GIRL GIVES BIRTH TO OWN PROM DATE

The prolific Strasser strikes again with a companion novel to his very funny first look at Time Zone High, How I Changed My Life (1995), and this one's even more fresh and irreverently funny than its predecessor. Nicole is a senior at TZH who takes life seriously and plans to find ``a cause or disease or something'' to devote her life to, but only after basketball star and hunk Brad asks her to the prom. To her surprise and consternation, Brad asks someone else. Drastic times require drastic measures, so Nicole transforms her next-door neighbor and oldest friend, grunge-king Chase, who's handsome but not very clean, into a stud muffin. She succeeds, of course (making true the book's reader-grabbing title), but not without a whole series of the hilarious, well-concocted misadventures. Both Nicole and Chase are corking characters, as are all their friends. Best of all, the high humor doesn't detract at all from Strasser's serious but understated message about nonconformity and self-acceptance; it's there, behind all the goofy plot twists and effervescent dialogue. (Fiction. 14+)