Focusing On Fear Street - Killer's Kiss

WELCOME TO FOCUSING ON FEAR SREET WITH THERESTHEGIRL

 

Book #42 in the original Fear Street Series

Published February 1997

Cover Art by Bill Schmidt

 

 

Not of the best quality but a picture of the main male character, Vincent Milano, covered with lip prints. The picture is on a heart stabbed to the wall with a really big knife. For a book published in February around Valentine's Day it has lots of reds and pinks and purples and is very realistic. It's got some good detail but I wish you could see the heart better instead of being close-up on the face. So this was another one that got a 2008 reprint cover so we might as well get that out of the way:

 

 

A skull with a lip print on the bone...okay maybe a little bit better than the last one. The color of the lipstick is actually much closer to the one described in the book than the red of the original and I like the color scheme with the double effect on the skull. To me it looks like the skull is wearing rose-tinted glasses but it's just the eye sockets weirdly colored and this one isn't too bad. So what does Russia have in store for us with it's cover since it's always a weird one?

 

 

 

Was this supposed to be for a vampire book instead? That looks like blood on the girl's lips. The blonde girl in our story, Karina, doesn't even have anything to do with the lipstick that comes into play in the book so that's one swing and a miss. The guy looks pretty good but I think it may be another male character, Stewart, and not Vincent but again not too sure. I like the color scheme but also again that weird realistic style of the girl and the illustration of the boy is kind of off-putting like it was cobbled from something much different but it does have a nice, dark tone. Next up: Brazil/Portugal.

 

 

Our three main characters: dark-haired, stylish Delia, handsome Vincent and conservative, blonde Karina in front of a background with party balloons and the outline of a dead body. The napkin on the ground is focused more with tell-tale lip print in the corner and it's pretty much book-accurate and very nice looking even if it does spoil that someone gets murdered. So, last but not least, the German cover.

 

 

The outline of chalk where a dead body fell and a napkin on the ground with a perfect lip print. Seriously, that is a really detailed lip print as well as the fabric napkin. It's not as foreboding as the usual covers but it conveys the point of the story across in a very simplistic manner so I'd say it's in the top three after the original and the Brazil/Portugal one with Russia in fourth and the US reprint in last place.

 

Taglines: On the front: "Her lips were sweet and deadly." and on the back: "Kiss life good-bye..." The blurb tells us, of course, two girls after the same guy and one of them seems a little more determined than the other to make sure the boy is hers.

 

 

The First Line: "Whoa."

 

 

 

What a way to start a story huh? This is said by Vincent Milano after he and Delia Easton get done making out on his couch. Delia is always wearing this dark purple lipstick and leaving lip prints on Vincent's face and napkins, tissues and notebook papers blotting her lips. Not that Vincent minds because Delia is just one of those girls that everyone notices with her wild style and dark curls but he admits that Delia isn't beautiful. Oh no the other girl he's seeing is much more beautiful: the blonde and blue-eyed, Karina Frye, whom reminds him of Michelle Pfeiffer.

 

 

Young Michelle...meow!



 

Yep, Vincent's a two-timer seeing two girls at the same time and not just any girls but Karina and Delia who go head-to-head over everything. Who had the best grades, the most friends, the hottest guys and now over an award that's pretty much a scholarship sort of deal but neither girl knows the other is dating Vincent so either they are both just really self-absorbed or not that smart.

 

 



 

 When Vincent realizes that the fireplace clock is broken and that Karina will be at his house any minute, he tries to usher Delia out when only minutes ago he was thinking about nothing but making out with her some more...what a jerk. So the minute Delia's car is out of sight, Karina's car arrives and Vincent thinks he got away with something big until Karina flips out...by seeing the purple lip print on his cheek! Apparently, Delia is the only one who wears that shade so Karina knows she was there which I guess makes her a little smarter than I thought. Vincent explains that Delia just came for some notes and kissed him on the cheek as she left...no big deal since he didn't kiss her back. Karina is too livid to eat out of Vincent's hands and leaves saying how much she hates Delia...angry enough that Vincent is kind of afraid of her.

 

 

I so wish I could rock purple lipstick!



 

So the following day at school, Delia is in the gym with her friends, Gabe Denver and Britty Myers. It's pretty clear that Gabe has a crush on Delia but she only has eyes for Vincent and if not thinking about her boy toy, Delia's thinking about winning the Conklin Award scholarship. Besides Delia and Karina, there are four others and another boy they know named Stewart Andrews competing for the award which Delia thinks Karina will win because she goes around acting like Little Miss Perfect. Britty is friends with both girls and can't understand why they fight so much since they all use to be best friends and I can tell you why: Vincent. All of a sudden, Karina enters the gym and attacks Delia.

 



 

She outright starts choking her and even pulls her earring out of her ear...ouch! Delia has no idea what this is about but Karina keeps mentioning that she won't win but this clearly isn't about some award...especially when Vincent's name comes up. Karina is still upset about seeing Delia's lipstick on Vincent's cheek last night and has some serious anger issues. When Vincent is at Delia's house the next evening, he ignores Delia telling him about Karina this and Karina that but Delia can't forget how insane she was and of course, Delia is still clueless to his two-timing. We learn Delia has a sister named Sarah, who is fifteen and a tomboy, when she catches her spying on the couple and she gives her a hard time in a rather nasty way. Sarah, being embarrassed in front of Vincent, tells Delia she'll get back at her after running away with one of Delia's drawings for her portfolio to present to the Conklin Award judges.

 

We see the next day, Stewart asking Delia out on a date for the weekend so they both can get their minds of the competition but Delia turns Stewart down, saying that she and Vincent are going together but doesn't Stewart already know that? Delia soon finds Stewart in a conversation with Karina in a storage closet and thinks Karina asked Stewart to ask her out so that Karina could get Vincent alone. She tells this to Britty and even though the other girl thinks Karina and Delia are letting this get out of hand, agrees to talk to Karina to see what's going on with her thinking Vincent is her boyfriend. Karina is obviously the smarter of the two and knows exactly what Delia's up to sending Britty as a sort of spy so that the plan goes up in smoke.

 

 

Pretend Britty is Cady, Karina is Regina and Delia is Gretchen



 

At the talent part of the competition (other than painting which I guess all of the contenders have to do?) for the award, Stewart performs a magic act, Karina sings an Italian opera piece and just as Delia is going up to perform a song she wrote on an acoustic guitar...she finds all of the strings cut and a decomposing rat stuffed inside the sound hole! Of course, Delia accuses Karina but maybe it wasn't her as Delia sees sister Sarah in the audience smiling and leaving with the other girl...or maybe that was a grin on Stewart's face while he was offstage? Delia goes home that afternoon to find a note on the door from Vincent. To make up for not being at the show today, he wants to take Delia out dancing so she heads over to Britty' house to get back her skirt and finds Brit and Gabe making her cookies to feel better...aww.

 



 

On her way back home, Delia sees Karina with Vincent and crashes her car! While Vincent is calling Delia's parents, Karina rushes over to check on Delia and now both girls know that Vincent has been dating both of them at the same time! FINALLY DELIA! Karina apologizes for attacking Delia and calls a truce but even though Delia agrees to the truce it still doesn't mean she'll give up Vincent and oh my god here it goes again...

 



 

Okay...so...not because of the accident but a lame excuse, Vincent tells Delia he has to do a rain check on the offer to go out dancing. Vincent is a little worried that his life will be ruined if Karina and Delia decide to be best friends again so he gives Delia the story that whatever Karina said to her was all just bunk and Delia believes it. This is also where we find out that now Vincent is a three-timer and his other girl just so happens to be...Sarah!

 

When the time comes to show her art to the judges, Delia finds that all of her drawings have been defaced with her own Midnight Wine lipstick and completely ruined! Running off, Delia finds Karina with Vincent and at this point, I do feel a little sorry for her. It's never really fun when you have a frenemy but is Karina really that crazy when someone else had better access to destroy her pictures? Over at Britty's, Delia talks about dropping out of the competition but her friend convinces her not to because even if Karina is responsible for sabotaging Delia and gets kicked out, Delia still has a chance to win. Of course, Delia turns it all around to how she has to get the award to get out of Shadyside but none of that is worth it if she has to lose Vincent to Karina.

 

 



 

Despite Britty trying to convince Delia that Karina is better off having Vincent and how many other guys would love to go out with her, Delia leaves to go and talk with Vincent but gets a surprise to see Sarah there in her clothes and make-up, making out with her man. Sarah and Vincent aren't at all sorry so Delia gets in a nasty comment to her sister and Vincent says he was just trying to give the younger girl pointers and it seems Delia might finally be realizing the truth about Vincent but no...of course, NO. Vincent is a master-manipulator and Delia tells him he has to talk to Karina because all of this is getting out of hand and Delia is worried about what the other girl might do next.

 

What is in store in this torrid love triangle between Vincent, Delia and Karina? Which girl will win Vincent's heart or will this lover boy get what he deserves?

 

Body Count: There's a love triangle involved...and three is always a crowd so of course...it can't end well for at least one of them.

 

MY TAKE: This book took a lot to get through in reviewing it and trying not to spoil Killer's Kiss for anyone who has not read it. First off with the characters, I couldn't really stand any of them except for Gabe, Britty, Stewart and even Sarah. Vincent of course is just a complete jerk that rivals Bobby Newkirk from Double Date but might even be worse. Delia is just not very bright in the first half of the book and Karina is so much smarter but she is still quite horrible. Once you get to the last few chapters, it gets interesting and has a really good twist where the ending just fizzles out. It's not comical or sad it just ends...that's about it. I would recommend it just to find out the twist/ending that all Fear Street books have and that's not really saying much...it's just okay.

 

THE SHADYSIDE HIGH TIME CAPSULE

 

 

 

 

Not really a lot of movies that I can find for this point in time that I really liked or could even suggest either one of these "couples" go and see except maybe Fools Rush In because well it's a decent flick and that title is spot on or even Beautician and The Beast because well Fran Drescher.

 

The music on the other hand is a whole other story!

 

 



 

 

NEXT BLOG: We're going to cross paths with one really bad...Cat.