Sweet Valley High #76: Miss Teen Sweet Valley
The moral of the story: Beauty pageants are outdated and sexist, but winning one means a really cute college guy will ask you out.
The Big Deal: Miss Teen Sweet Valley beauty pageant
Synopsis:
So, hey, guess what? Jessica is bored with high school guys and wants a college man. Steve had a few of his college buddies over recently and Jessica can’t figure out why one of them, Frazer McConnell, didn’t fall in love with her. She wants him to notice her, and this is her motivation for entering the Miss Teen Sweet Valley pageant. She doesn’t tell anyone she plans on entering because she doesn’t want to scare away the competition. Liz and Enid are totally against the pageant because they think it’s sexist. Liz decides to organize a protest committee.
Jessica announces to her family that she’s entered the pageant. Liz can’t believe it and says she’s going to get the pageant called off. She and her protest committee start a petition and go to the mall to get people to sign it. Amy sees them and tells Liz she should just not go to the pageant if she hates it so much. Sound advice, Amy, but we all know Liz can’t just sit by and not interfere. Liz writes an article for The Oracle, and it gets picked up by the Sweet Valley News (of course it does). Liz and Jessica are already on the outs and the article makes things worse. A local television station loved Liz’s article, and they noticed Jessica’s name on the list of entrants so they want to do an interview with them. At the interview, Liz comes off as brilliant and collected, while Jessica kind of panics and just keeps saying the same thing over and over.
Jessica gets home one day and finds Frazer and Steve hanging out with Cara and her cousin Barbara. She goes upstairs, frustrated that Frazer isn’t interested in her, and ends up having an argument with Liz. Liz is all condescending and asks why the pageant is so important to Jessica. And of course Jessica doesn’t have a good answer because for all her “pageant winners go on to do great things” rhetoric, she really only entered for the fame, the prizes and, most of all, Frazer.
Liz finds a loophole and thinks she can stop the pageant. The people holding the pageant were supposed to have gotten written consent from the school superintendent, but he’s been in the Soviet Union “meeting with Soviet educators,” so he couldn’t have approved it. Liz announces this at dinner and Jessica freaks out. She’s been taking dance lessons to prepare for the talent contest, but has been keeping it a secret from everyone. After Liz’s announcement, Jessica tells her how hard she’s been working, and Liz finally realizes how important the pageant is to Jessica and decides not to stop it, though she’s adamant about not going to see it.
Liz inevitably changes her mind and goes to watch Jessica in the pageant. When Jessica trips and falls during her dance routine, Liz goes backstage and tries to convince Jessica to keep going. Jessica refuses and runs off, so Liz finds Jessica’s bag and puts on her swimsuit. After doing the swimsuit competition, Liz goes backstage and finds Jessica, who is much happier now that Liz has compromised her principles and degraded herself onstage. She finishes the pageant for herself.
Jessica wins (did you ever have any doubt?). She realizes the other girls did really well, too, and worries that she only won because she’s the prettiest. She’s disappointed that the crown is a cheap tiara and that Frazer still doesn’t pay attention to her. Then she finds out the prizes are nowhere near as awesome as she’d been led to believe and she wants to cry. But Frazer comes by the house the next day and asks her out, so I guess everything is okay.
Quotes:
If she had anything to say about it, the pageant would be called off and the dignity of Sweet Valley womanhood would be preserved.
Oh, take the stick out of your ass, Liz.
The truth was, no one seemed to care as much about the beauty pageant issue as she did.
What does that tell you, Liz?
The Cover: Ooh, Liz has her bitchface on, complete with matching shirt and barrettes. Jessica looks smug, even though I think she probably could have done something a little different with her hair for the pageant. She wears it like that every single day of her life.
Tags: Body Image/Self Esteem, Prejudice, Twin Fight, Twin Switch
July 16th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
OMG, I swear, this was my favorite of the SVH series back in the day. I wanted to bitch slap Jessica for being so selfish and barely acknowledging Liz for putting herself out there. And don’t even get me started on flash-in-the-pan Frazer.
Still, none of this would have happened if it weren’t for those stupid Soviet educators.
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July 16th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
Damn commies, indeed!
Hahaha…
Whoa! Another day, another profound life lesson thanks to the good people of Sweet Valley. I’m taking notes and incorporating them into my own life. There’s no way I’ll ever enter a beauty pageant ever again! And as an added bonus, my first glimpse of Liz’s bitchface!
Banner day!
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July 16th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
What’s with the new cover format? Crazy! Breaking out of the mold!
That is one killer bitchface on Liz. Nice!
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July 16th, 2009 at 2:36 pm
Damn commies.
I didn’t really expect much of a thank you from Jessica for Liz doing the swimsuit competition, just based on her track record. I am, however, pissed that Liz was such a bitch about the pageant for 125 pages and then participated in one. What I learned from this is that making sure your sister wins a contest is more important than standing up for your principles. Maybe I should make that the “moral of the story.”
Thanks for stopping by, by the way!
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July 16th, 2009 at 2:48 pm
Yes, Bitchface Liz is not a common occurrence. Usually we see Helpful Liz or Concerned Liz, but Bitchface Liz is a rare thing, indeed.
I’m glad you won’t be entering any more beauty pageants. They’re degrading to women and men alike! I guess.
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July 16th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
Yeah, I hate the new covers. Not to worry, I have a few Australian editions coming up, and they kept the circle covers for a little while longer, I guess.
Just wait until the books in the mid #90s. Those covers really suck.
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July 16th, 2009 at 4:20 pm
I would have expected bigger pageant hair from Jessica. The higher the hair, Jess, come on.
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July 16th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
I know! Her pageant hair is a total fail. Of course, she still won, so what do we know?
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July 16th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
I think it would be impossible to narrow down these stories to just one moral, Shannon. There are so many layers of morals…in fact, its just one big onion of morals in my opinion.
To be embarrassingly honest, when I was young I was obsessed with SVH, Choose Your Own Adventure and whatever the hell those VC Andrews books were about.
BTW, I love this blog. In fact, I wanted to do a blog like this with the Choose your Own Adventure ones, but I was worried I would be too biased.
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July 16th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
You should do it! I would totally read a Choose Your Own Adventure blog.
I loved SVH, Baby-Sitters Club, VC Andrews, all of it. And check out my blogroll, there are blogs dedicated to all of them, ha ha.
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July 16th, 2009 at 8:07 pm
I can’t believe how fast you’re sailing through these! I HATED Liz in this one. Well, to be fair, I hate Liz in all of them, but this was pretty bad.
MR.
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July 16th, 2009 at 8:10 pm
I have WAY too much time on my hands, ha.
Liz was worse than usual in this one, I agree.
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July 17th, 2009 at 1:44 am
Jess, 1987 called and they would like their eyeshadow back.
Jess is only bored with high school guys because she’s made her way through every single one.
“She doesn’t tell anyone she plans on entering because she doesn’t want to scare away the competition.”
HaHAHAHAHAH That’s sort of awesome.
Liz is such a bitch in this book. I can’t believe I loved this book when I was younger.
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July 17th, 2009 at 8:30 am
I’ll go with that theory. I actually can’t think of a single guy she hasn’t been with. Even Winston got a dance one time.
Oh. Jeffrey. She never got with Jeffrey, though she tried.
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July 17th, 2009 at 8:38 am
I HATED this book as a kid, because I was sitting there like “wtf Liz?” It was super lame for her to compromise her principles and PARTICIPATE in one… not because Jessica was in major trouble, but because she had stage fright. It was the lamest thing I’ve ever heard.
It’s funny but until your blogs, I liked Liz… and now… dear goodness.
~ Abi
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July 17th, 2009 at 10:17 am
I don’t remember reading this one as a kid, but if I had I’m sure I would have been as brainwashed as everyone else.
I’m glad I could make you see the truth about Liz, ha.
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August 10th, 2009 at 11:13 am
I was just damn suprised Steve has college friends!
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September 14th, 2010 at 9:34 am
I think this cover makes the twins look particularly ugly. They look so block-headed. If they are supposed to be so fabulously gorgeous, why are they depicted with weird square heads on all the covers??
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December 29th, 2010 at 12:07 am
I remember hating the fact that Jessica knew from the beginning that she would win the pageant and actually did! I was hoping she lost and be taking down a peg even though she was since the prizes weren’t half what she thought they would be. I mean seriously did she really think that she would get thousands of dollars in prizes from winning a small local pageant!
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