In 1993’s The Cheater, R.L. Stine tells the story of Carter Phillips.

Carter has everything going for her.  Her father is a judge.  Her mother is socialite.  She’s a member of the exclusive Shadyside Country Club, where she and her friend Jill tear it up on the tennis court.  She’s got a sweet and sensitive boyfriend named Dan.  She’s got the type of name that people are definitely going to remember.  There’s just one problem.

Carter sucks at Math.

And if Carter can’t get a decent grade on the big math exam, she’ll never get into Princeton!

Finally, an R.L. Stine book to which I could relate!  Seriously, much like Carter, I was a pretty good student in high school but Math was never my thing.  I would look at those test papers with all of those numbers and symbols and all of those commands to “show your work” and my brain would just shut off.  Fortunately, my sister had been a year ahead of me and she held onto all of her old math tests.  Since our teacher pretty much reused the same tests from year to year, I was lucky enough to have an answer key.

Every test day, I would wear a skirt and, right before class, I would write the answers on my thigh.  If the teacher walked by my desk while I was taking the test, I would just pull down on my skirt.  Fortunately, the teacher was a male so even if he did suspect that I was cheating, it’s not like he could tell me to lift up my skirt or, for that matter, even get caught trying to look down at my legs.

And that’s how I managed to pass algebra without ever paying attention to anything that was said in class.  I know that I should probably feel guilty about cheating but, to be honest, I don’t.  If I had it to do all over again, I would do the exact same thing.

Unfortunately, Carter doesn’t have an older sister and when she suggests that maybe Dan could take the test for her, Dan is so shocked that Carter has to pretend like she was just telling a joke.  However, Adam Messner, who is a rebel who always dressed in black and doesn’t come from as wealthy a family as Carter or Dan, overhears Carter talking to Dan.  He offers to take the test for Carter, on the condition that Carter go on one date with him.

Carter agrees.  Adam gets a good grade on the test and, as a result, Carter is not only Princeton-bound but her father gives her a pair of diamond earrings.  But now there’s the fact that Carter has to go on a date with Adam and the fact that Adam has decided that he wants more than one date….

It’s an intriguing premise but unfortunately, Stine gets bogged down with one of those murder mysteries that ends with a rather silly twist.  Reading this book, it was obvious that it was written in 1993 because the main theme of the book seemed to be that Carter and her friends were totally right to be annoyed with the idea of having to deal with not-rich teenagers who dress in black and who have tattoos.  One gets the feeling that, if this book were written today, the roles would be reversed with Carter being portrayed as the villain and Adam as the misunderstood victim.

That said, I enjoyed The Cheater.  Stine kept the action moving quickly, Adam was actually a fairly well-drawn character, and I could relate to Carter.  Seriously, Math can be difficult!  The Cheater does the right thing and embraces the melodrama.