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Lizzie and Booker
The Valentine That Ate My Teacher
Publisher's Note A valentine adventure by the author of The Easter Bunny that Ate My Sister finds Lizzie, Scott, Sybil, and their substitute teacher, Mr. Bernstein, sucked into the class valentine box and swept into another world.
100 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1998
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
February 13, 2023
Holidays can be murder! After a pumpkin ate her brother, a turkey ate her father, and the Christmas tree ate her mother, Lizzie managed to survive New Year's and Groundhog Day without incident. But of course Valentine's Day cannot pass without someone being consumed! This time it's Lizzie's teacher (as well as her and her friends) who are teleported into a land of danger and moral lessons.
Lizzie's central dilemma is around jealousy of a popular girl in school. This girl is super snobbish and it's sickening how her friends swirl around her like royalty. Even worse, the hunky new teacher is always so impressed by her artistic creativity. Meanwhile, Lizzie is treated like garbage--or at least that's what we're led to believe, experiencing the story from her obviously skewed point of view.
But then Lizzie, the popular girl, and others from class are teleported to a spooky, otherworldly carnival. Under stress to escape before nightfall, Lizzie learns through not-so-subtle symbolism that she and the popular girl have a lot in common and they would actually make good friends.
It's a cute story that's probably the most satisfying of the four holiday horrors I've read from Dean Marney. The symbolism actually makes sense in its own warped way, and it's heavy handed enough that kids would probably be aware of the technique. It does do this at the risk of coming across sappy, however. The previous books made less sense, but at least they weren't preachy.
Whatever the formula is, I guess it's working. I keep coming back for more, and am even looking forward to whatever disasters Easter will bring.
Lizzie's central dilemma is around jealousy of a popular girl in school. This girl is super snobbish and it's sickening how her friends swirl around her like royalty. Even worse, the hunky new teacher is always so impressed by her artistic creativity. Meanwhile, Lizzie is treated like garbage--or at least that's what we're led to believe, experiencing the story from her obviously skewed point of view.
But then Lizzie, the popular girl, and others from class are teleported to a spooky, otherworldly carnival. Under stress to escape before nightfall, Lizzie learns through not-so-subtle symbolism that she and the popular girl have a lot in common and they would actually make good friends.
It's a cute story that's probably the most satisfying of the four holiday horrors I've read from Dean Marney. The symbolism actually makes sense in its own warped way, and it's heavy handed enough that kids would probably be aware of the technique. It does do this at the risk of coming across sappy, however. The previous books made less sense, but at least they weren't preachy.
Whatever the formula is, I guess it's working. I keep coming back for more, and am even looking forward to whatever disasters Easter will bring.
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December 17, 2018Cute little book 📙
February 14, 2022
…What did I just read?
April 4, 2025
can you tell I was going crazy at the cvg library… anyway this is the definition of unreliable narrator
August 9, 2021
REVIEW: The Valentine That Ate My Teacher, Dean Marney
RATING: 2/5 stars
If you hadn't noticed, I've been frequenting children's literature today. There's a contest I'm participating in where tickets are measured by number of books read rather than quality/maturity level. This is the last day, so I have been reading as many shorter texts as possible to reach the maximum quota.
I've referenced this book constantly over the years, but I hadn't actually read it for about a decade prior to today. It is, without a doubt, one of the creepiest children's books I have ever read. I adore the carnival aesthetic and the repeated, eerie statements given about love. The fact that no one believes Liz and she believes she is genuinely going insane is even more horrific. Unfortunately, the protagonist of this book is very unpleasant and hard to connect with. The book alludes to themes of appreciating others despite differences because, at your core, you may be jealous - or more similar in other ways than you think. But Liz doesn't really learn from this, it seems. She and Sybil are cordial at the end, but there is hardly an extension of friendship or acceptance that you might normally find in children's literature. It's merely an example of ignorance. In truth, I don't think I liked a single character in this book very much, including the parents or background folks. The run-on writing style did not help, and there are several elements of the carnival that are vague or nonsensical.
Overall, this book gets point for its atmosphere and subliminal messaging, but it loses most of its merit to flat characters, ambiguity, and absent commas. However, I really do recommend reading this at least once in your life to see how bizarre it is.
RATING: 2/5 stars
If you hadn't noticed, I've been frequenting children's literature today. There's a contest I'm participating in where tickets are measured by number of books read rather than quality/maturity level. This is the last day, so I have been reading as many shorter texts as possible to reach the maximum quota.
I've referenced this book constantly over the years, but I hadn't actually read it for about a decade prior to today. It is, without a doubt, one of the creepiest children's books I have ever read. I adore the carnival aesthetic and the repeated, eerie statements given about love. The fact that no one believes Liz and she believes she is genuinely going insane is even more horrific. Unfortunately, the protagonist of this book is very unpleasant and hard to connect with. The book alludes to themes of appreciating others despite differences because, at your core, you may be jealous - or more similar in other ways than you think. But Liz doesn't really learn from this, it seems. She and Sybil are cordial at the end, but there is hardly an extension of friendship or acceptance that you might normally find in children's literature. It's merely an example of ignorance. In truth, I don't think I liked a single character in this book very much, including the parents or background folks. The run-on writing style did not help, and there are several elements of the carnival that are vague or nonsensical.
Overall, this book gets point for its atmosphere and subliminal messaging, but it loses most of its merit to flat characters, ambiguity, and absent commas. However, I really do recommend reading this at least once in your life to see how bizarre it is.
February 17, 2012
i think this story is very funny and crazy :)
April 6, 2023
It all ends. Yes, the saga has all built to to this moment. Okay, so we've been going through the odd "_ ate my _-" saga for a while,. They've been mostly eh with weak writing and a mostly annoying protagonist, although it's in a way I can see kids liking more. They haven't made much sense and after getting better, the Easter one fell down to being weak for me.
So I can't say I was hyped for this final one in the saga. This was 1998 so the Apple paperback type market was about to fall of so no room for this classic saga. That and they ran out of holidays. Either way I read it and I was somewhat surprised.
This time Valentine's Day is around the corner. Lizzie is doing some Valentine's Day stuff for school even if she isn't a fan. There's a new substitute teacher who is cool but tends to not like Lizzie because...well duh, even with him she acts out a bit. Meanwhile the local alpha bitch Sybill is giving her some trouble.
Plus odd things are going odd and no one else seems to see them. Eventually they results in this big valentine box eating the teacher.
So this one is weird, even for this series standards. The weird stuff happens kind of right away, even if take a bit to get to the vore. It's a more psychological bent, weirdly enough. Lizzie is lizzie, she's arguably at her worst for some of this. There's a fair bit of "Why don't they like me" after she's been bad. That's annoying.
This starts rough because of that. This makes the least sense of these and that is saying something,. Ralph pops up sometimes, the guy who started all this, and isn't behind the valentine that eats them. His presence, the place they end up in, is never explained. It's all so out there and I feel like I'm going crazy as I read this.
The teacher is weirdly not important. He's not even eaten first, that's Sybil and he just goes in after. He's there but not in a huge way. Sybil is the focus here, but I guess "The Valentine That Ate This Girl I Know" wouldn't sell as well.
There's an arc with Lizzie and Sybil that actually kind of work. Sybil is a bit alpha bitch-y but really it's mostly Lizzie judging her and just being jealous, mostly. It's not super tight, it's done in a somewhat clunky/rushed way but it is nice when they get along in the end. And they do stick to it, Sybil does lighten up and the final note is rushed but nice.,
That psychological element revolves around that somewhat, and it sort of tries to be deep with that. It's done that in a rather clunky way that's not quite as smart as it thinks it is but it is interesting. This book is weird, with the events and the whole nature of it.
I kind of liked it. It's very flawed and doesn't make sense at all. But at least the situations are used to forward an arc, as slight as it can be. The others have been hit or msss with that but this did it the best, as it's baked more into the core of the story than it was with the others. So..it may be the best of these for that alone.
That's not a high bar to clear but there ya go. It ended up being fair ending to the series at least. This book is odd and all, but it had enough to it to be passable. As a whole, this series was eh. Some good ideas wrapped in a clunky package with a lead who can be charming but is often annoying.
This was a fun ride but they were often same-y so I am glad we're done. Stay tuned for whatever odd saga I tend up covering next. I know I got stuff like The Great Mom Swap to wrap up someday so we'll see where it goes.
Time on these readings, the new SlappWorld is out but i don't know when it will hit that library website. Once it does I'll get to it as soon as possible but I have no control of that. I got an idea for a random read to on Sunday is it's not up by then. I got a book related blog going up tomorrow so I'll be updating on here then at least.
See ya then.
So I can't say I was hyped for this final one in the saga. This was 1998 so the Apple paperback type market was about to fall of so no room for this classic saga. That and they ran out of holidays. Either way I read it and I was somewhat surprised.
This time Valentine's Day is around the corner. Lizzie is doing some Valentine's Day stuff for school even if she isn't a fan. There's a new substitute teacher who is cool but tends to not like Lizzie because...well duh, even with him she acts out a bit. Meanwhile the local alpha bitch Sybill is giving her some trouble.
Plus odd things are going odd and no one else seems to see them. Eventually they results in this big valentine box eating the teacher.
So this one is weird, even for this series standards. The weird stuff happens kind of right away, even if take a bit to get to the vore. It's a more psychological bent, weirdly enough. Lizzie is lizzie, she's arguably at her worst for some of this. There's a fair bit of "Why don't they like me" after she's been bad. That's annoying.
This starts rough because of that. This makes the least sense of these and that is saying something,. Ralph pops up sometimes, the guy who started all this, and isn't behind the valentine that eats them. His presence, the place they end up in, is never explained. It's all so out there and I feel like I'm going crazy as I read this.
The teacher is weirdly not important. He's not even eaten first, that's Sybil and he just goes in after. He's there but not in a huge way. Sybil is the focus here, but I guess "The Valentine That Ate This Girl I Know" wouldn't sell as well.
There's an arc with Lizzie and Sybil that actually kind of work. Sybil is a bit alpha bitch-y but really it's mostly Lizzie judging her and just being jealous, mostly. It's not super tight, it's done in a somewhat clunky/rushed way but it is nice when they get along in the end. And they do stick to it, Sybil does lighten up and the final note is rushed but nice.,
That psychological element revolves around that somewhat, and it sort of tries to be deep with that. It's done that in a rather clunky way that's not quite as smart as it thinks it is but it is interesting. This book is weird, with the events and the whole nature of it.
I kind of liked it. It's very flawed and doesn't make sense at all. But at least the situations are used to forward an arc, as slight as it can be. The others have been hit or msss with that but this did it the best, as it's baked more into the core of the story than it was with the others. So..it may be the best of these for that alone.
That's not a high bar to clear but there ya go. It ended up being fair ending to the series at least. This book is odd and all, but it had enough to it to be passable. As a whole, this series was eh. Some good ideas wrapped in a clunky package with a lead who can be charming but is often annoying.
This was a fun ride but they were often same-y so I am glad we're done. Stay tuned for whatever odd saga I tend up covering next. I know I got stuff like The Great Mom Swap to wrap up someday so we'll see where it goes.
Time on these readings, the new SlappWorld is out but i don't know when it will hit that library website. Once it does I'll get to it as soon as possible but I have no control of that. I got an idea for a random read to on Sunday is it's not up by then. I got a book related blog going up tomorrow so I'll be updating on here then at least.
See ya then.
July 8, 2020
A highly disturbing children's book. The narrator is a traditional mean-spirited child, which is okay, but relies heavily on cliches. This book traumatized me as a child, but in hindsight literally none of it makes sense! There is zero semblance of explanation for anything that happens. If I'm going to be honest, this reads almost like a Kafka novel, but a little bit funnier.
May 7, 2023
I read this when I was in fourth grade. I thought it was weird then and nothing has changed. Weird plot, characters, and dialogue, but speaking as a fourth grader or an 18 year old, who really cares? It’s a cute little book that takes an hour to read at most. I will say that I added a star for nostalgia reasons because, had I not read it earlier in life, I 100% doubt I would willingly pick it up.
October 27, 2016
I used to LOVE the books in this series when I was a kid!! I'd been wanting to reread them for a while - Problem was, I couldn't remember the author's name and the series doesn't really HAVE a name and I also couldn't remember the individual titles. All I remembered was it was about a kid named Liz with a brother named Booker but called Booger and she kept getting sucked into creepy nightmare situations.
I was pretty thrilled to find a book at the thrift store I worked at with a description that includes the names Lizzie and Booger.
I never actually read this one as a kid. I gotta say romance is not a preferred topic for me in children's books. Still, this was a fun read. Just reading it as an adult you're unlikely to be impressed - the narrator is cynical and negative about everything, the pacing is a bit too fast at first which causes some things to be glossed over that probably shouldn't be, cliches abound, and we never really know WHY this guy named Ralph goes out of his way to mess with Lizzie's head to impart morals into her.
But when you think of it from the perspective of the target audience, most of this is perfectly understandable. Why wouldn't Liz be so cynical - it's HARD to be a ten-year-old girl. The world is starting to relate to you as an adult but you still have a child's perspective on everything. Everything is confusing, and hazy, and nightmarish, but when you try to express your feelings no one takes you seriously. Why wouldn't you think every social norm you're subjected to is stupid? Exposition is boring. The cliches are there because they work.
I'm disappointed these books aren't more popular than they are, because they're gems. Planning to pass this on to my fifth-grader future sister-in-law. Maybe I'll find the others in the series on eBay or at the library or something.
I was pretty thrilled to find a book at the thrift store I worked at with a description that includes the names Lizzie and Booger.
I never actually read this one as a kid. I gotta say romance is not a preferred topic for me in children's books. Still, this was a fun read. Just reading it as an adult you're unlikely to be impressed - the narrator is cynical and negative about everything, the pacing is a bit too fast at first which causes some things to be glossed over that probably shouldn't be, cliches abound, and we never really know WHY this guy named Ralph goes out of his way to mess with Lizzie's head to impart morals into her.
But when you think of it from the perspective of the target audience, most of this is perfectly understandable. Why wouldn't Liz be so cynical - it's HARD to be a ten-year-old girl. The world is starting to relate to you as an adult but you still have a child's perspective on everything. Everything is confusing, and hazy, and nightmarish, but when you try to express your feelings no one takes you seriously. Why wouldn't you think every social norm you're subjected to is stupid? Exposition is boring. The cliches are there because they work.
I'm disappointed these books aren't more popular than they are, because they're gems. Planning to pass this on to my fifth-grader future sister-in-law. Maybe I'll find the others in the series on eBay or at the library or something.
May 24, 2013
meI liked itwas cute and funny. I have something in comin with the main character.we don't like Valentine.'s day
But she ends:up passing out and forced to good home. From on then on she starts to good semi crazy.when she her frinds and the substutute teacher get sucked into a Valentine. She is not sure if it was real or not.
But she ends:up passing out and forced to good home. From on then on she starts to good semi crazy.when she her frinds and the substutute teacher get sucked into a Valentine. She is not sure if it was real or not.
December 3, 2013
This book was a decent book. I guess for the age level it was written for it might be better suited. Although I didn't particularly like this book as well as most it would still be a good book for kids to read, especially around valentines's day.
June 17, 2011
l love this book its funny i am sure you will like it
February 3, 2012
this book is a great book
May 5, 2012
It is interesting!!!
July 22, 2016
I felt like too much was going on. But I liked the way it turned out in the end.
September 18, 2016
I didn't like this book as much as others because it was a little creepy and scary. Some parts were funny and it teaches a lesson about selfishness. Overall it was ok.
February 23, 2012
This book is amazing.I think everyone should read this AMAZING book.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews