SVT #29: Jessica and the Brat Attack

(Click here for a recap of Sweet Valley Twins #28: April Fool!)

OK, first: this has got to be one of the most objectionable covers out of the classics. Just look at Jess’ face. That expression is far too devious, I’m sorry. (I say this with a tremendous amount of love, by the way). Also, it looks like she’s just hanging around in a neighborhood tree, waiting for children to wander on by beneath her so she can recruit them to help her sell drugs and pay them with candy. On the plus side, this is the outfit that is described in the book! (Though I have no idea if those jeans are indeed “designer.” Check it out:

But anyway. When we open, we find out that the entire sixth grade is excited about the sixth-grade fair—that’s not a fair FOR sixth-graders, exactly. It’s a fair run by sixth graders for the whole school. Sounds like a very Sweet Valley Board of Education thing to do, huh? Maybe it’s some kind of hazing thing.

Jessica, Lila, and Ellen are gabbing about how they want to be in charge of certain booths at the fair, and Julie Porter (I don’t know why they are allowing her to be near them, by the way) shakes her head and reminds them that booth assignments will be completely random. We’re told that Julie is “in charge” of assigning the booths, though, which doesn’t make sense, then? If it’s random, what exactly is her role?

The coveted booth is the Wheel of Fortune. The one booth that nobody wants is the Water Balloon Toss, because you have to let people throw water balloons at you.

Everyone interested in running a booth is to report to Mr. Bowman’s classroom after school. Luckily, there are the exact same number of booths as there are interested volunteers! Crazy.

The kids pick their assignments out of a hat. Caroline Pearce gets to draw first, and she gets the Wheel of Fortune. Jessica is PISSED. But not as pissed as she is when she draws…the Water Balloon Toss! Lila gets the Bottle Toss and Ellen gets the Softball Throw. Personally, I’d rather Lila run a booth where she tells me everything that’s wrong with my outfit and Ellen runs a booth where she shares her thoughts for like a half hour. They both begin to tease Jess about her misfortune.

You know who doesn’t show up to pick a booth? Amy Sutton—which is odd because she just got Elizabeth to take over her babysitting job by lamenting that because of it, she can’t be in charge of a booth. (Elizabeth has opted to help Olivia Davidson make posters advertising the fair and has no plans to run a booth. Why this means she is OK with basically missing the entire fair, I have no idea.)

Jessica is home before Elizabeth, and she answers a call from Mrs. Sampson, Elizabeth’s would-be babysitting client. Mrs. Sampson explains that the job is from 10 am to 5 pm and that she will pay Elizabeth $10 an hour to watch her 2 youngest children. Jessica realizes that if SHE swipes the job, she’ll not only avoid getting pelted with water balloons, but she’ll make $70.

There were a lot of things Jessica could do with seventy dollars. She had a list of things she needed desperately: new perfume, a bathing suit like Lila’s, a subscription to Ingenue magazine—the list went on and on.

She calls Mrs. Sampson back and says that while Elizabeth is busy, she, Jessica, can do her the enormous favor of babysitting. All the while, Jessica is snickering to herself thinking about how babysitting is super easy and that she’s going to make $70 for doing nothing all day.

Elizabeth is aghast but honestly doesn’t put up much of a fight for the job. Probably because Amy told her that the Sampson kids are monsters. Jessica, the little psycho, acts like she was only thinking of her sister when she stepped in, saying, “But I didn’t want you to miss the fair!”

Jessica backs out of the water balloon gig the very next day, and when Julie frets about finding a replacement on such short notice, Jess suggests…Elizabeth.

Honestly, isn’t this the sort of thing faculty should be willing to do? Kids would definitely have fun throwing water balloons at their teachers, and, you know…it just seems that having ONE kid have to take water balloons all day is sort of…not a great idea?

Elizabeth is furious and tells Jessica not to come crying to her if she discovers that she’s in over her head with the Sampson kids. I love it when Elizabeth tries to stand her ground with Jessica, but we know she’ll never actually do it.

Saturday: Jessica heads to the Sampsons’ house.

She’d brought a backpack stuffed with the latest issue of Ingenue magazine, a couple of paperbacks, and even some homework. Jessica was looking forward to a nice, relaxing day curled up in a chair reading. Maybe she could even coax the kids outside and sit in the sun.

Mrs. Sampson opened the door on the second ring. Oh, hello, Jessica,” she said. Jessica was surprised to see that Mrs. Sampson looked completely worn out. It was only ten o’clock in the morning.

Ha! Welcome to parenthood, Jessica.

We are introduced to Dennis, an “angelic-looking boy” and Susan, “a little girl with red curls.” Just pointing that out because, yay, that matches the image of the kids on the cover!

Mrs. Sampson tells Jess that her other two kids are out for the day—Gretchen is on a hike with her Brownie troop and Peter is at a friend’s house. She shows Jess where Dennis’ medicine is in case he gets an upset stomach, and explains that there is spaghetti for lunch in the refrigerator—and she asks Jess if she has a microwave at home. Hmm. This book was published in 1989. Were microwaves really that uncommon then?

The last piece of instruction is that nobody is allowed in the immaculate living room. The Sampsons are going to a party on a yacht, so they won’t be reachable. First, I’m jealous about this yacht party. Secondly, I don’t think I’d feel comfortable leaving my kids with a brand-new babysitter for an entire day when I can’t even check in on them. Although, we will soon learn why Mrs. Sampson is rightfully desperate to GTFO of her house.

The Sampsons leave, and the phone rings—it’s Lila, calling from the cordless phone she brought to the fair. She informs Jessica that Elizabeth is the star of the fair and she hasn’t even been hit by a water balloon yet.

Jessica set the phone down, feeling another pang. Maybe she should have let Elizabeth babysit after all. It had never occurred to Jessica that you could duck and avoid getting hit.

That last part made me LOL. Our Jess, always thinking things through.

Dennis and Susan are complaining about various things—Susan has a bug bite, Dennis wants ice cream, they’re both bored, etc. Jessica suggests they play “Library,” and shockingly, neither one goes for it. The fighting continues, and Jessica calls Lila’s cordless phone while hiding in a hall closet as the kids destroy each other. Lila gives the phone to Elizabeth, who is in no mood for Jess since she’s just been hit by a water balloon by Bruce Patman. Gotta say, I expected Elizabeth to be more good-natured about this water balloon thing.

Jess returns to the kitchen, where she finds Susan physically attacking Dennis for eating ALL of the ice cream. Minutes later, he pukes. Right after that, Gretchen calls and says she’s on her way home from her Brownie hike because one of the troop leaders sprained her ankle. While Jessica is on the phone, Dennis breaks a potted plant and gets dirt everywhere. Susan is climbing up the bookshelves and taking books out—and they find the key (yes, a key) to the off-limits living room. The kids snatch up the key before Jessica can, and then the doorbell rings. It’s Peter Sampson. Speaking of keys, why doesn’t he have one to his own house? Peter was thrown out of his friend’s house because they got into a fight. Jessica chooses this moment to call Elizabeth again to plead for help. Elizabeth refuses.

Jessica’s hands flew up to cover her eyes in horror. “What—what—” she stammered. She couldn’t believe what she saw.

All three children were in the living room—the only room in the house that was off-limits. Dennis was jumping up and down on the white couch with his tennis shoes on. Susan was playing some kind of make-believe game with the collection of Wedgwood china. And Peter was putting a tape into his father’s very expensive tape deck.

The kids all decide to give each other tattoos while they ignore Jessica’s demands. Then Gretchen shows up. More chaos ensues. Eventually, the kids need to eat.

Jessica looked at the microwave and frowned. She couldn’t remember now what Mrs. Sampson had said about it. Does she set it on high or low?

High, she decided. And it probably needs a long time to get really hot. She didn’t want any of these bratty kids complaining, especially since there was barely enough for each of them to get a taste. She set the microwave on high for eight minutes, and while the spaghetti was re-heating, tried to get everyone something to drink.

The spaghetti turns into a brick. I still don’t quite understand why Jessica doesn’t know how to use a microwave. Does this seem weird to anyone else? Maybe the Sampsons have some super high-tech advanced microwave. They have friends who have a yacht, so it’s possible. I have a friend who has one of those refrigerators with a display screen that shows notes and pictures. I wouldn’t know how to use that.

After giving the kids sandwiches, Jessica calls Elizabeth again. This time, Liz takes pity on her. She says she’ll come help but first, she wants to know what Jess is wearing. For once, Jessica is not interested in talking about her outfit! But Liz presses.

“I’m wearing those designer jeans Mom got us at the mall last week—you know, the faded ones—and the navy and white striped T-shirt with the white collar.” Once Jessica got started describing an outfit it was hard to stop her. And my white tennis shoes—not the ankle ones, the low ones—and white socks with a navy stripe, and—“”

“You don’t have to tell me what kind of underwear you’ve got on,” Elizabeth groaned.

Ha!

Elizabeth shows up but doesn’t let the kids see her.

Jessica shook her head. “Maybe I’m dumber than I thought, but I don’t get it. What good is looking like me going to do?”

Man, this book is full of gems.

The twins proceed to freak the kids out by letting them think that Jessica has teleportation powers. For some reason, this makes them improve their behavior. They even clean up the mess they made in the living room.

Meanwhile, Lila, who got stuck managing the water-balloon booth (So who is running Lila’s booth? Where is Julie Porter? This makes no sense!), is vowing to get even with Jessica.

Mr. and Mrs. Sampson come home and are blown away by how well Jessica managed all 4 kids on her own. The kids ask for Jessica to be their permanent babysitter, and Jessica collects her $70, plus a $10 tip.

When both twins are home, Jessica declines to give Elizabeth any credit for what she did, and until Elizabeth calls her out on it, she also tries to avoid giving her any of the money. Jessica really sucks, you guys.

The last chapter is weird and a waste. Elizabeth, Amy, Lila, Ellen, and a few others tell Jessica that they’re having a “mini fair” so she can see what it was like. Then they all throw water balloons at her. Everyone laughs, including Jess.

In the last few pages, Mr. Bowman tells everyone that they are going to spend the next few weeks studying the art, music, literature, etc. of a small country called Santa Dora. Caroline Pearce gossips that the reason why is that they’re getting an exchange student. Jessica is totally uninterested until Caroline mentions that the exchange student is a BOY. Oooh.

And that’s the setup for our next book, Princess Elizabeth.

(Click here for a recap of Sweet Valley Twins #30: Princess Elizabeth)

SVH #40: On the Edge

OK, guys. If you have been reading my recaps for a little while, you know that Sweet Valley Twins is my ultimate fave, but recently, I decided to start reading and recapping some more Sweet Valley High. And wow—it is way more dramatic than I remembered! Someone has been in serious turmoil in every book I’ve picked up. None perhaps moreso than Regina Morrow in today’s selection, On the Edge.

Let’s check out the cover. There’s Regina, gazing at what appears to be an 8 x 10 headshot of Bruce Patman. Bruce totally would have headshots. As a sometimes-model, I’d like to think Regina is silently criticizing Bruce’s attempt at glamour, but alas, she’s simply brokenhearted. She and Bruce have been dating for a long time now. She is credited with changing his dipshit ways! But recently, old Bruce has started to revert to…old Bruce. And he and Regina have been drifting apart.

Love that avocado dresser, by the way. And whatever that pink blob is on top. A phone? I need to know. Tell me your thoughts.

The book opens with Jessica admiring herself in the full-length mirror in the locker room. If you’re already nauseated, sorry—it gets worse. Amy Sutton bursts in and immediately starts bragging about how in love Bruce is with her. How obvious it is. How he’s going to dump Regina for her. How they are basically star-crossed lovers, brought together by fate…or in this case, a health class project. Bruce and Regina have been working on some kind of report about the “underground” drug scene in Sweet Valley. Which…sounds kinda dangerous for a couple of well-to-do white kids?

Jessica is skeptical until Maria Santelli, a sane member of the cheerleading squad, confirms that Bruce does seem to be super into Amy. When she goes home, she tells Elizabeth what Amy is saying. Liz is furious at her ex-bestie. Jessica is just glad that something interesting is going on.

Chapter 2: Amy and Bruce are working on their project at the Patmans’ “sprawling” estate. And Amy is laying it on thick.

“I love this place,” she gushed, putting her hand closer to his on the table. “Bruce, it’s so much fun working together on this project.” She looked meaningfully into his eyes. “Do you think it was fate that we were assigned to work together?”

The secondhand embarrassment I have right now is REAL, guys.

Bruce hilariously is like, um yeah, no, I think it was the seating chart. The pair have plans to meet with Amy’s cousin Mimi on Friday. Mimi is in college and for some reason knows all about the underground drug scene. Amy tells Bruce it’s the only night Mimi can meet up, when in actuality, she had to beg Mimi to meet them on a Friday night so that Bruce would be forced to cancel his plans with Regina.

Dirty.

Then Amy starts telling Bruce about a “dream” she had that they were working on their project and all of a sudden, he started kissing her. Bruce laps it up. He starts talking about how much fun he used to have “sharing the old Bruce magic with more than one girl.”

Barf!

Eventually, they make out a little and Amy pretends to be concerned about Regina’s feelings.

The next day at lunch, Amy brags to Jessica about the makeout sesh. Jessica lets Amy know that she and Liz are planning to have a barbeque on Saturday, and that Bruce, Regina, and Amy will be invited. Amy thinks this is a great idea, since it will force Bruce to see her next to Regina. Amy thinks she’s “lots prettier” than Regina and hilariously Jess is like, “Yeah…I don’t know about that.”

Across the cafeteria, Regina is chatting it up with Justin Belson, a “wrong-side-of-the-tracks” type who randomly approached her to shoot his shot. She’s confused but Justin is nice and they end up eating lunch together, though he declines to attend a basketball game with him. Jessica watches with interest and we learn that Justin hangs out with badseeds like Molly Hecht and Jan Brown, and he isn’t at all the type of person that Regina would normally hang around with.

Chapter 3 leads off with what I am reasonably sure is the one-and-only Tolstoy reference in Sweet Valley history. Jessica tells Elizabeth that having all members of the love triangle at their party will be great because happy couples are boring. To prove her point, she says a famous novel started out that way. Elizabeth corrects her.

“That was happy families, not happy couples. And Tolstoy didn’t say that they were boring, just that they were alike.”

Hot damn. Liz for academic bowl chairwoman.

Elizabeth wants to give Regina a heads up that Amy has been trying to sink her claws into Bruce, but Jessica freaks. If that happens, Amy will know Jessica’s been blabbing to Elizabeth. Lizzie makes no promises, but after discussing the dilemma with interim boyfriend Jeffrey French, decides to stay out of it.

Justin calls Regina’s house to ask her to the movies, but she’s going to the Wakefields’ barbecue. Regina’s older brother Nicholas, who isn’t even in high school, is for some reason aware that Justin Belson hangs out with a bad crowd and is on academic probation. Predictably, Regina is like, he’s perfectly nice, leave me the f alone. Then she calls him out for wearing an ascot on his date with Elizabeth. Just kidding, but god I wish that happened.

Chapter 4 is the beginning of the end: the twins’ barbecue. Things are off to a bad start before Regina and Bruce are even inside, bickering in the car about how he’s being distant and weird. They go in and Regina feels like everyone knows something she doesn’t, everyone is looking at her weird—and of course they do, and they are. Then Amy shows up and everything gets worse. (Bet that’s not the last time I’ll say that!)

But her thoughts were interrupted as she and the others watched Amy turn to look at Bruce, who was standing, absolutely frozen, by the barbecue. Their gazes locked and Amy smiled—a tiny, knowing smile that made Regina’s stomach feel suddenly queasy. It lasted only an instant—Amy standing in a pool of late afternoon sunlight, eyes wide, staring at Bruce and Bruce staring back at her.

Not long after, Bruce and Amy are making out behind a tree (yes, behind a tree…in Elizabeth and Jessica’s backyard) and Elizabeth attempts to distract Regina.

Now, hang on. Elizabeth and Regina are supposed to be friends. If I caught one of my friends’ boyfriends making out with Amy Sutton at a party just a few yards away from my friend, I would tell my friend. Like, absolutely. This isn’t rumors. This isn’t a stupid mistake. This is right in Regina’s face, it’s awful. I DON’T GET YOU, ELIZABETH.

Of course, Regina finds out anyway and she freaks on Bruce and everyone at the party for making her feel like an idiot. She also tells off Elizabeth and demands Bruce’s car keys so she can drive herself home.

She calls Justin and they make plans to meet up the next day. The next morning, she lays in bed and thinks about how Amy isn’t really the problem—if it hadn’t been Amy, it would have been someone else, because BRUCE is the problem and their relationship had problems. Gotta hand it to Regina and ghostie for this take. Didn’t expect it.

Regina and Justin go to Kelly’s, Sweet Valley’s one and only seedy bar. Regina’s never been and Justin laughs, but ultimately he seems more of a down-on-his-luck kid than a bad kid. He tells Regina about his screwed up family life—his dad was murdered in an armed robbery at the liquor store he owned—and we learn about some other Sweet Valley students outside of the golden group Elizabeth and Jessica hang out with: Molly Hecht, Justin’s ex-girlfriend and best friend, and Jan Brown, Molly’s recent friend who is “part of the hardcore drug set.” Justin doesn’t approve of Molly hanging out with Jan. Basically Justin and Molly are both somewhat into drugs, but Justin fears Molly is getting in way too deep hanging out with Jan and her crowd.

Regina concludes that Justin is nice, if troubled, and wants to help him. She vows to be a good friend to him, and thinks they can help each other since they are both lonely.

At school on Monday, Molly barges in on Justin and Regina having lunch. She tells Justin that she’s having a party on Saturday and that “Buzz” might come.

Really, ghostie? Buzz?

Justin warns Molly not to let Buzz show up and Molly’s all like, yah, the thing about BUZZ is that ya never know what’s going to happen! Clearly Molly enjoys Justin worrying about her and that’s why she’s doing this, but that’s not the point. Anyway, Molly disengenuosly invites Regina to the party as well.

Meanwhile, Bruce and Amy are meeting with Amy’s cousin again for more drug information. Just what the fuck is this project, anyway? Mimi is naming drug dealers and shit, this should be info for the freaking police, not two random high school kids. Bruce and Amy could be trying to BUY drugs, under the guise of this school project. Jeez. What are they going to do? Put pictures of Buzz, Jan, Molly, and Justin on one of those three-sided poster boards and write their names with glitter gel pens? I really want to know what the end result of this project is.

Anyway, Mimi tells them that Buzz is the biggest cocaine dealer at her school and that he’s expected to show up at a party at “Margaret Hecht’s” on Saturday. She says if they know anyone who is planning to go they need to warn them against it, as BUZZ can be very persuasive about getting people to try bad things.

Bruce tries to warn Regina, and surprise—it doesn’t go over well.

How dare Bruce call up and act as if he had the right to protect her from getting hurt? He was the one who had hurt her in the first place. She was never going to forgive him for that—never. And she certainly wasn’t going to listen to his ridiculous advice!

On Saturday morning, Elizabeth, clued in by Jessica, also tries to warn Regina against the party. Regina basically hangs up on her. As the day goes on, however, her own doubts about the evening get stronger. She admits to herself that she isn’t sure she really wants to go.

Before she leaves her house, she decides to write a quick letter, which she drops in the mail on her way to meet Justin. WHO IS THE LETTER FOR? READ ON TO FIND OUT.

Regina and Justin stop for a soda at Casey’s place before heading to Molly’s and she confides her fears. He is basically understanding but tells her he doesn’t think she has anything to worry about—for some reason he thinks it’s unlikely BUZZ is going to show up, anyway, and if he does, Regina just has to ignore him. But Justin is definitely going to the party so he can keep an eye on Molly.

Over on Calico Drive, Elizabeth is freaking out about Regina and the party while Jessica is spraying her hair red with some kind of toxic 80s hairspray. The twins and some other people have been invited to Lila’s to watch “rented movies” on her movie-screen-size television.

Liz decides to call Nicholas and tell him about Regina’s plans for the evening. He immediately decides to drop everything, go to Molly’s house and haul Regina home, kicking and screaming. But first, he can’t find his car keys. Or his wallet. He decides to forget about the wallet and takes off. Then he can’t find the street where Elizabeth said Molly lives. So he stops to ask for directions. Then he gets pulled over for speeding. And he’s like, Jesus Christ, you cops are on me about freaking SPEEDING when there is a DANGEROUS DRUG DEALER named BUZZ barely MILES away?! The cops decide Nicholas should come to the police station to tell them all about the danger he thinks his sister is in.

And so, things carry on at Molly’s house. Jan Brown is a total bitch, making fun of Regina for being rich and saying that she hears she doesn’t even drink and all she does and sit around and study. Justin is off dancing with Molly. Wtf Justin? Also, wtf is with these high school parties? Not to brag, but I went to a ton of parties in high school and I don’t ever recall dancing at them—at least not in a, “may I have this dance” sort of way. Were we partying wrong or are these Sweet Valley kids just weird? I know the twins’ parties have dancing but I did not expect such things at Molly’s party. Will she ask BUZZ to dance?

Regina is about to ask Justin how much longer he wants to stay when Molly screams for everyone to SHUT UP because BUZZ has arrived! I have no idea why BUZZ needs silence, but OK. We’re told he’s a “thin, scraggly guy” who yells, “Let’s party!” when he enters the house.

Meanwhile, Nicholas has finally convinced the cops that they are needed at Molly’s house. He tells them she lives on Redwood Drive and one of them says, “Let’s get over to this place on Los Brisos and see what’s going on.” Huh?

Regina decided to drink a few beers even though she doesn’t like the taste (same here, Regina) just so she doesn’t draw more attention to herself. She’s feeling light-headed and wobbly. She walks in on Jan, Molly, and some other people smoking weed and while they’re being rude to her again, Molly’s freshman brother Ty comes in and says BUZZ is bringing THE STUFF and they better come out and get it now. Molly and Jan bolt to the living room.

Regina is trying to leave but Justin tells her he wants to stick around while Buzz is there.

“I don’t want to leave Molly here as long as Buzz is around. I don’t trust him. Cocaine is one thing—I know she can handle that. But he’s been trying to get her to do heroin, and I’m afraid if I leave her, she might give in. I can’t stand to see that happen to her.”

He gets Regina to agree to wait another half an hour and then he’ll take her home.

As Buzz starts cutting lines of coke on the coffee table, Regina asks what’s going on and everyone laughs at her for not knowing. Then she asks what it does to you and everyone sings its praises. Jan tells BUZZ not to waste any coke on Regina because all she’s good for is stealing boyfriends. It’s like the 12^th time she’s said something similar because she’s super bent out of shape about Justin not dating Molly and hanging out with Regina, even though it seems Justin and Molly broke up a long time ago.

A shocked silence fell on the group, and everyone looked at Regina, waiting to see what she would do. Regina felt her cheeks burn. A feeling so strong she couldn’t even name it welled up inside her. Suddenly she was sick of being Miss Goody-Two-Shoes, of sitting quietly and listening to everyone’s comments. For once she felt like doing something completely out of character.

“I’d like to try it,” she said.

BUZZ tells Regina how to snort coke and Justin doesn’t protest at all until it’s suggested that she do another line. Jan PHYSICALLY PUSHES Regina’s head down for the next line. WHAT. THE. FUCK.

Regina’s like, wow, I’m really kinda high, and everyone laughs.

But something was wrong with her chest. Her heart was beating really fast, as if she had been running. She couldn’t really breathe.

“What’s that noise?” she said thickly to Justin and reached out weakly for his arm.

“What noise?” he demanded, still grinning at her.

“Beating,” Regina said. “Like drums.”

“Hey, I think she’s going to be sick,” Molly said, anxious. “Why is her face so pale?”

“Like drums,” Regina repeated.

Justin helps Regina lie on the couch and orders stupid Ty to go get some wet paper towels. He says he wants to call the cops because something is most def wrong with Regina. BUZZ is like, “Are you crazy?!”

But it doesn’t matter because that second, cops burst into the house with Nicholas right behind them.

Regina’s pulse is racing and she’s having trouble breathing. For a few seconds, she’s able to realize Nicholas is there and she tells him to make sure everyone knows it’s nobody’s fault. Then she asks to see Elizabeth and Bruce. Nicholas calls Elizabeth at Lila’s and tells her to get herself and Bruce to the hospital.

There, they learn that Regina had an extremely rare reaction to cocaine: rapid acceleration of the heartbeat, which brought on sudden cardiac failure. She also had a heart murmur since birth that may have contributed.

Well, thank you, ghostie and Regina. I also have had a heart murmur since birth, and because of this book, I never tried cocaine. Mission accomplished.

The door to the emergency room swung open then, and Nicholas burst in, his eyes swollen with tears. “Regina’s dead,” he said brokenly.

Elizabeth would never forget the look on his face as long as she lived.

On Monday, there’s an assembly during which all the students are told the facts about Regina’s death and that the Morrows have explicitly said they want everyone to know that nobody should be blaming anybody for what happened. Of course, they don’t know that Jan Brown shoved Regina’s face into a line of cocaine.

Molly and Justin aren’t in school, and we’re told that everyone stayed away from Jan Brown and her friends. Jan is in school?! What, does she not want to fuck up her perfect attendance record? Does this not seem odd to anyone else?

Tuesday afternoon, Jessica announces that a letter from Regina arrived for Elizabeth—the one she dropped in the mail on her way to Molly’s party, of course. It’s all about how she forgives Elizabeth and she’s sorry for how she’s been acting and that Elizabeth has been a good friend. Can we say CLOSURE?

On Friday, there’s a special assembly to honor Regina. Elizabeth makes a speech and Nicholas reads a poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay. This book is really something.

Molly tries to talk to Justin but he won’t even look at her. Molly is officially a parasite—and there, we have the setup for the next book, which is all about Molly’s social and moral dilemma.

I know there’s a lot to snark on here, but honestly this book did make me sad. Ya got me, ghostie.

SVH #29: Bitter Rivals

As a Sweet Valley Twins enthusiast, Bitter Rivals is definitely one of my all-time favorite Sweet Valley High titles. It’s the book where Elizabeth’s sixth-grade bestie, Amy Sutton, moves back to Sweet Valley and is absolutely nothing like her former self.

Let’s look at the cover. Amy (on the left) and Enid Rollins are both standing behind Liz, glaring at her. They should be glaring at each other, but I guess this is supposed to represent both of them thinking Liz is an idiot for being friends with the other. I’m no big Enid fan, but guys…Amy is terrible. It’s not just that she’s vain, or boy-crazy, or self-involved. I could deal with all of those things (with a fictional character). It’s that she’s a BITCH, you guys.

When we open, Elizabeth, Jessica, and Enid are hanging out by the Wakefield pool. Jessica is pouting because Liz isn’t listening to her—she’s too busy daydreaming about what it will be like when Amy moves back to town. Elizabeth goes on and on about how great Amy is, and Enid can’t help but be nervous—what if she and Amy don’t get along? What will that do to her friendship with Elizabeth, the only thing Enid really has going for her?

Amy’s family is moving into the Bradleys’ old house, just a few blocks from the Wakefields (so I’m guessing it’s another storybook-perfect, tree-lined street). Jessica is still pissed that Helen Bradley moved because now she has to hold auditions for a cheerleader to take her place.

“Remember what happened last time?”

Elizabeth and Enid exchanged glances. They did remember! Who could forget? Jessica was co-captain of the squad, but the last time auditions were held, she took charge of the whole show. Annie Whitman had auditioned, and Jessica hadn’t wanted Annie on the squad, so she had done her best to keep her off. When Annie found out she hadn’t made the squad, she had tried to commit suicide. It has been a terrible mess. Eventually Jessica had to relent, and now Annie was one of the cheerleaders.

“Nothing like that had better happen this time,” Jessica grumbled, putting the suntan oil down and picking up her notebook.

“It had been a terrible mess???” Um. If I recall correctly, Jessica mercilessly bullied Annie for being sexually active. Hey Jess, I think if you just act like a human being, things should go OK this time around.

Rather than remind Jessica of the near results of her psychopathic tendencies, Enid just asks her why she has a notebook by the pool. Jessica and Cara Walker have started a new column for the Oracle called Miss Lovelorn. They give love advice to readers who write in. Why anyone would want advice from Jessica and Cara about anything is a mystery.

Enid reminds Elizabeth about their ski trip in Lake Tahoe. We’re told that they are staying with Enid’s Aunt Nancy, who is only 28 and lots of fun. This is my first time reading this book when I am older than Aunt Nancy, and guys, I’m BITTER.

Elizabeth realizes that if they go on the trip as planned, she won’t be there to welcome Amy back to Sweet Valley. She asks Enid if they can put the trip off for a few weeks. Enid reluctantly agrees, and even more reluctantly suggests that they ask Amy to come along.

The next day at school, Winston Egbert asks Elizabeth if it’s true that the woman of his dreams is moving back to Sweet Valley. I don’t remember Winston crushing on Amy, but let me know if you do!

Lila recalls that Amy was “clumsy and tomboyish” and then changes the subject to her cousin Christopher’s upcoming visit. Li is throwing a party in his honor, and rather creepily talks about him like she’s got posters of his face all over her bedroom walls. She says he’s “quite simply the world’s most fabulous man” and describes him as “six-foot-two, with really wavy, thick, blond hair and the most amazing blue eyes. They just sort of pierce right through you.” Christopher is from Maine, and an avid “yachtsman.” I’m too poor to have even realized that was a thing before now.

That afternoon, Jessica decides to put her Miss Lovelorn column to good use, writing and responding to fake letters to start a fight between the guy she likes, Jay MaGuire, and his girlfriend, Denise Hadley. Cara barely tries to talk her out of it.

Saturday morning: Elizabeth is headed to meet Enid at the beach when Amy calls.

Elizabeth listened for the familiar buzz of long distance. To her surprise, it sounded as though Amy were calling from nearby!

Amy has arrived in Sweet Valley a day early! Yay! Elizabeth races over to greet Amy.

“Amy!” Elizabeth cried.

The two girls threw their arms around each other. For several minutes they were laughing and hugging and talking and making no sense at all. But at last Elizabeth extricated herself from Amy’s exuberant embrace long enough to get a good look at her.

“Good lord, Amy,” she said, shaking her head. “You never told me you got so beautiful!”

When Amy had left Sweet Valley after the sixth grade, she was a skinny kid who needed braces. Now…well, Elizabeth could hardly believe her eyes. Amy was an inch or two taller than Elizabeth, with dark blond hair that fell to her shoulders. Her eyes, a slate gray color, were outlined with gray pencil. Her smile was flawless. She looked, Elizabeth thought with admiration, like a fashion model. She was wearing a cotton miniskirt and a T-shirt, and even in that outfit she would have looked at home in any of the top fashion magazines.

Elizabeth completely forgets about Enid while she and Amy catch up and Amy gathers what she needs to spend the night at the Wakefields’. Eventually, Liz remembers Enid. She starts to fill Amy in on Enid and mentions the ski trip, at which point Amy interrupts to tell Liz about a guy she met on the slopes who basically wanted to die when he found out that Amy was moving. Wish I could fact-check that story.

Elizabeth tries to call Enid but there’s no answer. She pushes her to the back of her mind as the day goes on, and is delighted that Amy and Jessica are getting along famously. She doesn’t seem to put together that the reason why is because Amy is yammering on about boys and clothes, the things Jessica cares about.

The next day, Elizabeth apologizes to Enid and arranges a brunch meeting at the Pancake House so Amy and Enid can meet. Amy wears a “glamourous” black jumpsuit and boots, which Jessica thinks are ahead of fashion. When Elizabeth is like umm we’re just going to the Pancake House, Amy says they could “meet a handsome stranger on the way.” Ohhhkaaay. Heads up, everywhere Amy goes, she finds an attractive guy to gush over.

Amy then proceeds to passive-aggressively shame Enid for ordering pancakes at the Pancake House. She opts for grapefruit because she hates herself if she weighs an ounce over 110 pounds.

Enid has an awful time listening to Amy and Elizabeth reminisce, and quickly (and rightly) figures out that Amy is “vain and silly.” Elizabeth doesn’t notice that Amy and Enid don’t exactly hit it off, and Enid decides she won’t say anything. MUST PROTECT FRIENDSHIP WITH ELIZABETH AT ALL COSTS!

Amy starts school the next week, and quickly becomes one of the most popular students at Sweet Valley High. Liz is thrilled that she’s fitting in so well, but she is slightly bothered by the fact that JESSICA seems to be the one who is mostly showing Amy around and introducing her to people. She worries that Jess is going to waste Amy’s time with trivial things, like the sorority and cheerleading. And Liz is hell-bent on Amy joining the newspaper staff so they can recreate their Sweet Valley Sixers memories. She is much too slow to realize that Amy just isn’t interested in writing anymore. And Amy is much too slow to just freaking say that her interests have changed.

On Wednesday morning, Enid and Liz decide that they are fine with skipping Lila’s party for her cousin Christopher so they can go to Lake Tahoe. Elizabeth promises to get Amy’s final answer so that Enid can go ahead and finalize plans with her aunt. They’re having lunch together that afternoon—or so Elizabeth thinks. Amy blows her off. Liz finally catches up with her at the end of the day. One “winning smile” and Elizabeth is ready to forgive Amy for anything. (That’s literally what we’re told.)

“Enid thinks that next weekend is the best time for her Aunt Nancy. But she wanted me to check with you before confirming the plans.”

“Next weekend?” Amy asked. She shrugged. “Sounds fine to me.”

Elizabeth stared at her. She’d expected Amy to be a little bit more excited. Enid was being characteristically warm and generous, offering to invite a virtual stranger to her aunt’s cabin. And Amy seemed so nonchalant about it all.

“It sounds like fun,” Amy said, giving Elizabeth an impulsive hug. “Honestly, Liz. Don’t look so glum. We’ll have a terrific time.”

Elizabeth felt vastly relieved. “I know we will,” she said happily. “Enid’s been going to so much trouble, Amy. She’s really made lots of plans with her aunt. I just know it’s going to be great.”

“Oh, look!” Amy exclaimed, her eyes lighting up. There’s Jessica and Cara. You don’t mind if run off with them, do you? They promised to take me to cheerleading practice this afternoon.”

Elizabeth stared at her. “Cheerleading practice? But I thought—”

“I adore cheerleading,” Amy told her. “I was on the squad at my old high school. Didn’t you know?”

Elizabeth shook her head. “I wanted to show you the Oracle office,” she said miserably. “Couldn’t we just—”

“Some other time, Amy promised, hurrying down the hall toward Cara and Jessica.

Now, I start to feel kinda bad for Elizabeth. I’m pretty sure this scene wrecked me when I first read it. Elizabeth had such high expectations for her reunion with Amy, and they’re falling short in every way because Amy has changed—but Liz is determined to hang onto Amy for the sake of the friendship they had when they were kids. It’s really quite understandable, and sad.

On Monday morning, Elizabeth tells Jessica that she, Amy, and Enid are skipping Lila’s party to go skiing. Jessica can’t believe it, and then drops a bomb: Amy is trying out for the cheerleading squad that afternoon. Jessica reminds Elizabeth that Amy was a great baton twirler in the sixth grade, so she really shouldn’t be that surprised. In fact, the Boosters were cheerleaders, and Elizabeth defended Amy’s decision in the sixth grade to Jessica and the rest of her snotty friends. Of course, the problem isn’t that Amy is into cheerleading, it’s that she’s become a shallow, vapid version of herself.

Attempting to be a good friend, Elizabeth watches the cheerleading tryouts to show Amy her support. Amy makes it (surprise!) and barely gives Liz a chance to congratulate her afterward. When Elizabeth says she’s meeting Enid at the mall to buy ski gloves and offers to pick up a pair for Amy, Amy stares at her blankly before calling Liz a “doll” and asking her to meet up at the Dairi Burger at 5:00. Elizabeth is aware there is something awkward and wrong about the whole exchange, but she promises herself that she’s going to be as understanding as she can—after all, Amy is still getting settled and adjusting, blah blah blah.

Elizabeth and Enid pick out choose boring and practical navy blue ski gloves for themselves, and Elizabeth gets a pair of bright red ones for Amy—something I for some reason always remembered very well. (I would totally choose the bright red ones for myself.) Done with their shopping, Liz invites Enid to the Dairi Burger. Enid is all about it, until she finds out that Amy will be there. Then she begs off, citing homework.

Would Enid have joined her at the Dairi Burger, Elizabeth wondered, if Amy weren’t going to be there? She had a feeling the answer to that question was yes.

Elizabeth heads to the Dairi Burger on her own, and discovers that Amy has made other plans for them.

No sooner had she arrived at the Dairi Burger than she’d found Amy waiting for her outside, a look of impatience on her pretty face. “Where’ve you been?” she’d complained, jumping right into the car.

Elizabeth had stared at her, astonished. “I was with Enid at the mall. We were getting ski gloves for the trip, remember?”

Amy frowned. “I’ve been waiting for ages. Liz, be a doll and give me a ride home, will you? Johnny’s supposed to call at five-thirty, and if I miss him I’ll just die!”

Elizabeth bit her lip. “I thought I was meeting you here so we could get a soda—not so I could drive you home.”

Amy smiled at her prettily. “I know that, Liz! Honestly, do you think I’m a total monster?”

Elizabeth just stared at her, then reluctantly turned the key in the ignition.

Lots of staring going on in this book. I guess that’s what happens when you’re repeatedly faced with a person who is living in an alternate reality where they are the only one who matters.

The girls go back to Amy’s house and while Amy is on the phone, Elizabeth moseys around her bedroom, thinking about how different it is from her bedroom when they were 12. There are no sports trophies or anything to show that Amy had an interest in anything but boys.

Then Elizabeth gives Amy the ski gloves and starts talking about the weekend. Amy freaks because she didn’t realize that going skiing meant missing Lila’s party.

Distraught, Elizabeth goes home and confides the problem in Jessica, who is like, well duh, disappoint Enid, not Amy.

Elizabeth takes the advice, and Enid reluctantly agrees to cancel on her aunt again.

Then there’s a whole scene where Jessica manipulates Jay McGuire into taking her on a date. I’m really not interested in this B-plot.

On Wednesday, Amy blows off another lunch date with Elizabeth, and our girl shows a bit of backbone, saying her time counts, too. Of course, Amy just practically cries and gets Liz to forgive her in two seconds.

Then Amy says she’s in love with Lila’s cousin Christopher, whom she has never met.

“Honestly, Liz! You don’t have to actually talk to someone to know it’s true love, do you?”

Elizabeth didn’t answer. She didn’t get a chance.

“Besides, Amy went on, “Lila really wants us to get together. She told me so herself. She thinks we’ll make a terrific couple. And with her help…”

“I hope it works out,” Elizabeth said sincerely, thinking privately that the last person she’d ever want involved with her love life would be Lila Fowler. “Anyway, it should make Saturday night more suspenseful for you, if nothing else!”

“Saturday night,” Amy said dreamily, “is going to be the happiest night of my entire life!”

On Friday night, Jessica goes on her date with Jay and eventually gets him to commit to going to Lila’s party with her, even though he’s pretty obviously not into Jess at all and still very much wants to be with Denise.

Meanwhile, Elizabeth is waiting at home for Amy, who said she would be over at 8. We’re told that the night before, Amy called and the two of them had the best talk since she’d been back, and Elizabeth was completely won over and feeling like their friendship was back on track. When Amy asked Elizabeth to go to the movies on Friday, Elizabeth “had been delighted to say yes.”

But now, Amy was nowhere to be seen. Elizabeth finally has a long think on the whole situation and realizes that Amy just can’t be depended on. She also realizes that she’s been a shitty friend to Enid because Amy was a shitty friend to her. She calls Enid’s house, but Enid’s gone out with some other people. So there, Elizabeth!

Finally, Amy shows up with a long story about how first she had to do this, then that, then this happened, etc.

“If your mother is having a dinner party over at your house tonight, how come no one answered when I called about an hour ago?” she asked pointedly.

Amy looked startled. “They must’ve all been outside,” she said. “That’s where they’re eating—out on the patio. And you can’t hear the phone when the door’s closed.”

Elizabeth didn’t know whether to believe Amy or not. Suddenly she realized that she desperately wanted to believe her. She didn’t want to lose Amy’s friendship. They had meant so much to each other when they were growing up. To lose Amy now would mean cutting out a part of her life that had meant a great deal to her.

Saturday night, party night: the party is a costume ball, and Elizabeth decides to go as a skier to send a message to Enid that she’s thinking about their weekend. The pair are supposed to drive to the party together, but then AMY needs a ride, too. Enid backs off again, and Elizabeth’s uneasy feeling intensifies.

Enid ends up dressing as a skier also, while Amy is a ballerina. If only Madame Andre could see her now!

Just as Lila is about to introduce her cousin Christopher to Amy, he interrupts her, saying he’s got to say hello to someone else first. Then he crosses the room to approach…ENID!

Turns out the two were at some camp together in Maine two years ago. They begin talking excitedly and are obviously hitting it off. Amy and Lila are furious.

Soon, Jessica is furious too—Jay ditches her once he spots Denise with another guy. Not even her slutty Cleopatra costume was enough to convince him to stick it out.

Amy makes a few plays for Christopher, but he’s clearly only interested in Enid. Eventually, Christopher heads over to the dessert table, and Amy pounces on Enid.

“Enid Rollins,” she aid, her eyes flashing fire, “didn’t I tell you before to just get lost? Don’t you know you make me sick?” She looked so angry Enid felt almost afraid. “I told you this last week: you can’t steal people from me! I won’t let you steal Liz, and I’m not going to let you steal Chris, either! He’s mine,” she said savagely, leaning closer. “He’s mine, Enid. Now just stay away from him!”

Gotta hand it to Enid, she handles the little psycho quite well, keeping her composure and standing her ground.

At the end of the party, Amy tells Elizabeth that Christopher is going to drive her home—but Elizabeth already knows that he offered to drive Enid home so they could be aloooneeee. Amy smiles and says she simply told Chris that there wasn’t enough room for her in Elizabeth’s car and that if he didn’t drive her home, she’d have to walk.

Suddenly Elizabeth was angry. “That wasn’t fair, Amy. You lied. Chris really likes Enid, and you’re just—”

Amy put her hands over her ears. “I’ve had it,” she fumed. “Do you realize all I’ve heard since the day I moved back is how terrific you think Enid is? Don’t you realize”—her eyes flashed—“that I don’t care? I think she’s a total bore! And I’m sick and tired of having you try to shove her down my throat!”

Finally! Amy reveals her true evil self.

Unfortunately, by this point, Enid is mad at Liz, too—for some reason she thinks she went along with Amy’s plan to have Chris drive her home. It makes absolutely no sense to me why Enid would think this, but OK. I guess sometimes you just need a plot device.

The next day, Elizabeth calls Enid to straighten things out but she doesn’t feel like hearing it. Then she calls Amy, and Amy’s mom tells her she went to the beach with Lila and Jessica. Wtf Jessica?

Liz then has a great talk with Alice. Really, it’s one of Alice’s shining parenting moments. She gently points out that Amy sounds very manipulative, and says Enid was able to size her up fast because she wasn’t carrying around the same emotional baggage about Amy that Elizabeth had. And that she stayed quiet so as not to hurt Liz’s feelings.

She heads to Enid’s house and Elizabeth finally admits to her that Amy has changed. They patch things up and Enid STILL suggests inviting Amy to go skiing if Elizabeth wants to. Enid’s got a date with Christopher so I guess she figures if Amy comes she can rub that in her face?

Amy declines the invitation (after asking if just she and Elizabeth can go skiing without Enid, even though it’s Enid’s aunt who has the cabin). Then, Elizabeth and Amy basically end their friendship amicably.

Amy bit her lip. “Are you mad at me?” she asked.

Suddenly Elizabeth felt sorry for Amy. “No,” she said truthfully. “I’m not mad at you.”

And she really wasn’t, she realized as she walked away. Disappointed, yes. And a little hurt, too. Elizabeth had cherished memories of Amy from the sixth grade, and it pained her to admit that her friend had grown up and grown away from her.

No, Elizabeth wasn’t mad at Amy. But she couldn’t pretend to respect or admire her anymore, either.

So that’s that. In the last couple of pages, we find out Jay and Denise are back together (they both wrote into Miss Lovelorn and Elizabeth printed both letters when neither Jessica or Cara picked up their column) and they give us a convo between Jeannie West and Sandra Bacon, setting up the next book, Jealous Lies.

Was anyone else heartbroken about the end of Elizabeth and Amy’s friendship? And confused about how Amy could be such a terrible bitch and still popular at school?

SVH #20: Crash Landing!

Spoiler alert: the cover makes this one look way more exciting than it is. Let’s take a look.

Elizabeth is clutching an unconscious Enid, as if the two of them have narrowly escaped an exploding plane (check out the way Liz is staring out into the distance with fear!)

There is a crash landing in Crash Landing! But Elizabeth isn’t involved. Enid is (so of course it’s kind of a boring crash), as well as her newly-licensed pilot boyfriend, George Warren.

When we open, George and Enid are taking a celebratory flight above Secca Lake. A bunch of classmates from Sweet Valley High are down below, having a picnic. While Enid is oohing and aahing at the scenery, George is thinking about when he can break up with her.

Poor Enid, he thought sadly. She has no idea how I feel. If only there were some way I could have kept myself from falling in love with Robin.

Robin is Robin Wilson—former fat girl, now Sweet Valley High cheerleader. The ultimate turnaround. Robin and George ended up in the same flight class and fell in loooove. The only problem? They were both with other people when it happened. Robin has broken up with Allen Waters but George has yet to break the bad news to Enid.

Soon, however, George has bigger problems. The plane engine stops working. He calls Air Traffic Control and they’re like, yeahhh sorry all you can do is land in the lake. So George and Enid brace themselves for the crash, with Enid screaming, “George, I’m so frightened!” the whole time. I know I shouldn’t feel like this, but really, it was quite irritating.

George is knocked out when they land and Enid somehow saves his life—and in the process, she injures her spine and loses all the feeling in her legs. The pair are rescued from the lake. It’s quite a dramatic scene, and Robin Wilson, who was standing at the water’s edge when the plane crashed, passes out, prompting some of her classmates to be like, hmm, that’s weird.

Meanwhile, Elizabeth is at the Sweet Valley police station with the rest of her fam, helping Jessica fill out a report about her latest boyfriend, Jack Howard. (He threatened her life.) This is all relayed to us readers in a very matter-of-fact way, it’s comical. She hears the call about the crash come in on a radio and loses her mind. After hearing that Enid and George are both alive, the Wakefields race to the hospital.

George is fine. Enid is paralyzed from the waist down and the doctor doesn’t know yet if she will be able to walk again. First, they have to operate. And they can’t operate yet.

George sneaks into Enid’s room so he can have a pity-me monologue while she lies there knocked out from pain meds. He yammers on about how it’s his fault she’s in this position (which of course it is) and that he will never leave her while she’s paralyzed, never hurt her with the truth: that he’s in love with Robin.

Elizabeth knows all about George and Robin, so she’s quite a nasty bitch to George for a good portion of this book. It’s pretty great.

OK, B-plot time: Jessica and Lila have signed up for a gourmet cooking class. This honestly could have been a lot better if they had focused on the girls’ friendship but instead they have Jessica fall in love with the teacher.

In his early twenties, Jean-Pierre was well over six feet tall, his broad shoulders tapering down to a slender waist. He had jet back hair worn a bit longer than that of most of the guys Jessica knew at school, and chiseled features that looked like those of the statues she’d seen in slides in her art class. And his eyes—Jessica had never seen such intense blue eyes before.

Then we get this:

The Eiffel Tower was one thing. But what Jessica really had on her mind was the dance coming up in a few weeks. Jessica had been racking her brains, trying to think of someone interesting to go with, and now this gorgeous creature had just fallen in her lap.

LOL. Yes, yes. The Eiffel Tower has nothing on the Sweet Valley High gymnasium.

After class, Jessica and Lila get into Lila’s fabulous lime green Triumph and head to Robin’s house because Jessica needs to let her know that there’s been a change in the time of their cheerleading practice. Oh, to once again live in a world without text messaging and cell phones!

On their way, they gossip about how Robin broke up with Allen for “some other guy.” When they arrive, they see George and his light-blue GTO at Robin’s house.

“You don’t think George Warren is the reason Robin and Allen broke up, do you?” Lila pressed her.

Interestingly, Jessica initially tries to keep Lila from seeing George’s car because she suspects this very thing—especially after seeing Robin pass out at Secca Lake. It’s a rare human moment for our Jess.

It turns out that George never actually saw Robin at her house—he decided against it, and then called her to tell her they can’t see each other. Still, the damage was done.

Jessica tells Elizabeth what she saw, so Liz has even more reason to hate George. She also tells her friends and fellow cheerleaders, and they all decide to wage a cold war on Robin. God I don’t miss high school. Or middle school, really. I feel like this was more of a middle school thing. God, Jessica and her friends are so immature.

A few days later, Elizabeth and George are at the hospital again while Enid is having her operation. Finally the doctor comes out and says Enid is going to be fine but it may take her awhile to be fully functional again. When Mrs. Rollins goes in to see her, Lizzie is left alone with George and he tries like hell to make her not hate him. He says he isn’t leaving Enid for Robin now, that Enid will never know the truth, that Elizabeth can’t tell her anything, etc.

“Don’t you see,” he pointed out, “how hard it would be on Enid if she thought things weren’t perfect? After everything she’s been through—”

Elizabeth spun on George, her eyes blazing with anger. “I don’t think I need you to tell me how to treat my best friend. I’d never say a word to her about you and Robin. That’s your business. But that doesn’t mean I have to pretend that everything’s fine when I’m talking to you, does it? When I think about how much Enid loves you, how trusting she is—and how she almost killed herself trying to save you—”

Elizabeth couldn’t help herself. Tears were streaming down her face.

“Stop it!” George cried. “Liz, don’t you think I’ve thought about all that? And Enid isn’t the only one I’ve hurt,” he added bitterly. “I hurt Robin, too. And because of me Robin hurt Allen. Don’t you think I realize what I’ve done?”

Yikes! Straight off the set of General Hospital, these two are.

Chapter Six opens with Robin lamenting her troubles in the student lounge. She’s gained back 10 pounds since the whole ordeal began. She thinks:

It took too long to get myself thin. I’m not going to let my figure go because my whole life is falling apart.

Well, at least she has her priorities straight.

She manages to coax Liz into meeting her at Casey’s Place after school to try and get to the bottom of why everyone is treating her like she has Covid after refusing to get vaccinated.

Elizabeth just says she feels awkward around Robin because of her relationship with George, and then begs off, citing plans with Todd. Robin miserably eats her feelings (in the form of a sundae).

Small aside: that evening during dinner at Casa Wakefield, the twins are officially given the Fiat. Little bit of SVH Trivia there for ya.

Then Elizabeth asks her parents if it’s OK if she has a “dinner party” at the house on Friday night. LOL what? For some reason, Ned and Alice don’t bother reminding their daughter that she’s only 16 years old.

My book has a typo in it—see below. I am not sure if I am the nerd who underlined it in pencil or if it was the person before me. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was me.

Friday/Firday night arrives and Elizabeth is all set for her dinner party. The guest list: Todd, Enid, and George.

She had done everything she could to insure (yeah that’s another error in the book, should be ensure) the night would be a success. She’d dimmed the lights in the Wakefield dining room, setting candles on the table to make the room look more festive. And she’d used one of her mother’s tried-and-true recipes for the spaghetti sauce. Todd had put some classical music on in the living room, and the total effect was charming.

What a bunch of dorks.

Over dinner, Enid (who is in a wheelchair) makes everyone uncomfortable talking about how wonderful George is. She also admits that she hasn’t exactly been keeping up with her physical therapy.

George bails early (who can blame him) and Enid is completely crestfallen. Literally 30 seconds after George leaves with an understanding that Elizabeth and Todd will take Enid home, Enid’s like, actually I’m ready to go, take me home now.

Elizabeth leaves a mess of dirty dishes in the kitchen so they can bring Enid home right that second, thinking to herself that Ned and Alice will understand if they come home to a disaster kitchen.

And where has Jessica spent the evening, you ask? Well, first she went to Cara’s, and then she went to the library to check out some cookbooks. Her parents’ wedding anniversary is coming up and she has decided to surprise them with a romantic gourmet meal and she’s planning the menu. It’s actually very sweet, even though her primary reason or the gesture is that she wants to—for once—outshine Elizabeth, the queen of thoughtful anniversary gifts. Jess is sure that with everything going on with Enid, Liz has totally forgotten their parents’ anniversary. This is her year, she’s sure of it!

Jessica’s dreaming of chicken cordon bleu and veal picatta when Ned and Alice start yelling at her about the dirty dishes. They barely listen when she says she’s not the one who left the mess, and when they do remember about Elizabeth’s dinner, they’re like, “Oh, well. I’m sure there’s a logical explanation.”

This pisses Jessica off even more. I’m on her side with this one.

Sunday afternoon: Enid is sitting around reading magazine articles like “How to Tell if He Doesn’t Love You Anymore.” She knows George has been acting weird and it’s freaking her out. When he finally shows up at her house, she asks him if he’s mad at her, which of course makes him feel like an even bigger piece of shit. Then she tells him he’s her whole world and she doesn’t know what would happen to her if he left her.

No pressure.

Enid resolves to do whatever she can to make sure George doesn’t peace out.

Cut to cooking class—Jessica has decided to stay after to ask Jean-Pierre to the dance. Hahahaha. At least Lila is like, “Don’t you think he’s a little old for a high school dance?” It must be nice to live in such a dream world.

The dream doesn’t last, however—Jean Pierre’s wife shows up at the end of class. Her name is Lizbette and she basically greets him like they’re on The Bachelor, jumping into his arms and wrapping her legs around him.

Unfortunately for us, this display happens before Jessica has a chance to embarrass herself by inviting Jean-Pierre to the dance. She attends with Ken Matthews instead, “undeniably one of the cutest and most popular guys at school. Ken was captain of the football team, and even if he wasn’t as sexy and mysterious as Jean-Pierre, he was a good dancer and a lot of fun at parties.”

Well, what more can a girl ask for?

Enid, George, Elizabeth, and Todd arrive at the dance and everyone stares at them. Robin and George are staring at each other with tortured expressions all night. Finally, George can’t help himself any longer—he dances a slow dance with Robin when the lights dim in the gym. Enid freaks and demands to know if George is in love with Robin. He doesn’t even have to answer.

Strangely, the blowup is all told from Elizabeth’s POV, as she tells Todd the story. No idea why the ghostwriter wouldn’t want to flesh out that scene! It’s basically what the entire book has building up to. Wtf?

The next day, Elizabeth goes to check on Enid and Enid basically tells her she’s going to pretend the other night never happened. She’s going to pretend George isn’t in love with Robin. And if the only way she can hang onto George is to never walk again, then so be it. OK, she doesn’t actually say this, but it’s heavily implied. Enid’s got a major mental block on walking, all because she’s afraid that if she’s alright, George will feel free to do what he pleases.

Elizabeth kind of feels sick. And later, she feels even more sick—Jessica made the family a cold seafood pasta for dinner that evening and included bad mussels. Liz, Ned, and Alice all puke. (Jessica was so busy she didn’t eat, so she was spared her own cooking.) So much for her practice run for the anniversary dinner!

A few days later, the Wakefields are eating out and mercilessly teasing Jessica about her poisionus dinner. Jessica sulks and quietly hates them, but still plans to make her parents an anniversary meal. Oh wait, Elizabeth ruins that too. She chooses that moment to surprise Ned and Alice with tickets to a dinner theater on their anniversary night—the same night Jessica was planning to cook for them. When she tells them this, they’re like, “Um, thanks but no thanks.” Jessica feels like crap and I don’t blame her. She really was trying to do something nice for once.

While Elizabeth is on a roll, she makes up with Robin and finds out that although George went to her house that one day, he didn’t see her. I don’t know why this was such a point of contention. It was pretty obvious in the days that followed that although he was there, they weren’t making out or anything.

Then Liz devises a plan to get Enid to realize she can in fact walk. She enlists the help of Mr. Collins’ son, Teddy. Teddy is 6 and a strong swimmer. She invites Enid over and then pretends like she was babysitting Teddy. She goes in the house to get drinks and Teddy pretends to fall in the pool and that he can’t swim. Enid screams for Elizabeth, but decides she can’t hear her. She heroically leaps out of her wheelchair and saves Teddy.

I mean. I guess this could happen? I get that Enid can walk but she hasn’t gotten out of the wheelchair in weeks, wouldn’t she have some severe muscle atrophy?

In the last chapter, Enid finally lets George go in a healthy way. And George finds out that it wasn’t his fault that the engine stalled. And Jessica keeps finding more reasons to hate her family, teasing the next book, Runaway.

God I can’t do another Enid-centric book for a long time. That was brutal.

SVT #18: Center of Attention

(Click here for a recap of Sweet Valley Twins #17: Boys Against Girls)

I think of this book as the one in which Jessica’s narcissistic tendencies really shine for the first time. Let’s check out the cover.

There’s the 3 Wakefield kids—in a decidedly NOT Spanish-style kitchen, by the way. Jessica’s on the left, shaking her finger at Elizabeth and Steven, who look like they have had enough of her shit. Side note: I think Elizabeth is wearing a Guess Jeans T-shirt. Also, this marks Steven’s first Sweet Valley Twins cover appearance. It’s hard to tell if he’s as cute as we’re constantly told he is because he’s all like, “Grrr, stop being the bad twin!”

In the first scene of the book, Jessica is all pumped up about a sweater she saw at the mall. She’s so excited about it that she tries to tell Steven ALL about it. And he’s like, who gives a crap? She then goes to try and tell her mom about the sweater. Alice is busy with Elizabeth, who is yammering on about her dream to write a horse book like Black Beauty. Jessica is like, “I SAW A BEAUTIFUL SWEATER OMGAHHH”

“It’s pale, pale violet,” Jessica said, “with a white unicorn embroidered across the front.”

Alice is like, sounds great, I’m tired though, byeeee.

Jess pouts because she didn’t get any attention and it doesn’t look like she’s going to get the sweater, either. In an effort to suck up to her mom for sweater money, she decides to make a chocolate parfait for that night’s dessert. I feel like the Wakefields always have dessert. Did anyone else normally have dessert after dinner growing up? I never did. Was I poor? Was I being body-shamed? What gives?

At dinner, Ned announces that he’s going to New York City on a business trip—he’s trying to settle a dispute between 2 candy companies. Alice is supposed to tag along and the kids’ Great Aunt Shirley is supposed to come look after them. Alice starts hinting that she’s too tired to traipse off to New York and taste-test candy bars. Then she announces that she’s going upstairs to lie down, and she politely declines Jessica’s parfait.

The next morning, the twins almost get run over by Dennis Cookman, who has just stolen a bike. Nice going, ghostie! Already setting the stage for the next book, and it’s only chapter 2!

At lunch that afternoon, the Unicorns talk about the upcoming auditions for the school’s production of Carnival and president Janet Howell says a Unicorn should get the lead. They all decide that Jessica should audition for the part, and Jess is delighted. The only problem is that she has to go up against Dana Larson, the best singer in the school. There’s a lot at stake, though—Bruce Patman is auditioning for the male lead! Jessica vows to do whatever it takes to get the starring role. (Side note: Lila brags about having watched Carnival on her “projection TV.” Which I think is just a projector? I’m not sure.)

After school, Jess heads to ballet class and Alice is too tired to pick her up so she arranges for her to catch a ride with Kerry Glenn. Kerry’s mom just had a baby and before she found out she was pregnant, she was tired all the time—just like Alice. Jess freaks, thinking her mom could have a baby that screams the way Kerry’s little brother does the entire way home. Thankfully, that plotline is put to rest within pages. Alice is not pregnant. She probably had her tubes tied after Jessica.

With the expense of a fourth college education out of the way, Jess tries again for the unicorn sweater, which costs $40. Alice tells her if she can save half, she will give her the rest. BUT IT’S THE ONLY SWEATER IN THE WHOLE STORE. Gotta say, I think Alice is being a bit unreasonable here. It DOES sound like a special sweater for Jessica. Can’t she just buy it and then give it to her after she saves half? At least then Jess won’t be scared about it being sold.

At dinner that night, the kids find out that Alice isn’t going to New York City because she doesn’t feel up to it. That means Aunt Sally isn’t coming. Yup, Aunt Sally. And before it was Great Aunt Shirley. Nice job, team.

When the phone rings the next day after school, Jessica picks up. It’s her mother’s doctor’s office—they have the results of her blood test. Jessica didn’t even know her mom had had blood work done, and she’s 12, so she’s understandably nervous now. What she hears on the phone while eavesdropping doesn’t make her feel any better, either: her mom’s white blood cell count is low and there is a lump on her neck that needs to be biopsied. There’s a slight chance it might be cancerous. Jessica instantly becomes convinced that her mom is dying. It’s hard not to feel bad for her, but don’t worry, that feeling will soon go away.

For the next chapter or so, Jessica is consumed by terrible thoughts. When Caroline Pearce calls to talk to Elizabeth about something with the Sixers, Jess snaps at her and Caroline’s all like, hey, what’s up your butt? Then Jessica blurts out that their mom is sick and they don’t know what’s wrong with her, etc.

Obviously since Caroline is a gossip and an exaggerator, the next thing you know…the whole school thinks Mrs. Wakefield is dying. Everyone feels terrible for the twins. Elizabeth sets Caroline straight, but it’s too late. Jessica doesn’t really argue with anyone who expresses their condolences. Is that because she’s THAT convinced her mom is dying or because she likes the attention? You decide.

Jessica DOES express to her mom that she’s not sure if she still wants to try out for Carnival. It will be a lot of rehearsals and she wants to be around in case Alice needs her. It’s actually very sweet. Alice tells Jess that she’s being silly, and besides, she would love to see her on stage. Jessica decides to audition—and also convinces herself that Alice’s dying wish is to see her star in the play.

The next morning before school, Jessica met her friends at the fountain. “I’ve decided to go to the Carnival auditions tomorrow,” she told them. “My mother wants me to try out, and I don’t want to let her down. It would mean so much to her to see me up on that stage before…” Her voice trailed off.

“Oh, Jess, you’re so brave!” Lila breathed, squeezing Jessica’s hand.

“I know you’ll get the part,” Janet said. “You just have to!”

“After all you’ve been through, you deserve it,” Tamara added.

Jessica shrugged modestly. But inside, she couldn’t help feeling Tamara was right. Since her mother had become sick, Jessica’s life had been just awful. Winning the lead in the musical wouldn’t make up for all the sadness, but it might cheer her up just a little bit. Besides, she thought, it would mean so much to Mom.

By lunch time, the whole school had heard that Jessica was auditioning for the musical to please her dying mother.

I mean…guys. This is crazy. Jessica is crazy.

The next day is Friday. Audition day and the day they find out what’s wrong with Alice. This chapter opens up with Elizabeth perched on her “thinking seat” in the yard, thinking about how she doesn’t want her mom to die. I guess this scene was thrown in there to add legitimacy to Jessica’s craziness.

Ms. Wyler springs a pop quiz in math class that morning, and Jessica can’t concentrate. She cries and is excused. She goes and sits in the bathroom and studies her Carnival script. Ms. Wyler tells Elizabeth she can be excused also, but Liz holds it together and says she’d rather take the quiz.

The twins call their mom at lunch, but the results of her biopsy still aren’t in.

Jessica bursts into tears in science and English class as well, and is excused both times.

When school is over, the twins race to the pay phone to call their mom again. GREAT NEWS: it’s just a virus! And not the coronavirus! Alice is going to be fine!

Jessica heads to the auditions. Winston asks her how her mom is doing. Now I must note that Jess DOES try to tell Winston the good news. But then Dana Larson interrupts them to tell Jessica she’s decided not to audition for the musical because she wants Jessica to have the lead role. She thinks Jessica needs it more than she does. Ms. McDonald, the music teacher, supports this decision. Jessica doesn’t even have to audition. She’s granted the lead, and everyone applauds.

It only took Jessica a moment to make up her mind. “Thank you, Dana,” she said slowly. “I really appreciate what you’re doing for me. I just hope I can return the favor someday.”

YIKES.

When Jess gets home from school, her dad is back, with a briefcase of free candy bars in tow. And yet he still goes out to the grocery store to buy cake and ice cream for dessert. What is it with this family?

Saturday morning, Ned, Steven, and Elizabeth go swimming. They’re horsing around loudly when Dana, Sandra Ferris, and Brooke Dennis show up to see how Jessica is doing. Jess is panicked thinking about how her family is hardly behaving as if Alice is dying.

She finally decides to call off the whole charade—and also, she’s kind of forced to, when Elizabeth bursts through the door to the den, dripping wet and laughing about Steven putting a fake ice cube with a bug in it in their dad’s lemonade.

“Now that my mother is going to be all right,” she announced, “I want you to audition for the lead in the musical.”

“What?” Dana asked in amazement. “You mean your mother isn’t dying?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you ever since you walked in here,” Jessica lied.

She also leaves out how she found out the news before the auditions. The only person who knows about Jessica’s psychopathic lie is Elizabeth, and all she does is make Jessica do all the chores she assigned to herself and Steven the previous week.

Jessica comes out on top, as always. Her parents think she’s amazing for helping out around the house so much. Ms. McDonald gives her another part in the musical that has a solo dance number. And she gets the Unicorn sweater and all of her friends are jealous.

My mom consistently side-eyes the way I clean my house. I can’t dance. And none of my friends are jealous of my wardrobe. I’m going to bed.

(Click here for a recap of Sweet Valley Twins #19: The Bully)

SVT #47: Jessica’s New Look

This is kind of an obligatory subject to tackle, isn’t it? GLASSES. DO THEY EQUAL NERD OR NOT? I’d like to start by saying that the title for the preview excerpt in this book is “Four Eyes and No Friends?”

LOL. WHAT THE HECK, GHOSTIE? Let’s check out the cover. We have Elizabeth doing one of her best-ever shoulder pats and wearing what looks like a rather tight skirt by Elizabeth Wakefield standards. Jessica is scowling because she’s been told she has to wear glasses (for a couple of months, aka, until the end of this book) and she’s convinced that this is going to ruin her status at Sweet Valley Middle School. Most kids would probably just be afraid of getting teased, but for Jess, her REPUTATION is at stake.

OK let’s get on with it, shall we? When we open, the twins are in the lunch line. Jessica has cut in front of a bunch of people so she can piggy-back on Elizabeth’s order but nobody cares because she throws them a “dazzling smile.” Barf. Elizabeth is getting Brussels sprouts, which is just ridiculous. Elizabeth is a 12-year-old in 1991. No 12-year-old in 1991 knew that Brussels sprouts are in fact delicious. I’m also willing to bet that middle school cafeteria Brussels sprouts are QUITE subpar, even today. Jessica wants a huge piece of chocolate cake. This is how they show us that the twins are different.

When they exit the lunch line, Jessica squeals excitedly. There are BOYS at the Unicorner. CUTE, POPULAR BOYS: Bruce Patman, Jake Hamilton, and Aaron Dallas. Jessica decides to leave her cake with Elizabeth because god forbid she EAT in front of the BOYS. Then when Lila asks her where her cake is, Jessica says:

“Cake? What cake? You know I don’t eat cake. Cake makes you fat.”

Yikes. Food-shaming aside, the awkward exchanges between the Unicorns and the boys are pretty delightful. We’re told that Kimberly Haver laughs too loudly at something and that when she “flutters” her eyelashes, Jessica asks if she has something in her eye.

Serious question: has anyone ever successfully “fluttered” or “batted” their eyelashes? I feel like this must be just an expression. Doesn’t it just look like you’re blinking rapidly? That’s no good.

Finally, Jessica brings up basketball and the conversation gets easier—at least between her and the boys. None of the other Unicorns know anything about basketball. (Except Belinda Layton but she’s not talking. Maybe she’s doing something wild, like eating.) They gab about the Laker game the night before.

Lila tossed her light-brown hair over her shoulder. “The Lakers are an incredible baseball team,” she agreed, still focusing her attention on Bruce.

BAHAHA.

Jessica goes on to impress the boys with her actual knowledge of the game and then Aaron invites her to come to a Lakers game with him (and his parents).

As you might imagine, this is the most exciting thing to happen to Jessica in her 12 years. For some reason everyone agrees this is a REAL DATE. Again, I’d like to bring up the fact that Aaron’s parents are going. Wouldn’t a real date be more like if Aaron and Jessica went to the movies and then Casey’s Place by themselves?

At dinner that night, both twins have exciting news—Jessica’s is of course her “date,” which Ned and Alice agree to because Aaron’s parents will be there. Elizabeth’s is that she has been selected as the school’s “Junior Journalist” which means she’ll get to write an article for the Sweet Valley Tribune. It means her first real published story in a real newspaper with a real byline and it is a really big deal. I’m not kidding, it is. I would have been fucking ecstatic. I didn’t get my first real byline in a real newspaper until I was in college and an editor from a local paper came to talk to my media writing class and I chased her down the hall afterward. We writers can be scrappy.

Steven is jealous because Jessica gets to go to the basketball game. I have to mention that in Sweet Valley Confidential, Steven and Aaron Dallas are dating. I’d say this was all just a ruse to get to Steven but I like to pretend Sweet Valley Confidential never happened. (Not because of Steven and Aaron, but just because it was a Dumpster fire.)

The next day at school, Jessica fancies herself a celebrity because she has a date. She can’t stop thinking about Aaron. She’s rudely awakened from her daydreaming when Ms. Wyler calls on her to solve a math problem written the board. Jessica adds the numbers instead of subtracting them because she did not see the minus sign. Dun dun dunnnn.

After class, Mandy Miller (who is not yet a Unicorn in this book—I believe she had to get cancer and nearly die in order for them to let her into the club) approaches Jessica and happily listens to Jess carry on about how Aaron asked her out.

That afternoon at lunch, Janet Howell says they’ve all got to think of something they can do to ensure that they are the focus of Elizabeth’s article. The topic is “Students Who Make a Difference” and since I’m assuming the Tribune wants to see an article about kids making a POSITIVE difference, the Unicorns don’t really qualify. They finally decide to raise money for something. Ideas include new uniforms for the Boosters and a TV for the lunchroom so they can watch their soap operas. Then they’re like hey, the thing we raise money for should probs benefit everyone, not just us. The next idea is curling irons for the girls’ locker room. They’re pretty hot on that until they remember that boys go to their school, too. They finally decide on raising money for a new encyclopedia set. You guys remember encyclopedias, right?

Moving on. After English class, Mr. Bowman tells Jessica he’s noticed her squinting a lot and says he thinks she needs to get her eyes checked. And she’s like, “YOU think I need to get my eyes checked?! You’re wearing a striped shirt with a polka-dot tie!” JK. He gives her a note for her parents.

Jess is scared because she knows she’s been having headaches and trouble seeing things far away lately, but she’s obviously determined to NOT wear glasses and she thinks she can hide Mr. Bowman’s concern from her parents. She does, however, tell Elizabeth.

“I do not need glasses, Elizabeth. And even if I did, I would never wear them. I’d be the laughingstock of the whole school. The Unicorns would take away my membership. I’d have to hang around with Lois Waller and Randy Mason. It would mean permanent nerdhood!”

I have to admit, I think “nerdhood” is a pretty funny word.

That afternoon, the twins go for a bike ride and Jessica asks if they can ride by Aaron’s house. When they do, a giant piece of white paper floats in front of her bike—only Jess doesn’t realize it’s not a piece of paper, it’s actually a frigging CAT, until the last second.

Jessica squeezed her brakes, and her front wheel swerved. The bike went spinning out of control and slammed into the curb. The bike stopped there but Jessica kept going. In a flash of panic, she realized she was flying through the air!

Where does she land? Aaron’s yard, of course. Way to play hard to get, Jessica. It’s all worth it though because Aaron touches her shoulder when inquiring if she’s OK. Hey, that’s Elizabeth’s move!

The next day is Friday. Mr. Bowman asks Jessica if she gave her parents the note and she’s all like, yeah, sure did. Because he knows Jessica, Mr. Bowman calls Alice. Cover blown. Alice decides to take both twins to the eye doctor. Jess is horrified. She decides to “exercise” her eyes all weekend to improve her vision before her appointment on Monday. This means staring at a moving pencil. She also eats almost nothing but carrot sticks.

The Unicorns decide that in order to raise money for the new encyclopedia set, they will have a skate-a-thon. How very 1991. They brag to Elizabeth and Amy about their planned good deed.

“We’re going to help the library.” Lila smiled grandly.

“How do you plan to do that?” Amy asked skeptically. “By painting the library purple?”

On Monday, Alice picks the twins up early from school to go the eye doctor.

Jessica sees Dr. Cruz, and I am delighted that there is some non-white representation in Sweet Valley. And a doctor!

“I don’t think your eyes are silly, Jessica,” Dr. Cruz said seriously.

“Yes, but I can see fine. I can see you, and I can see that stool over there.” Jessica glanced around the room. “I can even see that picture on your desk. Is that your dog?”

“Actually, no,” Dr. Cruz said. “That’s my grandson.”

Bahaha.

Anyway, Jessica’s told he has to wear glasses for a couple of months. Elizabeth’s eyesight is perfect. Was there ever any doubt?

They all head to the “Valley Vision Center” to get some glasses. She chooses a pair of light violet frames. While the glasses are being made, Alice takes the twins shopping and buys Jessica a new outfit from Kendall’s. We’re told it’s a dark purple skirt with a matching top, which I assume is that lovely ensemble we see on the cover, except Jessica never actually wears the outfit in the book. But since when does that matter?

For the next few days, Jessica only wears her glasses around the house and Elizabeth acts like an old schoolmarm about it, admonishing her every chance she gets. It’s really annoying.

One night the whole Wakefield fam goes to the movies to see Tale of Love II. Sounds like a cinematic masterpiece. Lila happens to be at the theater too and catches Jessica wearing her glasses. Jessica buys Lila’s silence by promising Lila she will give her the new purple outfit, plus the purple earrings. Lila still treats Jessica like a slave for the rest of the book.

I’m starting to wonder why I have such fond feelings for Lila. She’s kind of awful. Does she only get awesome in Sweet Valley High? I always liked her as both a worthy adversary and friend of Jessica but, shit. I’m glad I had better friends than Lila when I was 12!

Chapter 9 gives us the big skate-a-thon. Elizabeth and Amy are amazed to see that the Unicorns pulled off a successful fundraiser. Frankly, so am I. Elizabeth agrees to cover the event for the Tribune. Unicorns rejoice!

Aaron asks Jessica to skate with him (aww) and while they’re going around the rink, Jess notices her parents come in. How bad could Jessica’s eyesight be if she can spot her parents out of a crowd of people while she’s skating around the rink, not expecting them?

Of course, she’s not wearing her glasses so she has to come up with a plan.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Jessica put on a sudden burst of speed and plowed directly into Lois.

Both girls went sprawling, and Lois’ glasses popped off her face and went skittering across the floor. In an instant Jessica was back up on her skates. She swooped down on Lois’ glasses and snatched them back up.

“My glasses!” Lois wailed.

“I have them,” Jessica called. “’I’ll skate all the way around and bring them back to you. Wait there!”

Then as she goes around, she puts the glasses on and waves to her parents.

Quite brilliant, but it doesn’t work. Jess gets in trouble for not wearing her glasses and then she decides to sulk in her room for the rest of her life.

Elizabeth is the one to relay this message to the family.

“Bad news, mom and dad,” she announced grimly when she got to the den. “Jessica says she’s never coming out of her room again.”

“Bad news?” Steven exclaimed. “That’s great news!”

Freshman-year-of-high-school Steven was so funny in a typical older brother way. Idk what happened to him when he went away to college. Here’s another example of young Steven’s awesomeness:

“I just wanted to tell you that you’re all wrong about your glasses,” Steven began.

He paused, and Elizabeth gave him a nod of encouragement.

“I mean, they don’t make you look any worse than usual.”

OK, let’s get on with it, we’re almost done. Jessica announces she’s not going on her date with Aaron and Elizabeth decides to scheme to get to change her mind. Her first plan is to make Jessica jealous by telling her she likes Aaron. Jessica doesn’t care. Then she pretends to call Amy and talk about how cute she thinks Aaron is so Jessica will overhear. Jess cares so little, she takes a nap.

But she only slept for a few minutes. She woke with heavy pressure on her face. Slowly, she struggled to sit up, and as she did, she caught sight of herself in the mirror. The pressure on her face was from a pair of glasses wider than her head! They were so huge that her entire face was hidden, all but her eyes, which were magnified until they were big as apples!

Jessica jumped to her feet and tried to take the glasses off, but her mother suddenly appeared, wagging her finger in warning. “You have to keep them on!” her mother scolded.

Jessica tried to leave her bedroom, but the glasses were so huge, they wouldn’t even fit through the door. She turned sideways and at last managed to slide out, but as soon as she did she was suddenly surrounded by all the Unicorns, laughing and pointing and calling her “geek”!

“I am not a geek!” Jessica cried. “I’m the most popular girl in school!”

“Oh, no, you’re not!” Aaron Dallas said, appearing right in front of her. “You’re the biggest nerd in school. And I don’t go out with nerds!”

“I’m not a nerd! I’m not a nerd!” Jessica cried desperately.

“Nerd, nerd, nerd,” the Unicorns chanted.

Well, that was indeed horrifying, wasn’t it?

Elizabeth’s Plan C is to tell Jessica she’s going to the game with Aaron, but first, she’s going to the mall to find something new to wear. Jessica’s like, whatever.

When Elizabeth comes back, she’s wearing glasses! And Jessica thinks Elizabeth looks great in them! And they’re twins! So if Elizabeth looks great in glasses, Jessica must look—wait, no. In Jessica’s warped mind, Elizabeth looks good in glasses because they go with her nerdy image. She still refuses to be seen in hers.

Sunday is date day, and Elizabeth has one last plan. Rather than cancel Jessica’s date as Jessica asked (Jessica couldn’t even tell Aaron herself that the date was off?!), she pretends to be Jessica and greets Aaron—wearing her fake glasses. And Aaron thinks she looks great. Then Elizabeth is like, oh just let me get my purse and she runs upstairs. Jessica is finally convinced that she can in fact still be cute and popular with glasses. Thank god, right? She goes to the game with Aaron. They have a wonderful time.

But that’s not all. Before we go, we are treated to an excerpt from Elizabeth’s Junior Journalist article.

Ahem.

The Friday night skate-a-thon, sponsored by a group of sixth graders who call themselves “Unicorns,” raised enough money to purchase a new encyclopedia set for the Sweet Valley Middle School library. While Unicorns may be rare, this hard-working group proved that generosity is not.

Um. OK first, we have 2 factual errors. The Unicorns is a club made up of sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-graders, and all of them organized the skate-a-thon. Second, unicorns are not “rare.” They don’t exist. At all.

Another thing, how did they prove that generosity is not rare?

This is the worst fake article I’ve ever read in my life.

Click here for a recap of the next Sweet Valley Twins book: Mandy Miller Fights Back

SVT #113: The Boyfriend Game

Since it’s almost Valentine’s Day, I bring you a recap of a love-themed book. This one was published in 1998, and I think I picked it up on eBay like 10 years ago when I felt like revisiting the series. I’m not sure I ever read it. Perhaps I did and it was just really unmemorable. Anyway, let’s check out that cover.

I don’t want to give anything away, here, so suffice it to say that’s one of the twins and 3 guys from Sweet Valley Middle School. If the description in the book is to be believed, they are, from left, Todd Wilkins, Bruce Patman and Winston Egbert. Isn’t Winston supposed to be not cute? He looks exactly like Todd here. I’m enjoying how Bruce is wearing preppy clothing and that all 3 have some version of the quintessential “cute guy” 90s haircut.

Anyway, as the cover illustrates, the Sweet Valley Middle School kids are chosen to be contestants on a popular preteen game show called Young Love. It’s essentially The Dating Game for 12-year-olds. I always preferred Love Connection, myself. I still remember shouting the number of my favorite candidate at the television when I was 7 years old. “3! 3!!!!!! Ugh, 2?! Really?!” What a childhood.

This book is a lot of build up to the day of the show taping. We learn that schools in the area have been invited to apply, and then they must submit an essay about why their school should be chosen. The winners get to appear on Young Love, and the winners on Young Love get to go to Dizzy Planet, a new theme park that is all the rage. It’s so cool that only Lila Fowler has been there so far. Every club and group of misfits in school writes an essay, including the Unicorns, namely Janet, who dictates:

Other places might be cool, but not as cool as here. Our students know what’s hot and what’s not, and they’re not afraid to show it. Or wear it. And when it comes to hanging out, Sweet Valley is awesome. If you’re a pretty girl or a gorgeous guy, you’ll have no trouble finding someone right for you here.

Sounds like a really sarcastic Yelp review.

Mary Wallace is writing down what Janet says and she doesn’t know how to spell “gorgeous.” Jesus, Mary. I thought you were one of the smarter Unicorns?

This book heavily features a character called Donald Zwerdling. I don’t remember him so I’m assuming he showed up after I outgrew the series (says the girl who is pushing 40 and still reading said series). Donald is a geek. As if that was evidenced enough by his name, he also watches Star Trek and is in the Science Club. Like, we get it, ghostwriter. The Science Club also writes an essay.

Sweet Valley Middle School is unique among middle schools in southern California, which we shall endeavor to prove in the paragraphs below.

Firstly, our student population is quite diverse, with students from a variety of backgrounds and socioeconomic groups.

LOL wut? Last I checked, Maria Slater was the only non-white student in school. And they prob only let her in because she’s a former child star.

Donald says they should insert a poem into the middle of their essay, in an effort to be more romantic.

The thought of love and romance makes me dizzy in the heart.

And a trip to Dizzy Planet makes romantic feelings start.

Appearing on the Young Love show would be my dearest wish.

Being chosen for your show would be better than getting a brand-new satellite dish.

Yikes. Well, it is the Science Club, not the creative writing club.

The jocks also try to write an essay. Amy Sutton, Todd Wilkins, Aaron Dallas, Jo Morris…Jo Morris?! Haven’t seen her since Sweet Valley Twins No. 2, Teacher’s Pet! My how time flies. Anyway, they all put their heads together and can’t come up with anything more interesting than just saying they are the best at everything and that no team practice ever runs late on Monday because everyone has to rush home to watch Young Love.

The Chess Club submits an essay that leads off with “Who can determine the strategy of love?” The Foreign Exchange Student Association also submits an essay. (The what? Well, I stand corrected, perhaps there is diversity at Sweet Valley Middle School. I cannot begin to imagine the horrors of studying abroad in Sweet Valley though, what with the rampant crime, Margo, fatal cocaine parties, Jessica living there, etc.) Anyway, their essay is written in several different languages that none of their fellow classmates have bothered to learn. The Drama Club begins their submission with “Lights, Camera, Action! It’s time for Young Love and we have just the cast for you at Sweet Valley Middle School!” Well, that’s kind of cute, at least.

Elizabeth saves the day by putting each essay on a big piece of poster board. It’s the only way to give fair representation to everyone in school, after all.

And what do you know it—they win! IT TAKES UNTIL CHAPTER 8 FOR THEM TO WIN.

Kids have to sign up to be on the show, and then a lucky few are randomized into being contestants (those asking the questions) or candidates (those who sit on a panel answering the contestant’s questions and competing to their dream date).

If anyone reveals their status to anybody else before the taping, the whole school is disqualified. Nobody appears on the show, and nobody goes to Dizzy Planet. Oh and apparently the show throws the school a dance too, and that will get canceled as well. Which would mean they would have to wait, like, until the next day for another frigging dance.

I know you’ll be shocked, but both twins are selected to be on the show. Elizabeth is a contestant, Jessica is a candidate.

But the first two to break the rules are Sophia Rizzo and Patrick Morris, who are kind of an item. Patrick is a candidate and Sophia is a contestant. They start scheming to ensure that Patrick chooses Sophia and they can go to Dizzy Planet together. (The show disguises the contestants’ voices.)

Sophia comes up with a code question for Patrick to ask: What’s your favorite food? And she will answer: “Poetry, for woman does not live by bread alone.”

LOLOLOLOLZ.

On Monday night, Jessica sits in front of the TV with a soda and plate of cookies (my god it has been a lifetime since I did that and I am really jealous) and watches Young Love. A candidate says she chose her winner because he was “honest and sincere.” Jess deduces that this is the only way to get picked on Young Love, and the only way to ensure her trip to Dizzy Planet, so she asks Elizabeth for a few pointers on being “honest and sincere.” Trust me, Jess, guys don’t care about that. Especially not if you’re thin and blonde.

While talking to Amy, Elizabeth realizes that perhaps she doesn’t want to be a contestant—the show host, Byron Miller, tends to make fun of them if they are nervous. Swell dude. Amy tells Liz about a recent episode where someone was chosen for being “honest and sincere” and she realizes that this is why Jessica asked her about how to be a better person the other night—she must be a contestant.

For once, Elizabeth is the one to approach Jessica with the trading places scheme, and Jess readily agrees, of course. As a contestant, she is guaranteed to go to Dizzy Planet, and she can flirt with Byron Miller.

OK, finally, it’s showtime. “Elizabeth” is up first. Jessica is blinded by the stage lights and surprised by how hot it is underneath them. She immediately loses her cool and starts stammering all over the place. She screws up the questions. She gets made fun of by Byron. She’s a disaster. But! She does end up picking Todd (over Bruce and Winston) as her dream date. Elizabeth is jealous AF.

Elizabeth ends up on a panel vying for the affection of Aaron Dallas, Jessica’s sort-of boyfriend. She decides the thing to do is make sure she DOESN’T get picked, out of loyalty to Jessica. Ummm OK.

Elizabeth acts like a complete ditz on the stage. Case in point:

“Um, I mean, I don’t like sad movies because they make my mascara run.” She giggled again. “The other kinds are okay.”

Aaron chooses Amy Sutton because between her, Ellen Riteman, and Elizabeth acting like a tool, Amy is the only one who seems normal. Bad move, Aaron. Ellen is a freaking blast.

Amy apologizes to “Jessica” before heading offstage, saying that she wishes they could trade places so Jess can go to Dizzy Planet with Aaron. And only then does Elizabeth realize she should have just been normal and been chosen, then she and Jess could have just switched back for the Dizzy Planet trip and both been with their fave guys. DUH.

Janet Howell is also a contestant. To her dismay, she chooses Donald Zwerdling as her dream date. Patrick Morris screws up his code question and winds up with Maria Slater, former child star. Sophia is seething with jealousy.

Weirdly, Aaron reveals himself to be a giant jerk in this book, remarking to “Elizabeth” that Jessica sounded like “the airhead who ate California” on the show. Jessica then loses her shit on Elizabeth and they get into a full-fledged shouting match backstage. Sophia gets angry (and kind of violent—way to go with the Italian stereotypes, ghostie) with Patrick and cries. Janet verbally attacks a production assistant and demands a do-over. Donald awesomely sticks up for himself and says there’s no way he’s going anywhere with a snob like Janet. Eventually Byron Miller comes in and gets all Mr. Belding on them, demanding to know HEY, HEY, HEY WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?

He informs all these entitled snot-nosed kids that if anyone backs out, there’s no trip to Dizzy Planet or Valentine’s Day Dance for anyone. The next book is about the Dizzy Planet trip—which apparently Byron will be attending as well. Sorry guys but it’s gonna be a long time before I seek to read that installment!

SVT #2: Teacher’s Pet

(Click here for recap of SVT #1: Best Friends)

OK, here it is, Sweet Valley Twins No. 2, Teacher’s Pet. No, this isn’t about Elizabeth’s affection for Mr. Bowman and his horrible wardrobe. It’s about the twins’ ballet teacher, Madame Andre, and her somewhat creepy fixation on Elizabeth and total disregard of the existence of Jessica.

Let’s look at the cover. That’s Lizzie in the front, looking all angelic ballerina like. Looming behind her is Jessica, looking like the brat that she is (although she has good reason to, this time).

I already have problems with this book on page 1. We’re told that Madame Andre has just phoned and asked the twins to come to the dance studio. Elizabeth and Jessica are 12 years old, Madame Andre. You can’t just order people around like that. It kind of reminds me of when I was around 15 and I worked in this clothing boutique for tween girls and my manager tried to put me “on call”—my dad was not having that, as he had to drive me to work. He called her and told her to get real, I’m not a nurse, nor do I have a driver’s license.

Anyway. Luckily for Madame Andre, the dance studio is easily accessible by bus, bike, or carpool, as is nearly everything in Sweet Valley. The ease of commuting in this town must make the taxes ridiculous, amiright?

At the studio, Madame Andre tells them about their upcoming recital. The class will be performing a number from Coppelia, which is an actual ballet and really screwed up. As Madame Andre explains, Coppelia is a lifelike doll. In fact, she is so lifelike and beautiful that Swanilda and her true love, Franz, are tricked into thinking she’s a real person. And Franz falls in love with her. Yikes. I don’t care what you’ve been through in your life, it’s not as bad as that.

There are 4 small solos and, of course, the lead role of Swanilda. The rest of the crappy dancers will be in the corps de ballet. Auditions are 1 week away—and of course both Elizabeth and Jessica want the lead. Unfortunately for Jessica, Madame Andre doesn’t think anyone in class can hold a candle to Elizabeth—least of all Jess, who got off on the wrong foot when she showed up to their first class wearing a purple leotard, purple legwarmers, and barrettes with purple ribbons hanging from them.

Jessica laments that she has no shot at the lead because Liz is teacher’s pet, which Liz denies. The girls decide that maybe the reason Madame Andre never notices Jess is because she always stands next to Amy Sutton, who sucks at ballet. (This is a strategy Jess uses to make herself look better.) They decide to invite Amy over to help her with ballet, in the hopes of making Jess look better. Idk why Jessica doesn’t just stand somewhere else, but OK.

The day Amy is supposed to come over to the twins’ house to practice, Jessica forgets all about the plan—there is a “special Unicorn meeting,” after all!

Elizabeth and Amy practice. When Jess gets home, Amy is gone and Liz blasts her for forgetting their plans. They fight and Jess calls her teacher’s pet again. At the next ballet practice, even AMY gets praise from Madame Andre. Amy, of course, tells her that Elizabeth gave her some pointers.

“But of course. Elizabeth is a dedicated dancer,” said Madame, giving Elizabeth a radiant smile.

Jessica felt her throat tighten and her eyes fill with tears. She had dreamed that Madame would say those words to her. If only she hadn’t gone to that Unicorn meeting! No, she thought quickly. It was all Elizabeth’s fault. Elizabeth had betrayed her!

In Jessica’s defense, Madame Andre is defo up Elizabeth’s ass. In Elizabeth’s defense, she didn’t really do anything to get Madame Andre to like her so much.

Much of the rest of the book is about the twin war. When Jessica asks Steven to ask Elizabeth to pass the mashed potatoes at dinner, we get this:

“Tell Jessica to eat my share. I’m watching my weight for the recital.”

OH SNAP. Gotta love some 80s body shaming—and I guess it never really went out of style with ballet. I never danced as a kid, and good thing. A friend who did ballet for years told me her teacher would point at each kid and say, “skinny, fat, skinny, fat,” etc. WHAT THE FUCK? I really can’t help but question people who get their kids into dance, it seems like it’s asking for them to have an eating disorder, or at the very least, body image issues. Luckily, the twins are perfect.

As audition day approaches, Jessica practices nonstop and when she does, we’re told she is “transported to another world, where she danced among fluffy pink clouds and soared and dipped with a grace of a bird.” Wow.

On the day of the audition—which is supposed to be at 3 p.m.—Madame Andre calls and changes the time to 11 a.m. Man, my dad would have had a fit. HOW CAN SHE DO THAT? Elizabeth decided to go to the mall with Alice, so Jessica takes the call.

She smiled as she hung up the phone. Madame Andre didn’t know it, but she had done Jessica a big favor.

Jessica half-heartedly writes a note for Elizabeth and practically skips all the way to the dance studio, thinking Liz will never make it to the audition on time. And if she doesn’t audition, of course, she can’t dance the lead. When asked what happened to Elizabeth, Jessica is all like, “Yeah, I don’t know. I guess she didn’t want to come!” That part is kinda fucked, Jessica.

Of course, Elizabeth bursts into the room just before the audition is over. It turns out that Alice forgot her credit cards so they came back home and saw Jessica’s note. Madame Andre is visibly relieved. This, after she spent most of the audition staring at the door hoping Elizabeth would show up. It’s really gross. Elizabeth thinks Jessica is THE GREATEST SISTER IN THE WORLD for leaving the note, and she tells Amy so later that evening, when they’re talking on the phone. Amy informs Liz that Jessica told Madame Andre Liz wasn’t interested in coming to the audition. Liz is crushed. She spends the next few days avoiding Jess.

At the next ballet class, the solo parts are announced: the four smaller solos go to Cammi Adams, Jo Morris, Kerri Glenn, and Melissa McCormick. Elizabeth lands Swanilda. Jessica is stuck in the corps de ballet.

Elizabeth confronts Jessica about her stunt and Jessica just shrugs and says it wouldn’t have mattered anyway because Liz is teacher’s pet. She was never not going to get the part.

Suddenly, Madame Andre came rushing into the dressing room. “Something terrible has happened,” she cried. Her face was creased with concern. “Coppelia is missing!”

Coppelia is the life-size doll—a pretty important prop for the performance. Everyone looks for the doll—except Jessica. They are unsuccessful.

At the next practice, Coppelia is still missing. And Elizabeth starts to notice that Jessica is actually a really good dancer. A seed of doubt is planted—might Jessica be a better dancer than Elizabeth? Could it be that Elizabeth really is teacher’s pet? Did Jessical steal Coppelia in an effort to sabotage the recital?

Elizabeth is having trouble learning her steps for the recital. She practices at home but two days before the recital, she’s not getting any better—and Jessica notices.

Jessica’s anger and resentment began to melt as she watched Elizabeth try to master the turns, a look of utter panic on her face.

She’s going to make a terrible Swanilda if she doesn’t get that step right, thought Jessica. She’ll embarrass herself and Mom and Dad and me. Jessica tried to fight down the tide of sympathy that was sweeping over her. Part of her wanted to see Elizabeth fail so she could say I told you so. But the rest of her couldn’t forget that no matter what, Elizabeth was still the most important person in the world to her.

Aw. I miss when Jessica was sweet.

Jess helps Elizabeth with the steps and is able to explain—better than Madame Andre, apparently—what she needs to do differently. Elizabeth takes her advice and feels the improvement.

That night, Liz is convinced—Jessica is right. She is teacher’s pet. And Jessica is way better dancer than anyone else in the class.

At dress rehearsal, Coppelia is still missing. Amy volunteers play Coppelia, since she can’t dance at all—she actually fell down during her audition. As Coppelia, all she has to do is sit in a chair the whole time. Madame Andre is like yes, thank you, please just sit there because you’re a shit dancer, that’s perfect.

That night, Elizabeth decides she is going to fake an injury so that Jessica has to dance the lead in her place. At the same time, Jessica decides she’s not even going to go to the stupid recital.

At breakfast the next morning, Jessica tells her family she isn’t going to the recital. Steven jumps all over her, saying she just can’t stand to hear Elizabeth get applause. Jessica finally says fine, she’ll go, but she’s not dancing. She’s just going to sit in the audience. I’m sure that won’t fuck with the blocking of the routine at all.

When they get to Sweet Valley High (hee hee!) that evening, Elizabeth hops out of the van and pretends to twist her ankle. She implores Jess to take her place, and citing time, says they can’t let Madame Andre know about their plans. Ned and Alice are just like, sure, whatever. Yeah I don’t know, either, guys.

The only person Elizabeth told about her plan was Amy, and because Amy is a good friend and a sweet kid when she’s 12 (not so much when she’s 16), she decides to dance in the corps and let Elizabeth be Coppelia. That way she’ll at least get to be on stage.

Jessica blows everyone’s minds as Swanilda.

Madame Andre races to tell Ned and Alice what a talent, what a prodigy, what a miracle of a dancer Elizabeth is, and they’re like, yeah so actually, that was Jessica.

“Surely it can’t be,” said Madame Andre. She was shaking her head in disbelief. “Jessica could never dance that well. Oh my…” Her words trailed off and her face clouded with sadness. “It is obvious that she can. How could I have been so blind?”

Good question. You’re a shit teacher, perhaps?

Finally, Jessica gets the praise she wants from Madame Andre. Elizabeth confesses that she faked her injury. And Amy confesses that she hid Coppelia because she was afraid to dance in front of an audience.

All’s well that ends well. The last chapter is set up for the next book, The Haunted House.

SVT SUPER CHILLER #8: The Secret of the Magic Pen

Brace yourselves, people. It’s a rather campy camp story.

Here’s the cover. The artist really did a shit job with this. First, this picture on the top really bugs me. Why include this and make the twins look different from that picture? For me, this picture on the top is classic Elizabeth and Jessica. THIS IS WHAT THEY LOOK LIKE. I get that continuity is a problem for this series but man…you can’t even stay consistent on ONE COVER? Anyway. I’m assuming that’s Jessica in the purple shirt and the other girl is Miranda Page, a fellow camper who only appears in this book. This scene never happens. Two comments on Miranda: 1) I totally had this outfit. 2) I never realized until very recently that she’s peeking through a bush, or something. I thought she was just standing like that for no reason. That red thing glowing on the ground would be the aforementioned “magic pen.” The fact that the word “Beware” is coming out of Jessica’s flashlight, well, I’m just going to try to ignore that.

Anyway. It’s the summer before the twins’ tenth trip through sixth grade, and they’re bored AF. All of their friends are doing cool things and they’re doing nothing. Elizabeth decides she’ll try to write a mystery novel that rivals her favorite author, Amanda Howard, but when she sits down and tries to start, she can’t think of anything to write about.

There were so many choices to make, she hardly knew where to begin. Should her heroine be a young girl, a college student, or an adult? Should her setting be Sweet Valley, or should she make up a fantasy world where only the strangest things happen?

LOLLOLOLOLOL.

Elizabeth, of course, doesn’t realize the irony of that last thought.

That night at dinner, Ned and Alice have a surprise: they’re sending Elizabeth and Jessica to Camp Faraway for two weeks. The twins are ecstatic. There are writing workshops for Elizabeth and acting classes and dance lessons for Jessica.

On the bus to Faraway, they discover that their friend, Mandy Miller (one of the nice Unicorns) is also coming to camp. They also meet Miranda Page, a pretty, confident, but nice, wannabe actress like Jessica, and Starr Johnson, a reader-writer type like Elizabeth who quotes Shakespeare ad nausem.

All the girls are assigned to Cabin Windlewisp. The first night, the camp director, a lady named Gunnie, tells the campers a bit about the history of Faraway. Of note: one of the most famous people to ever come from the area was a mystery writer named Roland Barge, and, oh, yeah, a long time ago there were supposedly some murders committed on the Camp Faraway property. Cool thing to tell a bunch of 12-year-olds, Gunnie. And you call yourself camp director!

The next day, the twins go on a tour of a place called Hangman’s Cave with their counselor Holly and some other girls, including Mandy, Miranda, Starr, and an annoying pain in the ass called Priscilla Westover. Priscilla is a rich southern belle who says things like, “If mommy and daddy find out that anything has happened to me, all I can say is, lawsuit!” The cave is pretty creepy, on account of being a cave and everything. When a bat starts flapping around, Priscilla loses it (I know she’s supposed to suck, but like, I would definitely lose it as well) and she accidentally knocks Elizabeth on the ground. By the way, what appears to be a bottomless depth of water lies below. While Jessica yells at Priscilla, Elizabeth discovers something in a crevice of the cave.

It was a beautiful, ornate antique fountain pen. It was made of a shiny red stone carved so thinly it was almost transluencent. And from the inside, something was making the pen glow. Elizabeth had never seen anything like it in her entire life. A million questions raced through her mind. How did this get here? Who does it belong to? Do they know it’s missing? How long has it been here?

She decides to keep the pen to herself but show Jessica later. Jess is unimpressed by the pen, but Elizabeth feels like it was meant to be that she found it. After all, her goal during these two weeks is to write the greatest mystery novel ever, and what better way to do it than, you know…writing it all down by hand? (It’s 1994 in this book. I really feel like Camp Faraway ought to have at least a couple of computers.)

The next day is the first day of the real camp schedules, meaning Jessica has acting class and Elizabeth has a journalism class. She volunteers to write an article about Roland Barge for the newsletter that will go home with all of the campers. Jessica finds out that the play being put on by the campers on the last night of the session is called The Royal Switch, and she’s determined to get the lead. As someone who has done some theater here and there, I just have to say…2 weeks is NOT enough time to put an entire production together. Gunnie is the director of the acting workshop and I CALL BULLSHIT, GUNNIE.

That night, Elizabeth fakes sick to get out of going to the lodge for Bingo with the rest of her cabin so she can work on her article. But instead, she starts writing a story.

The story takes place on the grounds of Camp Faraway in the early 1900s. It’s about Amelia Champlain, a kitchen maid, and Richard Bittle, a “dashing” young man who worked in the horse stables. They are in love, and Amelia shares her passion and talent for writing only with him. He urges her to keep her writing a secret so that other people don’t laugh at her. Um, OK.

“You are so full of love and advice, Richard,” Amelia said as they embraced. “How would I ever do without you?”

LOL what a shit sentence.

Elizabeth is sort of startled by the way the details of this story are just spilling out of her, but she decides she must just be inspired by the pen. Yeah, that’s it.

“You are radiant with passion,” Richard told her admiringly. “I adore the way your cheeks are flushed with excitement.”

Oh, jeez. Put down the pen, Elizabeth. And the pipe.

Amelia turned to get her manuscript—but it was missing. She looked under the table, on the counter, and even in the most unlikely places, like the icebox and cabinets. She ran to the parlor where a housekeeper was dusting, and enlisted her help in the search. But it was all to no avail. Finally, she glanced into the roaring kitchen fire. The title page was at the edge, just starting to char around its corners.

Elizabeth is moved to tears. Probably not the first time Lizzie has shed a tear over her own writing, but OK.

Jessica stays behind in the lodge after Bingo so she can prepare for her audition. At some point, she gets up to get a drink and when she comes back, her script is gone! She accuses Priscilla of taking it but the other campers agree that she hasn’t left her seat all evening. Holly helps Jessica look for the script, and eventually they find it—in the fire.

Jessica tells Elizabeth what happened and Elizabeth is freaked out because it’s the same thing she wrote in her story. Jessica chalks it all up to a coincidence/twintuition and politely suggests that Elizabeth is losing it with this whole pen thing. I love when Jessica is the rational one.

The next day is the play audition. Jessica nails it and is cast as the lead, Penelope, a peasant girl who finds out that she was switched at birth and is actually a princess. I’m still waiting for that to happen to me.

Elizabeth researches her article on Roland Barge and finds out that he was a recluse and a bit of a jerk. He never spoke to anyone about his writing. He turned out masterpiece after masterpiece until his last book—that one was a piece of crap and everyone blasted him for it, and then he just disappeared.

Elizabeth can’t focus on Roland Barge, though. She’s too consumed with thoughts of Amelia and Richard and decides to continue writing her mystery. But when she goes to put regular old Bic pen to paper, nothing happens. Elizabeth is convinced that the power is all in the pen, and the pen is telling her its own story.

That night, the pen “calls” to Elizabeth and she starts writing again. This time, Amelia has just returned from an afternoon of strawberry picking with friends to find a note from Richard, asking her to meet him on Emerald Lake that evening. She’s elated.

She takes her boat out even though it looks like a storm is coming in. Out in the middle of the lake, she decides Richard must have felt it was unsafe to go out on the water and trusted that she had enough sense to avoid it as well, but before she can row back to shore, her boat begins filling with water. She almost drowns but is saved by a young fisherman, who later tells her that her boat was sabotaged. CREEPY.

The next day, Jessica is blowing it at play rehearsals and Gunnie acts like a huge bitch because she doesn’t have the entire play memorized yet. Um, it’s been A DAY, Gunnie. Perhaps Camp Faraway should begin offering yoga classes, because you need to chill the f out.

Feeling the pressure, Jessica takes a boat out on Emerald Lake to go over her lines. You can guess what happens next. Back at the cabin, Elizabeth starts to put two and two together and she takes off for the lake, determined to save Jessica but she nearly drowns herself. Both twins are saved, because really, none of us would ever recover if the series suddenly ended here. Liz tells Jess twintuition took her to the lake, and keeps quiet about the pen.

The next day, everyone’s fawning over the twins. Don’t ask me how that’s any different from their regular lives! Gunnie comes over just as Elizabeth is talking to Jessica about the Roland Barge article she has yet to write. You’d think Gunnie would be informing them both that they’re being sent home for breaking the camp rules and almost dying, but no.

Gunnie says she knew Roland Barge when she was a girl. Her uncle owned the property that is now Gunnie’s Camp Faraway, and she visited every summer. And for some reason knew a reclusive famous writer who lived in the area. Something is weird here, am I wrong?

“Of course, that was before he changed his name,” said Gunnie.

DUN DUN DUNNNN.

Roland Barge’s real name was Richard Bittle, and he was a lowly servant with an ambition for fame and fortune before he was a famous writer. Gunnie recalls that he was rather friendly with a beautiful kitchen girl named Amelia. She also recalls that Amelia broke Richard’s heart by running off with another man. Gunnie suspects that’s why Roland became such a grumpy old man. She also casually suggests that maybe Amelia was murdered because nobody ever heard from her again.

Later, Elizabeth tells Jessica she’s worried that something terrible is going to happen to her because everything that happened to Amelia has happened to Jessica. Did that make sense? I’m tired. Elizabeth wants to go home but Jessica refuses on account of the fact that she’s starring in a play in a few days.

Mandy and Miranda head to dress rehearsal without Jessica because Jessica’s curling her hair. Elizabeth claims to be terrified for Jessica’s safety but then she watches her leave the cabin alone, rather than, I don’t know, getting off her ass and walking to the theater with her.

She starts to write again. Why doesn’t she just write more than three sentences at a time? Maybe then she’d get the whole story in one shot and could stop fearing for her sister’s life? When Elizabeth picks up the pen again, Amelia has received another note from Richard.

Amelia, my love,

Perhaps we should stay away from the lake. Instead, I thought we’d meet for an evening stroll through the cave on the far end of the property. I count the moments until I see you.

With love and adoration,
Richard

Amelia is kind of put off by the whole cave thing but figures Richard will protect her from anything dangerous. She also thinks that this is the night they will finally get engaged. Who the hell wants to get engaged in a cave?

When she gets there, Richard is a bit of a dick about helping her into the cave, and worse yet, he strangles her to death once she’s finally inside.

Elizabeth is horrified and runs to the theater to find Jessica, but when she gets there she discovers that Jess never showed up to rehearsal. She insists that Gunnie come with her to Hangman’s Cave. Inside, they find Jessica, cowering against a wall and clutching her throat.

“I was on my way to play rehearsal and something pulled me toward here. I can’t explain it.” She put her face in her hands.

Jess can’t explain it and neither can the ghostwriter. Weak. This just seems lazy after inventing a perfectly good reason for Jessica to take the boat out alone on the lake, but whatever. This book is almost over, thank god.

Elizabeth’s hand felt a sudden surge of electricity. We can’t leave yet. The pen is calling for me.”

“What’s calling–?” Gunnie began.

Elizabeth’s fingers trembled as she pulled the pen from her pocket. It was glowing so brightly, it was almost blinding. Gunnie shielded her eyes.

Elizabeth puts the pen on the cave wall, where it writes just fine, which I find to be one of the most implausible things in this whole book.

“Richard killed me,” she read aloud from the wall. “He lured me into the cave with promises of love. He tried to strangle me then he drowned me in the bottomless pool. All so he could steal my art, my dream.”

The pen then tells them to go look under the floorboards in the stable to find Amelia’s orginial manuscripts. They’re there, along with Richard’s failed attempts at writing his own books and his journal, which recounts every step of his plot. He also expresses remorse for what he did to Amelia and writes that he’s going to go off himself in the cave where she died so they can be together again. Hate to break it to you, dude, but Amelia will def not give you another chance, even in the afterlife.

Elizabeth finally writes her article, in which she exposes Roland Barge. Jessica stars in the play and is a big hit. They go back home untraumatized and never again think of how a haunted pen almost killed them both.

SVT SUPER CHILLER #7: The Haunted Burial Ground

OK guys. For the month of October, my goal of completing recaps for the first 10 Twins books is on hold. I LOVE the Chillers, and, well, tis the season!

Here’s the cover.

That’s Elizabeth in the very-problematic-by today’s-standards costume and Jessica’s attempt to be a sexy witch in her mom’s dress. The fugly girl in the vampire cape is Amy Sutton and the cat is Tamara Chase. I believe this is her one and only cover appearance? She’s also entirely inconsequential in this book so I’m convinced the only reason she snagged a spot is because she has an easy-to-draw costume. Oh, and there’s a really laughable skeleton on there, too.

When we open, Jessica is riding her bike home from Lila’s house—in the dark. And in the fog. Oh, to be 12 again. I see so poorly at night that I have bailed on plans when rain is expected.

Someone is following Jess on a bike and she’s trying not to freak out. She’s wishing she took her mom up on her offer to come pick her up or have Steven ride over to Lila’s to ride home with her but noooo, she’s much too mature for that!

It soon becomes clear that the person on the bike IS following her—and just when she reaches her split-level ranch house with a charm all its own, it becomes clear that the person on the bike has no head. Jess freaks and screams for her mom and dad while making a mad dash toward the door.

The headless bike rider (a 90s version of the headless horseman, I presume) is actually Steven and his friend, a super cute lead singer and guitarist for a super cool local band called The Skeletons. I can’t decide if that name is cool or lame, or so lame it’s cool. Help me out.

Despite the prank, the singer, Scott Timmons, seems like a nice dude. He compliments Jessica on mostly keeping it together, and he mistakenly assumes she’s 13. Jessica is in love. When she tries to tell Elizabeth about Scott, Liz is uninterested and demands to know where Janet Howell was that afternoon because she sure as hell wasn’t at the site for Houses for the Homeless even though she signed up to volunteer. God, Elizabeth is such a pain sometimes, you guys. And I know she was the twin I more identified with growing up, so this worries me. Who asked you to take roll, Elizabeth?!

Jessica informs her that the Unicorn president had to attend an emergency club meeting because Ellen Riteman proposed changing their official color from purple to orange and black, for Halloween. I recall that in another book, Ellen proposed changing their color from purple to red, an idea I would have supported whole-heartedly.

Elizabeth tells her that’s not a good excuse for failing to show up and Jessica asks her why she has to turn every conversation into an I Hate the Unicorns Festival. Ha! Then she “flounces” out of the room. Man. Been a long time since I’ve flounced anywhere.

After school the next day, Elizabeth is in the girls’ room changing into her painter’s overalls for another afternoon of work for the imitation Habitat for Humanity. We’re told she folds the plaid skirt and green turtleneck she wore to school that day and places them in her backpack. Leave it to Elizabeth to voluntarily wear an outfit that resembles a school uniform.

She starts to hear strange noises and then, an ear-splitting scream. No worries, it’s just Jake Hamilton, scaring the crap out of the new girl by pretending to have been bludgeoned with an ax in the hallway. Elizabeth tells Jake to get lost and helps the new girl, Kala, recover.

Kala is part Native American. She tells Elizabeth that her family moves around a lot for her dad’s job and that next summer, she and her dad are going to drive around Northern California for a family research project. Elizabeth suggests she come along with her to the house-building site to meet Jack Whitefeather, the Native American lead of the project. Kala agrees and also volunteers to help.

Meanwhile, Jessica is making a fool of herself with Scott downtown. She screams his name when she spies him coming out of the music store to the point where he half expects he was close to being hit by a car, or something. He makes a remark about her “lung power” and asks if she’s ever done any singing. OF COURSE SHE HAS. WITH A BAND AND EVERYTHING. Scott says it’s too bad she’s not a few years older or he would sign her up to sing with The Skeletons. Jess immediately starts saying she can look older but she’s interrupted by Steven and Joe Howell (brother of Janet, who doesn’t seem as douchey as Janet).

As the boys talk, Jess learns that the Skeletons haven’t taken any Halloween gigs yet but that Scott is planning on doing a cover of “Monster’s Ball,” a duet jam by Johnny Buck and Melodie Powers (or, as she’s known in Sweet Valley Twins #34, Jessica, The Rock Star, Melody Power).

“I think I’ve got the melody down. And the sheet music will show me what chords to play on the guitar. Now all I need is a gig and a girl to sing with on Halloween night.”

“I could be the girl!” Jessica exclaimed breathlessly.

Oh, Jess. The 3 boys walk away but Jessica of course has come up with a perfect plan. SHE will throw a party on Halloween night and it will be so awesome that the Skeletons will want to perform at it. And Scott will ask her to sing with the band. I’d love to Sure Jan Jessica right now but let’s face it, she’s prob right. She convinces the Unicorns to back her on the idea by calling it a Monster Ball. They all convince Mr. Fowler to let them use some creepy property he owns on Sleepy Hollow Road. This man is the head of a multimillion dollar corporation, by the way. And this is a decision he makes.

On Friday night, Elizabeth is having a sleepover with Kala and Jessica is having a sleepover with the Unicorns. Eventually Elizabeth and Kala join them for some Ouija board fun. I was never allowed to have a Ouija board, even though I’m pretty sure neither of my parents believe in ghosts. I should ask them what their reasoning was for this.

The girls decide to summon the spirits who “hang out” around Sleepy Hollow Road. Legend has it that people have seen skeletons at the property—one of them headless. The marker on the Ouija board spells out “STAY AWAY.” Jessica accuses Ellen of pushing the marker because she doesn’t want to do all the work to prepare for the party. Honestly, I wouldn’t either. I hate hosting parties. I have to clean my whole house and I always spend too much money on food, most of which is not eaten. And this Halloween party requires the girls to clean up outside and everything, because apparently the area around the shack they’re going to have the party in has been used as a junkyard.

Janet decides they should have a séance. I’m not sure how this solves things, but hey, this is the girl who thought she was reincarnation of a Hawaiian princess. Elizabeth remarks that any self-respecting ghost would have better things to do than hang out at a Unicorn slumber party. Good one, Elizabeth! Although, I see YOU are hanging out at a Unicorn slumber party. That’s right, I can take roll, too.

Janet leads the séance because she feels that it’s sign of respect to the spirit world. LOLz.

Ellen let out a long moan, then she began to speak in a strange, high-pitched voice. “Staaay away,” she said. “It’s daaannngerousssss.”

One by one, each girl opened an eye. Everybody at the table was peeping except for Ellen, who swayed back and forth dramatically, and Kala, whose chin continued to rest on her chest.

“It’s daaaanngerous,” Ellen moaned again.

“No, it’s not,” Jessica said.

“Pay nooooo attention to Jeeeesica,” Ellen continued in a high, whining tone. “She doesn’t caaare if the property is hauuuuunted or not—she probably just has some costume she wants to show offfff. Why should weeee do a lot of work so sheeeee can show offfff?”

How many times can I say it? Ellen Riteman is a national treasure, and I love her.

Jessica starts tickling Ellen and pretty soon all the Unicorns are laughing hysterically. Alice comes downstairs and tells them to shut the hell up and go to bed. Kala is strangely quiet and Elizabeth suggests they go upstairs to sleep.

A few hours later, the Unicorns are all still awake, talking from their sleeping bags in the living room, when they hear tapping against the window. When Jessica checks it out, she sees 2 skeleton faces pressed against the glass. All the Unicorns freak. Elizabeth comes downstairs when she hears the commotion, but she doesn’t fall for the trick. (I guess Ned and Alice took some Percocet and passed out, idk.) Turns out the skeleton faces are just masks. And behind the masks are Bruce Patman and Rick Hunter, 2 of the cutest guys in school. They ask how the Unicorns fell for such a lame trick.

“We just thought we’d raised the dead, that’s all,” Jessica said. “Want some hot chocolate?”

The boys come in and the girls tell them about their plan for the Monster Ball. They’re psyched. Elizabeth agrees to help them clean up the property if the Nature Scouts, a group of homeless kids who, uh, like nature, I guess, can use it as a clubhouse once the party is over. Sounds like the kind of thing George Fowler would have to agree to, but the Unicorns go ahead and say deal.

Just then, the kitchen door swung open and Kala stood in the doorway. Her eyes were strangely distant and unfocused.

“What’s the matter, Kala?” Elizabeth asked, feeling a tingle of worry in her stomach. “Did we wake you up?”

“The old ones say they are resting,” Kala said in a flat voice. “Please do not disturb them.”

“If she’s talking about your parents,” Bruce said, throwing a wary look toward Elizabeth and Jessica, “we’d better get out of here. Come on, Rick, let’s go.”

Honestly, I kinda snorted at that.

Kala doesn’t remember anything the next morning.

Elizabeth tells Jack Whitefeather that she won’t be available to work on the houses for the homeless for the next couple of weeks because she’ll be cleaning up the other property in the hopes that the Nature Scouts can use it. When he finds out it’s the property on Sleepy Hollow Road, he’s all like, “OH. THAT PROPERTY. I’VE HEARD STORIES. LET ME KNOW IF YOU FIND ANYTHING…UNUSUAL.” Jack also mentions that he’s going to be out of town for a bit due to his brother’s wedding in Boston.

Kala offers to help Elizabeth clean up the Sleepy Hollow Road property. On their way there, Kala tells Liz she had a dream that a bat flew into her room and told her to volunteer. Um, OK. The bat asked her, “Who will remember that you were here? What will you leave behind?” Man, deep bat with the tough questions. Kala tells Liz that Native Americans placed a lot of importance on dreams and thought they were visions of the past or prophecies of the future. Liz thinks this is “kind of spooky.” Can you stop with the judgement for one second, Elizabeth?

The girls check out the property and find a creek with supposedly clean water. Kala drinks some which I find questionable. Granted, I’m no nature scout, but how do you just trust that this random creek has water suitable for drinking?

The Unicorns arrive and Janet makes fun of Kala’s feather earrings, a move that would get her labeled racist today. I don’t know where Janet stands on this issue, but she’s defo a bitch in this book.

Suddenly, Jessica comes running out of a cave, screaming that there are bats chasing her. And there actually are! After the bats are done swarming the Unicorns, Kala confesses to Liz that she’s scared she somehow willed the bats to attack. She was so mad at Janet that she pictured the bat from her dream and wished it would….”never mind,” she says.

Later in the afternoon, Elizabeth sees the shadow of an eagle, but the sky is empty. A minute later, Ellen screams that there’s a bear, but nobody else sees anything and they all accuse her of being spooked by a tree stump. Later, Mandy thinks she sees the shadow of a wolf.

“Bears. Wolves. Shadows of the past,” Kala said softly as Mandy ran off to the group of Unicorns still collecting trash.

“What?” Elizabeth asked in a low tone.

Kala shook her head. “I’m sorry. I’m remembering the rest of the dream I had last night. The bat said something about a bear and a wolf being shadows from the past.”

Elizabeth stared. Had the bat incident—not to mention the bear-shadow incident and the wolf-shadow incident—jump-started Kala’s imagination? It would be too weird a coincidence if she had dreamed about all of those animals.

The only thing missing is the eagle,” Kala muttered, almost to herself.

DUN DUN DUNNNNN.

Overwhelmed, Elizabeth and Kala decide to go sit in the shade for a few minutes. There, they find an Indian arrowhead. Kala remarks that it’s strange to find one there, and Elizabeth says she’ll show it to Jack Whitefeather.

“Kala,” Elizabeth began in a tentative voice.

Kala’s dark eyes looked very weary and strained. “Yes?”

“Let me know if you have any more…you know…dreams.”

Much of the rest of the book is kind of whateves, sadly. Bruce, Jake, and Rick try to prank the girls by hiding in those orange trash bags that look like pumpkins but then the garbage men come and Jake freaks because he thinks they loaded Rick and Bruce into the truck—but it turns out the bags Rick and Bruce were hiding in were mysteriously moved, and everyone’s fine. The guys say they heard voices telling them to find another place to play tricks. Everyone’s weirded out and the Unicorns are ready to throw in the towel on the whole Monster Ball, until Jessica tells them that she got the Skeletons to play. Of course, this isn’t exactly true.

One morning, Kala and Elizabeth are having breakfast up at the Sleepy Hollow Road party site (your guess is as good as mine as to why) and a dude from Fowler Construction moseys on by and tells them that 2 days after their Halloween party they’re going to tear the shack down and start building a 20-story office building.

Kala starts to think maybe her dreams are telling her she has to do something to stop the construction. Then the girls find a bear tooth on the ground and Kala is more convinced than ever she’s supposed to protect the land, since the bear in her dream said something about showing her proof. Proof of what? Idk. That it’s a real talking bear that appears in dreams and asks for favors, I guess. Kala bails on clean-up for the day because she’s tired.

When the Unicorns arrive to start working, Mandy says they have to do something to better reinforce the walls. She wants to use sheetrock but Janet insists they can use the rotten lumbar outside since the place only needs to stand for 1 night—and since Janet is in 8^th grade, president of the Unicorns, and has consistently bailed on building houses for the homeless, everyone listens.

Then the Unicorns reach a new low when they decide that instead of hauling their trash to the dump (the garbage men were pissed off about the whole incident with the dudes and the bags and told them they weren’t coming anymore) they will just throw them over the fence onto the property of the old people next door. Really? Even Mandy and Mary? Apparently.

Kala suddenly appears and tells everyone she had another dream and the animals have a message for the Unicorns. This Kala certainly isn’t trying to win any popularity contests, I’ll say that.

“They wanted me to give you a warning,” Kala said. “They said the old ones are angry.”

Nobody cares. Shock.

The next afternoon, Ellen finds a skull in the creek. She freaks (justifiably). Jessica uses the story to drum up interest about the Monster Ball with the kids at school and with Scott, and the girls decide to put the skull in a tree, which is just…I’m really not sure if they think the skull is fake, or what. But the tree business is disturbing.

Smart kid Randy Mason remarks that the story is “macabre” and LILA explains to everyone what macabre means. I just thought that was worth noting.

Jessica finds Scott downtown (Doesn’t this kid ever have band practice? Or homework? A dentist appointment? Anything?) and tries to convince him to play for her party. He says he will on 2 conditions—that she spend the night at Sleepy Hollow Road and that she sings a song with a band. SCOTT HASN’T EVEN HEARD JESSICA SING. Whatever. I’m so done with this.

Jessica accepts the deal and convinces her friends and Elizabeth to spend the night with her at Sleepy Hollow Road. Because the second half of this book isn’t dragging enough, Amy Sutton and Maria Slater also join the slumber party. Kala begs off.

The girls decide to have another freaking séance, and Elizabeth hears a voice whisper in her ear, “Believe.”

In the middle of the night, the door violently opens and wakes everyone up. Standing in the doorway is Kala, with dead eyes. It’s freaky as hell. She tells everyone that the old ones are angry and that the construction must be stopped. Then she leaves.

By the way, there’s zero mention of where anyone’s parents think their kids are while all of this is going on.

The next morning, Elizabeth heads to Kala’s house and discovers that Kala has no memory of making a cameo at Sleepy Hollow Road last night.

Jessica calls Scott and tells him she spent the night and survived. He doesn’t even ask for proof. Since when is Jessica’s word good enough to go on? He agrees for his band to play at the party.

Elizabeth and Kala head to George Fowler’s office. They speak to various people to try to stop the construction but they begin all of their explanations with “So, we had this séance…” so nobody listens. Even George eventually agrees to talk with them but this time he doesn’t bend to the will of sixth graders. The construction shall go ahead as planned. As for the “old ones”? George informs Elizabeth and Kala that they’re now going to enjoy retirement in Palm Springs, because he bought their property, too.

This whole time, Elizabeth’s been calling the lady Jack Whitefeather left in charge to see if he’s back from Boston, but no dice.

Party Day: Elizabeth heads to the Houses for the Homeless site and the lady in charge tells her she can go into Jack’s office to leave him a note. While in there, she decides to snoop around, because she’s Elizabeth. There are some books on Native American History on a shelf and as she’s looking at them, a big heavy book on his desk blows open and turns to a page.

Slowly, with her heart pounding in her throat, Elizabeth looked down on the page. She gasped.

They were all there.

The bat.

The bear.

The eagle.

And the wolf.

They were painted on the border surrounding the base of a clay pot. Elizabeth squinted, reading the small type of the caption underneath the photograph.

“A Native American burial pot,” it read.

Elizabeth then heads over to Sleepy Hollow Road, digs for like a second, and finds a pot that looks exactly like the one in the book. She puts it in the mantle above the fireplace (the shack has a firellace?) and tries to tell George Fowler he can’t build an office building over a burial ground, but he can’t be reached.

Meanwhile, the Unicorns are all getting ready at Jessica’s house, which makes no sense since I’m sure Lila has a much bigger bathroom. It’s a cute scene that sort of made me miss having places to go and being, well, any number of years younger than the age I am now.

Elizabeth tells Kala what she discovered and it’s kinda anticlimactic. Kala’s basically like, oohhhhh. I get it now. Um, OK. Kala decides not to go to the party because she thinks it might be seen as disrespectful to “the old ones.” For some reason, though, she suggest that Elizabeth go to the party dressed as a Native American. I get that these costumes weren’t generally seen as problematic in 1996 but still. Still.

PARTY TIME: Jessica is having the time of her life. Scott’s flirting with her “like she’s at least 14.” He even puts his arm around her while the Unicorns are watching. Having been a teenage girl, I can confirm that this is the best night of Jessica’s life. She gets up to sing “Monster Ball” with Scott and the band. Of course she’s fantastic. BUT the music is so loud that the walls begin to shake, and the pot Elizabeth put on the mantel topples over and breaks.

Well. That’s sure to piss off the old ones.

Suddenly, everyone takes note of a few skeletons that are hanging around outside. One of them is headless. The headless skeleton walks over to the tree where the girls stuck the skull. Gotta figure he or she would want that back, amiright?

They quickly deduce that it’s not any of the kids at the party in costumes but for some reason remain convinced that the whole thing is a gag. Then Kala appears (again?!) and tells everyone to LEAVE THIS PLACE.

Oh, you’re wondering if there are any adults at this event? Yes, don’t worry. Mrs. Pervis, Lila’s housekeeper, got stuck ALONE supervising the whole thing. I’m gonna try to work, “I need to drink like Mrs. Pervis at a Sweet Valley Middle School Halloween party” into my general vernacular. Think that will catch on?

Pretty soon the whole freaking building is caving in and everyone’s running for their lives.

“Well,” Janet Howell said in a huffy tone. “I guess this is what we get for listening to Mandy!”

LOLZ.

Apparently unshaken by all of these events and almost dying, the kids all decide to move the party to Lila’s house.

Yes, I’m serious. Literally no one is the least bit affected by the fact that they just saw a gang of skeletons, one of whom was reclaiming his/her head, and that they almost got trapped in a collapsed building. Who knew the Sweet Valley kids were so tough?

A few days later, Elizabeth, Jessica, Kala, Jack Whitefeather, and George Fowler are at the Sleepy Hollow Road site. Kala says she doesn’t remember showing up to the party. They all figure they will never know if the shack collapsed because of the old ones’ anger or the faulty construction.

Jack finds a piece of the broken burial pot. Together, they all convince George he can’t very well build over a burial ground. Finally, a good decision from George. An eagle swoops around overhead. It’s supposed to be a sign, or something. I guess its celebrating.

George then declares that the property will become the Sweet Valley Nature Scout Wildlife Preserve and they will build a proper clubhouse on the other side of the property line and teach the kids about the people who are buried there.

He shot a look at Kala and lifted an eyebrow. “If you think the old ones will approve.”

There was a shrill cry and a loud thudding sound in the wind. The eagle reappeared over their heads and circled twice before disappearing again behind the treetops.

Elizabeth looked at Kala intently.

Kala smiled at the group gathered around her. Her eyes shone brightly. When she spoke, her voice was quiet. “I think that means they do.” She smiled at Elizabeth. “And so do I.”

Well, it’s better than the ending of The Unicorns Go Hawaiian, anyway.

If you’re craving more spooky Sweet Valley, I’ll be focusing on Chillers and the like for the month of October! Follow me on Instagram (@SassValley) for more spooky nostalgia on the daily. Also, check out my recaps for:

SVT #3: The Haunted House

SVT SUPER CHILLER #5: The Curse of the Ruby Necklace