Mia doesn't always have the best luck with parties, so even though it's her sweet sixteenth, she doesn't want a birthday bash. As usual, Grandmère has other ideas, and thinks a reality TV special is just the thing in order to celebrate royally. The whole scheme smacks of Lilly's doing -- Lilly, whose own TV show is still only limited to local cable viewers.

Will Mia be able to stop Grandmère's plan? Will her friends ever forgive her if she does stop it, since it involves all of them taking the royal jet to Genovia for an extravaganza the likes of which would turn even Paris Hilton green with envy? Why can't Mia get what she really wants: an evening alone with Michael?

With a little luck, this sweet sixteen princess might just get her wish -- a birthday that's royally romantic.

Wednesday, April 28, 9 P.M.,
Albert Einstein High School gymnasium

"So Lana's dad rented the sultan of Brunei's ten-million-dollar yacht for the night, and had Lana and her friends driven out into international waters so they could drink without getting in trouble."

This is what Lilly just called to tell me.

"Lilly," I whispered. "You know you aren't supposed to call me on my cell phone. It is for emergency use only."

"You don't think this is an emergency? Mia, Lana's dad renting the sultan of Brunei's yacht like that? That is a throwdown. He is basically telling your grandmother to bring it."

"I don't have the slightest idea what you're talking about." Because I don't. "And I have to go. I'm at a PTA meeting, for crying out loud."

"Oh, God." I can hear the soundtrack for Altar Boyz in the background. Ever since Lilly started going out with J. P. Reynolds-Abernathy the Fourth, she has gotten way into soundtracks from musicals, because J. P.'s dad is a theater producer, and J. P. can get free tickets to any Broadway show he wants, and all of the off-Broadway ones, too. And even the off-off-Broadway ones. "I forgot you had to go to that stupid thing. Sorry I'm not there with you.

But . . . well, you know."

I did know. Lilly was serving the last week of a grounding her parents instituted after she was brought home by the NYPD for attacking Andy Milonakis — this kid from downtown whose cable access television show was picked up by MTV — with a Dojo's side salad. Lilly believes Andy's getting a basic cable deal instead of her is a travesty of justice, because her own local show, Lilly Tells It Like It Is, is so much better (in her opinion), as it isn't simply entertaining, but also highlights facts she feels her viewers ought to be aware of. Such as the fact that the U.S.'s decision to withhold $34 million from the United Nations Population Fund will lead to two million unwanted pregnancies, 800,000 induced abortions, 4,700 maternal deaths, and 77,000 infant and child deaths worldwide.

Whereas a typical episode of Andy's show features him holding a jar of peanut butter in one hand, a jar of salsa in the other, then making the jars dance with each other.

Lilly is also peeved that Andy is deceiving the American public by allowing them to think he is just a kid, when we both saw him coming out of d.b.a., which is a bar in the East Village that cards. So how did he get in there if he isn't at least twenty-one?

This is what she asked him when she saw him eating a falafel at Dojo's Health Restaurant on St. Marks Place, and why she claims she was forced to hurl her side salad at him, drenching him in tahini dressing, and causing him to call the cops on her.

Thankfully the Drs. Moscovitz talked Andy's legal team out of pressing charges, explaining that Lilly has been experiencing some anger issues since their recent separation.

But that didn't stop them from grounding her.

"So how's the meeting going?" Lilly asked. "Have they gotten to the you-know-what part yet?"

"I wouldn't know, because I'm too distracted, talking to YOU," I whispered. I had to whisper, because I was sitting in a folding chair in the middle of a row of very uptight-looking parents. Being New Yorkers, they were all, of course, very well dressed, with Prada accessories. But being New Yorkers, they were also all angry about the fact that someone was using a cell phone while someone else — namely, Principal Gupta — was up at the podium, speaking. Also, of course, that Principal Gupta was basically saying she couldn't guarantee that their kids would get into Yale or Harvard, which was making them madder than anything.

Meg Cabot is the author of the best-selling, critically acclaimed Princess Diaries books, which were made into the wildly popular Disney movies of the same name. Her other books for teens include the Mediator series, the 1-800-Where- R-You books, All-American Girl, Ready or Not, Teen Idol, and Avalon High, as well as Nicola and the Viscount and Victoria and the Rogue. She also writes books for adults, including The Boy Next Door, Boy Meets Girl, Every Boy's Got One, and Size 12 Is Not Fat. She is still waiting for her real parents, the king and queen, to restore her to her rightful throne. She lives in Key West and New York City with her husband and a one-eyed cat named Henrietta.

• Contact Us |
• Site Help |
• Site Map |
• Privacy Statement |
• Support KCLS |
• KCLS Employment