#1 Patti’s Luck by Susan Saunders, 1987.

Patti Jenkins has just moved from the big city to the smaller town of Riverhurst.  Recognizing her as a former classmate, Stephanie invites her to join the group of friends she has sleepovers with, Kate and Lauren.  The other girls like her, but almost immediately, bad things start happening.

At their first sleepover with Patti, the girls start watching a creepy old movie that spooks both Patti and Lauren. Patti accidentally knocks over a tray of snacks, and Kate jokes that it’s part of the curse, like in the movie.  Then, the water main breaks at Stephanie’s house, so the girls are unable to wash out the purple styling gel they just put in their hair.

From there, it just seems to get worse and worse.  Patti accidentally sets Lauren’s backpack on the back of a car that drives away, and the girls have to chase after it on their bikes.  Lauren eventually catches up with the car and gets her schoolwork back, but Patti gets lost and caught in a rain storm before she can find her way back to school.  Then, on a school field trip, she helps her classmates to find an elevator at the museum.  After Patti presses the button, the elevator doors close before their teacher gets on, and the elevator gets stuck for awhile with the lights off.

Is Patti bad luck?  She seems to think so, and Lauren, being the superstitious type, is pretty creeped out, thinking that Patti might really be under a curse.  Kate, of course, says that’s all nonsense.  When Stephanie is hurt after Patti accidentally lets Lauren’s brother’s huge dog out of the room whee he was supposed to stay, Patti starts avoiding the other girls because she’s worried about her bad luck curse. The others decide that they need to do something to help Patti out of her bad luck streak.

The book acknowledges that most of Patti’s “bad luck” is just a series of unfortunate accidents and coincidences and that it’s only Patti’s nervousness and superstitious attitude toward them that makes it seem like something more.  Kate devises a way to remove Patti’s bad luck that works partly because Patti feels the need for some kind of ceremony to help her get back to normal.  In the end, all of the girls realize that there’s nothing really supernatural or superstitious going on.

The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.