Debuting in 2004, Lisi Harrison’s The Clique series was Gossip Girl for those who hadn’t yet gotten their period. The books revolved around a bratty quintet of spoiled female tween-agers from Westchester, New York, who referred to themselves as “The Pretty Committee.” There was Dylan Marvil, the perpetually burping, red-haired jester of the group, whose storyline always involved her weight (inspiring!); Alicia, the only one with boobs; Kristen, the athletic but “poor” one (because she’s on a scholarship and lives in an apartment, duh); and outsider Claire, the Keds-wearing one from Orlando. Finally, there’s Massie Block, the group’s bordering-on-sociopathic, self-appointed Alpha (her screen name is literally MASSIEKUR). The pastel plaid covers of each book made you feel as if you were carrying an adorable tartan clutch. The covers also featured images of two to three models whispering, giggling, or staring into the abyss and in no way resembled the typical middle-school-aged reader. And that was just the beginning when it came to the series’ issues with relatability to its impressionable and pre-adolescent audience.
In my experience, the hottest market for these books was the predominantly-Jewish sleepaway camp. The books were like currency - you would only trade your Best Friends For Never if you could sweeten the deal with a Dial L For Loser. The fervor for these books verged on religious; they were our bible, nee, Torah.
At the camp I attended, my only friend was the camp therapist; however, I did share one thing in common with my bunkmates - a love of The Clique. In the summer of 2007, I was the only girl who had the newest installment of the series, Sealed With a Diss. My stock went up, and for the first time everyone wanted to be my lake buddy. The only other time my peers paid attention to me was when I read the guide to putting in a tampon from The Care and Keeping Of You in a Borat voice. Why I only bonded with these girls through literature I will never know. Coming in droves from Long Island and Westchester, my bunkmates were the closest things to Massie Block that existed. They never even came close to accepting me - I was the chubby Jewish bull in a china shop. The Clique exacerbated my feelings of otherness. It showed me what it took to be like the girls at my sleepaway camp while also completely blowing my confidence because I knew deep down I would never be like them.
Beyond my experiences at camp, The Clique series severely messed with my expectations of what life would be like in middle school. Over the course of their seventh grade year, the Pretty Committee hosts a co-ed “When Hell Freezes Over” Halloween party where they dress as “Dirty Devils,” are invited by a famous director to audition for a feature film, and, my personal favorite, have an alcohol-free cocktails kiosk at their school (yes, SCHOOL) called Virgins. In the “Clique” universe, 12-year-olds get nose jobs and drink Atkins shakes to curb their weight. Meanwhile, nothing in my tweenage existence was remotely as exciting or fabulously nauseating as any of the above, but I still tried my darndest to make my "Clique" dreams a reality. While Massie wore the fictional Chanel No. 19 as her signature scent, I swathed myself daily in Viva La Juicy. I donned the color purple often because Massie dubbed it “the color of royalty.” Though I didn’t audition for a feature film, I did audition for my middle school’s production of Once Upon a Mattress and quit upon hearing that I was chorus.
The series probably cut deepest when it came to laying out expectations on how a 13-year-old’s love life should look. The girls were constantly on the hunt for a HART, or a Hawt Alpha Rich Toned boyfriend, and typically snagged the attention of a teen boy or two. With names like Dempsey, Landon, and Derrington (Derrick Harrington, to be clear), the paramours within “The Clique” universe doused themselves in Drakkar Noir cologne, made mix CDs for their crushes, and wore rhinestone brooches with the first initial of their girlfriends’ names. The real crowning achievement, however, was receiving a first kiss. Whether it was being the best kisser, shame about never having been kissed, or even a bet about who would be the first to get kissed in order to win a pair of Spanish boots, swapping saliva was always at the forefront of most “Clique” books’ storylines. Massie even taught her own seminar on how to best lose your “lip virginity” called MUCK (Massie’s Underground Clinic for Kissing) even though SHE was a secret lip virgin herself.
In turn, I too then expected that my love life would flourish. A little more about me during this time - I would randomly break out into “What Is This Feeling?” from the musical Wicked at a moment’s notice. I heavily enjoyed watching both South Park and The Simpsons. My mom said I was cute even though I resembled an overweight Lord Farquaad with neon braces. The fact that I did not pin a K brooch to my personal Derrington is honestly astonishing. Where the boys of The Clique wore Drakkar Noir, my potential suitors wore a sickening amount of Axe body spray. My HART never materialized, and I was instead told by a boy at a Bar Mitzvah that I looked like a rhino in my dress. My worst fear came true - not only was I a total lip virgin myself, but as The Clique series would put it, I was an “LBR” (loser beyond repair).
Now, older and (possibly) wiser, I know that I was not a loser. My “nerdy” interest in theatre led me to eventually joining my college’s improv group and meeting some of my best friends. Just because my bunkmates didn’t enjoy my Ralph Wiggum and Cartman impressions, some really cool people later in life did. And I did slowly start to grow comfortable with my body. Though difficult to realize at the time, I was a kid with my entire life ahead of me. My existence was not permanently ruined just because I didn’t have a rhinestone-covered Razr, never kissed a boy with one blue eye and one green eye, and didn’t discover a secret lair hidden within the bowels of my middle school that featured a Starbucks machine, juice bar with real palm fronds, and five electric foot spas.
The Clique series filled a void for when I was too young to understand or enjoy the “Housewives'' franchise but old enough to hang out at a Starbucks after middle school. While the books’ consumerist and superficial undertones were incredibly damaging to my fragile pre-teen psyche, they messed me up just enough to give me a sense of humor. The Clique series is fun, escapist lit, but only to an audience that realizes that’s just what the books are: fiction. And while I recognize that I read the series when I was not old enough to know better, I’m still on the hunt for an underground lair with an electric foot spa; but that’s my own problem to worry about.
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