Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen is is a teenage book written by Dyan Sheldon. It was first issued in 1999 through the press. In 2004, a Disney movie was created based on this work. The author, Dyan Sheldon, was born in New York and lived in London when the book was published. She has written many teenage novels including, My Wonderful Life, Sofie Pitt-Turnbull Finds America, Janet’s Planet and Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen. She says, “I write for the young people based on personal experience. I simply do the characters younger. I thought that I would outgrow these events — but they continue to occur”. This story tells the reader about a girl who is used to the world that existed only for her. She always gets what she wants; she is the first among her classmates. However, her life changed very quickly in New Jersey and she realized that her upturned life could not depend only on her popularity. Her selfish and childish behavior was broken by another reality.
From the beginning, the central figure for the story is Mary Elisabeth. She is the main character of the book, known to her friends as Lola. Her parents recently decided to move with from New York City to a little town in New Jersey. That was an important moment in Lola’s life because her usual lifestyle had gone away. Lola devoted herself to being an actress, and she did not want to live in the suburbs where she found out that all around was the same. To overcome the feeling of boredom, she decides to try for the leading role in a school play. Carla Santini, a popular girl at school, also aims for that role.
That is where Mary faces her first problems. She has to struggle with Carla Santini who does not want to give up her place in the school community. They both compete for a leading role in a school play. The hostility between two girls only worsens after the collapse of Lola’s favorite band. She goes to New York with her best friend and then they find out that the singer is drunk and on the side of the road. Eventually, they are brought to the ambassador of the party.
Mary Elisabeth longed to be at the center of attention. However, when she moved to New Jersey with her family and was a student in Dellwood, Lola finds that the role of the Drama Queen is already filled by Carla Santini, a person who was born to win at everything. Carla always got everything that she wanted, until Lola did not enter the picture and caught leadership in a school game.
Lola and Ella returned to school the next day, wishing Carla’s boasting about their tricks in afterparty but when they start talking about it, Carla convinced everyone that they were not present at the party. Lola goes home frustrated and decided not to go to the stage in the school play. When Lola gets a leading role, Carla persuades most of the students to pay no attention to Lola, and Lola makes a decision to leave the play. In the next scene, Lola had a fight against her best friend Ella, who is disappointed about Lola’s decision.
When Lola was chosen for the school play, Carla disclosed that she had tickets for the last concert of a recently broken up band, Sidarthur. Lola claimed that she had tickets as well, even though it was not true. But, she could not buy them because she did not have money for them. When Lola asked Ella to do it for her, there were no tickets left. Lola has an idea that they could still obtain them from a reseller.
The night the concert was supposed to take place, Ella and Lola traveled to New York. Lola then realized that she has somehow lost the money she was supposed to pay for the tickets. Eventually, two girls faced a problem and had to go to a police department. Lola stated her father’s address in New York. In this part of the story, Lola’s dishonorableness starts to be an issue. At the time of meeting Ella, she told a fake story concerning her father’s death. When Ella learned that this story was not true, she became very angry and disappointed. They explained what occurred to Lola’s father when he arrived, Stu welcomed all of them back aside and Ella pardoned Lola for the fake story. Two girls spoke with Carla who seemed to be upset. Lola spoke about her work, but they were disappointed to find out that she was intoxicated.
Carla offended Lola when she said that she neither saw Lola nor Ella. No one believes Lola when she tells a story about arrest. Later, Lola heads home, suppressed and does not want to take part in the play, although she provoked Ella’s support and arrived behind the scenes just in time to see that Carla took the part.
Finally, as Lola was coming to the stage, she was called Lola by her mother. After a lot of work that brings applause, there was a party at which Stu was present. Carla tried to save herself from an insult, saying that he came to her. As Carla lied and it became obvious, she receded from crowds on the almost crying and gets to the fountain. As the peace-making signal, Lola tries to help, and Carla concedes defeat. Having danced with Stu, Lola goes to dancing with Sam and in the end, they kiss. This scene showed Lola that her initial perception of the world in New York was rather different and she realized that life is not limited to her popularity and leadership.
