Apparently, R.L. Stine’s readers who so upset over the brilliant (but dark) ending of Best Friend, Stine felt the need to not only give them a sequel but to hold a contest to allow his readers to chime in and have a say in what should happen in the sequel.  (To be honest, that sounds like more of a publicity stunt than anything else but hey, whatever works.)  The contest was won by a girl in Wisconsin, which should be perfect evidence that the contest was rigged because everyone knows that Wisconsin is a made up place.

Anyway, in 1997 — something like five years after the publication of Best Friend so, seriously, how long did this contest last — Stine gave the world Best Friend 2.

Best Friend ended with Honey Perkins apparently murdering Bill with Becka’s knife and then promising to testify that Becka killed Bill in self-defense in return for Becka being her best friend and Becka …. agreeing!  (Woo hoo!  Way to go, Stine!)  However, the girl from Wisconsin decided that 1) Bill wasn’t really dead (despite the fact that he certainly appeared to be dead at the end of the previous book) and 2) Becka went back on her word and reported Honey to the police.  Honey was put in a mental hospital but, as this novel begins, Honey has broken out of the hospital and enrolled at a school near Shadyside.  Honey tells everyone that she’s Becka and then she tracks down Eric, who was Becka’s boring boyfriend who was dumped for Bill in the first book.  Eric was so heart-broken that he had to transfer to a new school.  (Awwwww, poor Eric!)  Honey puts Eric out of his memory by murdering him.

At Shadyside, Becka is still trying to recover from the trauma that Honey put her through.  Becka is in therapy and she even discovers the true origins of why Honey is so obsessed with her.  That’s right, it turns out that Honey is motivated by more than just a fanatical desire for Becka to be her friend and it’s actually kind of lame.  Seriously, I hope that girl in Wisconsin never ever wrote anything else because she’s one of those writers who had to overexplain everything.

Anyway, Becka finds herself being stalked again and getting threatening phone calls and all of the usual stuff.  Eventually, the stalker is revealed and it’s another twist and …. ugh.  It’s a super lame twist.  This is why you don’t let contest winners write books.  Basically — should I reveal this?  What the Hell, this book is over twenty years old.  Consider this to be your SPOILER WARNING but basically it turns out that Honey is not the one doing the stalking this time but instead, it’s Becka’s best friend from the previous book who is upset over the fact that Becka never visited her in the hospital after Honey injured her.  But there’s nothing about the character, from what we’ve seen of her, that suggests that this sort of thing would drive her mad.  This is just a twist that comes out of nowhere.  I mean, what are the chances that Becka is going to have two people in her life stalking her because they feel that she wasn’t a good enough friend?

(That said …. why wouldn’t you visit a friend who was put in the hospital by someone who was stalking you?  Becka is kind of selfish but still, everyone in this book overreacts.  Most people would just say, “Okay, I guess I’ll go find a better friend.”)

Anyway, Best Friend was Stine at his best but this sequel is lame and I blame the imaginary state of Wisconsin.