t coming to mind that represented what it was like back then that was even too much for me to watch because there was a slave tied up and beaten until almost inches of his life. Yeah it might be a little too much to show in a classroom, but the SVH crew really need an eye-opener to the WHOLE story. And this just can’t be covered in a single classroom exercise.
Penny wanted to expose it, but I don’t think just brining it to light would do much. It’s always gonna be there. Although to be honest, SVH seems pretty blind to it. Then there was the male against female views of sports which didn’t really surprise me. I was surprised that they got the characters mixed and said DANA not SHELBY or KRISTEN was the one that carried about girl’s sports. Dana never even cared about sports until she went to a game to watch Aaron play so I don’t see her all upset about what the girl’s sports team aren’t getting. And I don’t think there would be an issue if they have a band about the boys getting the more expensive instruments.
But overall, I just don’t think this book did enough to brooch racism. I was happy to see Andy get his scholarship despite Charlie. BUT, the book ends and nothing really is done to Charlie and his thugs. They aren’t expelled. They don’t go to jail. So really what was the point of the book? It just feels like saying that you can come up despite racism, but while a fancy speech can be given about it for a few minutes at the end of the day there’s really no solution.
Nell is staying after school to work on his biology project with his friend Andy. Andy is one of the top science students and one of SVH’s few black students.
Liz tells Penny about an idea she had for the newspaper-a survey that asks the student body what they’d change about the school. Olivia says she’d ban Pi Beta Alpha because she’s against inclusivity. Elizabeth tho is a little surprised and thought the answers would be more basic.
Andy and Nell work on the project. They wrap up their work and head out, but when they get to Andy’s locker it’s trashed and there’s a note. “Go back to Africa where you belong.” Andy just blows it off and lets it roll off him like whatever, but Nell is appalled and wants to report it. Andy takes the passive approach.
The next day Nell (unable to keep it in) tells Penny and she just says it’s Andy’s call. Nell would rather hang out with Penny longer, but he has to go to a family picnic with his family and the Cashman’s. So apparently being a racist run in the family. Mr. Cashman first starts bitching about how the new supervisor actually expects him to be on time (does he not realize what color his skin is) “What you talkin bout Willis?”. That is actually his name.
He says the only reason he was even given the position is because of the affirmative action program. But the crazy part is Mr. Freeman is just as big a racist as Mr. Cashman. Nells father gives some bs about how not all blacks are bad but affirmative action isn’t fair. When they leave Nell heads to his room shocked about the ugly truth, he learned that afternoon.
In class it’s announced that Andy won a scholarship so Nell and Andy plan to take out Tracey and Penny to celebrate at a movie and dinner. Elizabeth gets some feedback from her article. Naïve Liz who with her tunnel vision of Sweet Valley High being this perfect fairy tale land of sunshine and rainbows is taken aback that actual problems exist in her world.
The couples go out to eat and it’s cool until later in the parking lot Charlie gets in Andy’s face. Andy again is passive, and Charlie tells him the only reason he got the scholarship is affirmative action. Andy again walks off and goes to get Tracey (who’s inside the Dairi Burger). When they get back, Tracey’s car tires are flattened. Nell offers to take her to work.
The next day Andy is upset because he had to pay 45.00 to get Tracey’s car paid and plus, they won’t have it ready until later. Nell even feels like he should offer to pay Andy some money. Instead he tries bring up Dr. Martin Luther King which is the WRONG thing to do. Andy gets irritated, but Nell continues to push him to take some kind of action. Andy basically tells him he’s not new to this (happened to him in junior high) and this is his way of handling it. Andy tells him he doesn’t need help from SVH’s white principal (Mr. Cooper), and avoids him the rest of the day. Nell gets upset and thinks Andy doesn’t have the right to take it out on everyone and treat him like Charlie just because they happen to both share a skin tone.
Later on, he finds Penny and Elizabeth and confides in them. Again, Elizabeth is disturbed. Nell actually compares how Andy’s treating him to how Charlie’s treating Andy. Umm yes and no. Nell wants to have Andy’s back but he’s frustrated that he’s taking out his anger on him.
Liz talks to Jessica but she doesn’t quite see the difference between racism and elitism and starts talking about Lila and Bruce and how they get more advantages. Not the same thing! She even points out how “lucky” they are. Liz says because they are lucky, they have a responsibility to help those that aren’t. Jess just says Andy should ignore Charlie.
Nell is all in his feelings when he’s called to dinner. His Dad is in a funk because Willis is supposedly lording his position over Mr. Cashman (who’s frankly sounding like a little punk with all this whining and carrying on. I just wanna tell him to shut the hell up and grow a pair). But who should stop by but Charlie?
Charlie (tired of his ol punk ass father) suggests they go for a ride. They ride for a lil but the worse they do is stop by Chrome Dome’s, blow the horn, then leave before the comes to the door. (I’m surprised it wasn’t a WHOLE lot worse and Charlie didn’t suggest they go “have some fun” meaning go harass the 3 black students at SVH). Charlie suggests they do it again when he drops Nell off. Nell feels guilty for hanging out with Charlie.
Nell tries to be nice to Andy the next day but when he see’s him talking to Charlie (who invited him to Secca Lake to party but he refused) he tells him he can’t have his cake and eat it to0. It’s him or it’s me. Nell gets mad and tells him he can’t tell him who to be friends with and Andy leaves .
Penny looks through some suggestions at school and finds one about how anyone who isn’t “a real American” doesn’t need to be at SVH and she throws it away. She decides that the lurking racism spreading through the school needs to be exposed
Nell is confused. The black boss fires Mr. Cashman YAY Andy is still being cold to Nell, and Penny encourages him to keep reaching out to Andy. Nell invites him out later with him and Penny. After class Charlie trips Andy and he snaps and jumps him in the hallway. Mr. Collins breaks it up and sends Charlie to the principal office. He then pulls Nell to the side and asks if he knows anything about it and Nell confesses it’s racial. Instead of -oh I don’t know REPORTING THIS TO THE PRINCIPAL- Mr. Colins just tells Nell to tell him if Charlie gets out of hand again.
See there it is-proving Andy’s point-. And this is a TEACHER! Again, Andy tries to invite him and Tracey out with him and Penny and he tells him “Good day sir!” Penny and Nell instead go to the movie and Nell just can’t concentrate on it so they leave. Outside he sees a confrontation-some thug shaking up Andy’s Dad’s car-. They drag him out the car and jump him until he’s unconscious. Charlie sees Neal and encourages him to get some licks in and he balls up his fist and all his frustration and anger over Andy’s rejection swirl in his head. He swings on Andy then runs off shocked at himself. He gets in his car, drives off, and then pulls over to pukes. He can barely look at Penny because the guilt is eating him alive.
Jess wants to start a petition and Liz suggest a racism awareness program. In sociology class the teacher to teach them about racism takes the light eye colored people and the dark eyed colored and separates them. He get’s the dark-eyes to treat the light-eyes like ish for the whole class. They get kinda carried away with it showing how easily it is to discriminate. Jessica is angered by the experiment and thinks about how wrong it is to discriminated against people for a minor reason.
Nell skips and goes home to find his Dad who treats him to a football game. At the game, he tells Neil he heard about what happened but he knows his heart was in the right place. Neil is stunned by his idiot father and instead of going home with his father goes over to Andy’s house. But he can’t quite tell him the truth, because Andy wants them to go back to being friends (he thinks he saved him).
The next day there’s a discussion at lunch about who gets more advantages and each of the opposite sex think the other opposite sex. The boys blow it off that girls’ sports get less attention and money. And also the suggestion of a girl trying out for Quarterback.
Charlie finds Neil and blackmails to give Andy another dose of ass whoop or an anonymous note will appear at the police station. This makes Neil tell Andy the truth. But he still puts it off. Neil tries to find out if he knows and he says it was Charlie and he’s getting what came to him by everybody giving him the cold shoulder.
At the awards event, the Principal gives a speech about intolerance and Andy gets the award and a standing ovation. He then tells Andy and Penny what he did. She runs off upset. Later though he comes to the rescue of Andy when Charlie and his thugs again try to beat up on him again. Neil stands by him and tells him if they try to beat him they’re gonna have to beat both of them. But even in doing this they know it can never be the same between them.
Penny contemplates what Neil did and wonders if she should give him and second chance. It ends with Liz and Penny hoping that the anonymous note from the girl that said girls should be allowed to try out for Quarterback will try out because the current one is failing his classes.
My Thoughts:
Wow! This was a tricky subject to touch on in this series. I was kind of surprised that they went there. Despite that it has covered racism before with characters like Manuel and Jade’s grandparents. Although that was prejudice because they worked doing laundry.
I agreed with Olivia for the first point. High schools should NOT have sororities. Mine didn’t have one, and I didn’t even know this was a thing. College ones are bad enough. But then even if you took away Pi Beta, even groups like the cheerleading squads discriminate. If we go back to the beginning of the series you see the results of what this did to Annie Whitman.
I even wish Valentine’s Day could be outlawed and wiped off every calendar in the word for this fact alone. It’s also the reason I closed my Facebook account. So in anyway that it can be eliminated in schools and cause less hurt and harm to the unfortunate ones who don’t get included in these groups or treated badly because of it.
As for Andy, let me start by saying that from his description if Sweet Valley High was rebooted today (and with all the reboots today this very might happen) I know the PERFECT actor to play him.
Now as for Charlie, maybe we should have let him get his ass beat in the book where he owed that guy for gambling debts. It was amazing to me that when it was Charlies butt on the line in swoops Elizabeth and Jeffrey. However, in this case, where is Elizabeth (or anyone for that matter) when *Andy* has gotten dragged out his car and beaten bloody? And it puts a VERY sour taste in my mouth of this series because “Savior Liz” when it’s anyone else has not hesitated in interfere in all the other students’ situations. But when it’s the BLACK student. That’s why I don’t think this is a subject they needed to touch.
I was happy that Charlie's dad got fired. GO WILLIS! And I’m not one to support someone lording their position over anyone, but COME ON! Are we really all that upset about Mr. ASS man getting fired?
Nor was I that happy that “Mr. Wonderful Redford” (Collins) just blows off the incident when Neil tells him Charlie jumped Andy because he’s a racist. Mr. Collins after being told this should have found Andy AND Charlie and took them to Chrome Dome and asked Andy was this true. Then Charlie should have been expelled from SVH and told there’s no place in SVH for racists.
And WTF kind of father tells you it’s unfair to kick a man while he’s down, but they understand that they’re heart was in the right place? Neil’s father needs to be fired also. As a matter of fact let’s take all the sorry ass males in this series and dump them on a unknown island somewhere never to be read about again. I seriously doubt like for Jessica and Winston someone would try that hard to find them all.
This class room experiment with setting the dark eyes against the light eyes (which is a GREAT title for a Goosebumps book by the way) was… It was an interesting attempt and while I DO like that the teacher put the dark eyes over the light ones, it just DID not cover the pain, and the anger blacks have gone through with racism and discrimination all throughout the course of history. The light eyes might have felt anger for a minute, but when class ended guess what? Everything went back to the way it was. The racism we face is a daily occurrence and it isn’t over in 1 hour-or however long this class was-.
And then words and actions are just one part of it. The light eyes didn’t get the physical end of it like Andy did and the teacher should have followed up with that exercise of clips of police brutality against us and how we were attacks with clubs, hoses, and dogs way back when. Then thrown in some clips of us being beaten with whips and chains back in the days of slavery. There was a movie that the name isn’t coming to mind that represented what it was like back then that was even too much for me to watch because there was a slave tied up and beaten until almost inches of his life. Yeah it might be a little too much to show in a classroom, but the SVH crew really need an eye-opener to the WHOLE story. And this just can’t be covered in a single classroom exercise.
Penny wanted to expose it, but I don’t think just brining it to light would do much. It’s always gonna be there. Although to be honest, SVH seems pretty blind to it. Then there was the male against female views of sports which didn’t really surprise me. I was surprised that they got the characters mixed and said DANA not SHELBY or KRISTEN was the one that carried about girl’s sports. Dana never even cared about sports until she went to a game to watch Aaron play so I don’t see her all upset about what the girl’s sports team aren’t getting. And I don’t think there would be an issue if they have a band about the boys getting the more expensive instruments.
But overall, I just don’t think this book did enough to brooch racism. I was happy to see Andy get his scholarship despite Charlie. BUT, the book ends and nothing really is done to Charlie and his thugs. They aren’t expelled. They don’t go to jail. So really what was the point of the book? It just feels like saying that you can come up despite racism, but while a fancy speech can be given about it for a few minutes at the end of the day there’s really no solution.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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August 11, 2022One long “oh my god” moment. Am I more shocked that they went ahead and wrote a hate crime book, or that this kids soap opera written in 1990 actually has some pretty solid rhetoric about the nature of privilege? Either way, not loving this recent trend of the books not having a resolution.
August 6, 2014
The one with misguided attempts to make a statement about racism...
November 4, 2021
SVH has racism!!!! Andy (black) and Neil (white) are besties, but Andy has become the victim of racial bullying and Neil isn't sure how to support his friend, especially when Andy becomes distant and starts treating him like 'just another white person'. When Andy is beaten up one night, Neil loses his head and punches him as well, but Andy has no idea this has happened as he was unconscious at the time. Neil feels horrific about this, even more so when his dad seems to approve. He eventually confesses to Liz and his girlfriend Penny and then to Andy, who is understandably angry at him.
The situation isn't REALLY resolved properly, but all the students at SVH are horrified at the racism they didn't realise lurked under the surface, and Andy and Neil reconcile to a degree, trying to be more understanding of one another
The situation isn't REALLY resolved properly, but all the students at SVH are horrified at the racism they didn't realise lurked under the surface, and Andy and Neil reconcile to a degree, trying to be more understanding of one another
April 2, 2020
I’m not sure if I ever actually read this one, or if I just remember it from being referenced in later books. Either way, it was actually fairly good, albeit quite hard to stomach at times.
I do find it funny that the summary on the back says that “Andy and Neil have been best friends for years”, yet in the first chapter we learn that they basically just met. Oh, Sweet Valley... you don’t even have continuity with your plot lines when they occur in the same book.
I do find it funny that the summary on the back says that “Andy and Neil have been best friends for years”, yet in the first chapter we learn that they basically just met. Oh, Sweet Valley... you don’t even have continuity with your plot lines when they occur in the same book.
January 23, 2018
Lately, I’ve been wondering if racism is my favorite tackle subject. Andy was funny and easy to understand, but Mr. Freemount was a confusing person filled with empty words. The class experiment was amazing, but the ending was disappointing. I’m more confused than ever.
October 31, 2011
"Thats what friends are for." That is a common quote in America. But in this case, thats what mistakes are for. In this story, two friends go against each other. Andy is an African American. Neil is an American. Andy always gets bullied because of his race. therefor, Neil wants to help. But as he tries, he realizes Andy is against him. In solution, the boys have a big fight and solve their conflict. Now "Thats what friends are for."
April 1, 2011
I love these books. There, I said it. I can not imagine growing up without them. They were just great storytelling.
June 21, 2013
I remember the cover just not the story.
September 10, 2016
how do you rate a book that's well-meaning about teaching hard lessons about racism but is so completely misguided that it might actually make things worse?
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