For the first time since their last fateful slumber party when they were all about 9 or 10 years old, Nell, Lara, Rachael, Dana, and Mindy are getting together again. The difference is that this time Nicole, Nell's little sister, won't be there. When everything went horribly wrong all those years ago, Nicole ended up dead and Nell was badly burned. Celeste, a quiet and shy new girl, is with them instead.

Lara is looking forward to skiing, maybe kissing a cute boy, and catching up with her old friend Nell. However, something has her on edge. How did that snowman in the shade manage to melt and refreeze? When one member of their group disappears, leaving behind a single ski and a patch of dirty ice, Lara starts to wonder if there's something supernatural at play.

This was incredibly tedious. At least half of the book was Lara and Rachael snapping and growling at each other over something - either over the upcoming homecoming queen vote, or Percy, a cute guy they'd met. Dana was their fat friend (who actually said, out loud, "I wish anorexia was contagious and I knew someone who could infect me." (16)), and Mindy was their stupid friend. For some reason Mindy insisted on fighting with Dana about a second guy, Cal, even though Dana made it clear that she wasn't interested in him. The problem was that Cal was very much interested in Dana, or at least in groping her, whether she was willing or not. Cal was gross, despite Pike's weak efforts to reform him at the end of the book.

The book's big twist was both painfully obvious and more than a little far-fetched. Pike tried to complicate things with the melted snowman and Dana's disappearance, but it didn't work out very well and felt at least as weak as his attempt to make Cal look like a decent person at the end.

I can't remember if I ever read this when I was a teen. It wouldn't surprise me if I had and then immediately forgot about it. It's definitely not one of Pike's better works.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

Tedious, with a too-obvious "twist." Not worth the time it took to read it.

But now I can do my next Snakes and Ladders roll, so there's that.

Yes, let's try putting the fire out with BRANDY. O_O

One of the girls has disappeared, but hardly anyone's worried yet - mostly they're just arguing (over who's better, boys, the food, etc.). It's incredibly tedious.

I figure the cars they arrived in are a loss as well. When they got there, a guy dressed as a ranger told them he'd park their cars, and they just gave their keys to him (are they so used to valet parking that this didn't seem strange to them?). At any rate, it's looking more and more likely that the ranger was no such thing.

Now it's time for the flashback to That Night, the original slumber party that resulted in one death and one serious injury.

This slumber party (in reality, more a skiing trip at someone's vacation home) is exactly like that slumber party years ago, when one character's face was badly burned and her younger sister was killed. The only difference is that there's a new character in the mix, a girl named Celeste who is extremely closed mouthed about herself. She's totally going to turn out to be a killer or something. Probably working with Nell, the girl whose face was burned.

This line made me wince, hard:

"I wish anorexia was contagious and I knew someone who could infect me."

Oh Dana, no you don't.