Shannon's Sweet Valley High Blog

The moral of the story: It’s totally okay to try to sabotage your sister’s chances of getting into a really great school. She’ll get in anyway and then she’ll have to forgive you.

The Big Deal: Get Rich Quick party at Winston’s

Synopsis:

Liz wants to go to Interlochen, a boarding school in Switzerland, for her senior year. Everyone else thinks she’s crazy for wanting to leave Sweet Valley. I’m just going to point out that Interlochen is in Michigan and leave it at that. Jeffrey is upset about the Switzerland thing and Liz thinks the best way to handle it is to show him her brochures and make him see how much it means to her to go. Even Liz’s parents don’t want her to go.

Winston has a lottery ticket, bought for him by his father, and he’s having a party during the drawing. Liz notices the first three numbers are 712, which makes her think of Jeffrey because his birthday is July 12. Winston and Maria go to a convenience store to get snacks for the party and they see a poor old man who can’t afford to buy his granddaughter a bag of cookies. Somehow Winston and the old man get their coats mixed up. At the party that night, Winston can’t find his lottery ticket, but finds one in the old man’s coat. It happens to be the winning ticket. Liz is confused because she thought his ticket started with 712. She asks Winston about it and he tells her his father had gotten him two tickets.

Winston doesn’t know what to do about the lottery ticket. He finds out where the old man lives and goes to his house, which is in “the poorest part of Sweet Valley,” to return the jacket and explain the lottery mixup to him. But Jack Oliver hasn’t been following the numbers and doesn’t even know he’s won. Winston rationalizes that the man doesn’t feel cheated or anything so he should just keep his mouth shut and the $25,000 is his. But he feels bad and buys Jack’s granddaughter a doll and has it sent to her anonymously.

Enid and Liz argue about Switzerland, then Liz and Jeffrey argue about it too. Everyone is being ridiculous and getting pissed at her for wanting to leave them all behind. Moreover, nobody can believe she’d want to leave a place as perfect and terrific as Sweet Valley. Then Enid and Jeffrey talk. They both feel bad about not being supportive of Liz and decide to show their support by putting together a scrapbook for her full of awesome Sweet Valley times. They use their lunch period to go to a craft store for some scrapbook glue. Jeffrey is supposed to have lunch with Liz, but he writes her a note telling her he and Enid are running an errand and sticks it in her locker. She doesn’t get the note because some sophomore boys snatch it and throw it away. Lila tells Liz she saw Jeffrey leave with Enid. Liz gets jealous.

Steve and Jessica decide to sabotage Liz’s chances of getting into Interlochen. Someone will be coming to the house and the high school to interview her friends and family, so they’re going to act like jackasses so the interviewer thinks Liz can’t possibly be as wholesome as she seems. When the guy, Mr. Sterne, comes to the house, there’s a motorcycle parked in the driveway, Steve hasn’t shaved and pretends he can’t function in college because it’s so far away from his family, their parents are late and Jessica is dressed like a whore. Elizabeth is livid. The next day, Jessica dresses exactly like Liz. She has enlisted the help of all her guy friends and she keeps running into Mr. Sterne, a different guy on her arm each time. Then, while Liz is meeting with Mr. Sterne, Steve keeps calling the school, pretending to be different guys, and asking for her. Mr. Sterne tells Liz her behavior is unacceptable. Liz is crushed. Then she looks out the window and sees Jessica dressed like her and understands. She is, once again, livid. She gives Steve and Jessica a piece of her mind, then goes for a jog. She decides to go past Jeffrey’s house and apologize for being so distant, but when she gets there she sees Enid’s car in the driveway. She assumes Jeffrey has forgotten all about her already.

Winston (remember Winston?) finally goes to the lottery people and explains the mistake, then goes to Jack Oliver’s house to tell him he’s the real winner. Jack thinks Winston is the finest young man he’s ever met. Lila’s mad that he gave back the money without having bought her a single present.

Liz is screaming at Jessica and Steven again when Mr. Sterne shows up unannounced. Jessica and Steven called him and explained what they did, and he thinks it speaks to Liz’s character that they love her so much they’d do anything to keep her from leaving. They offer her the scholarship. Then Jeffrey and Enid come by with their scrapbook and Liz realizes she’s been a real jerk. So she turns down the scholarship because Sweet Valley is “even more magical” than Switzerland.

Give me a break.

Quotes:

“They’ll never let her go. Trust me, Jess. Remember what happened when I wanted to leave school to join Bob Rose’s cruise ship?”

[the next page]

“Remember how concerned we were when Steven wanted to leave school to join his roommate on that cruise ship?”

Right, because going to a prestigious boarding school in Switzerland is the same as dropping out of college to work on a boat.

The Cover: Holy makeup, Liz! It’s a boarding school interview, not an audition at the strip club.

Does Sweet Valley even have a strip club?

The moral of the story: 1.) A Wakefield twin can change even the most racist jackass’s opinion about Americans. 2.) It’s okay to steal your sister’s boyfriend as long as you really love him. 3.) Just because two people look the same doesn’t mean they are the same. (This lesson has to be taught to Steven, the dumbass brother of identical twins who are like night and day.)

Best Outfit: Jessica – “a pair of velour jogging pants and a loose, man-tailored shirt.” She also wears a pair of stirrup pants later.

Synopsis:

Well, the twins are off to France for a ten day student exchange organized by Ms. Dalton. On the plane, Liz looks at a picture of the family they’ll be staying with and Jessica teases her for having a crush on the seventeen-year-old in the picture. He’s wearing very tight jeans, but Liz insists she’s not interested. Then for some reason they start talking about Cara and Steven’s new relationship and how Enid can’t go to France because she has to stay home and babysit.

When they arrive in France, Avery Glize and her son René – he of the tight jeans – pick them up at the airport and it soon becomes clear that René is a big ol’ jerkface who hates Americans. Liz decides she finds him “as attractive as an algebra exam.” He says some mean things and his mother scolds him and they have a big argument in front of the twins.

Meanwhile, in Sweet Valley, Steven is getting along swimmingly with René’s sister Ferney. This is because Ferney looks exactly like Tricia Martin. Not only that, but she likes science, just like Tricia did. Ah, jeez. He feels a strong attraction to Ferney and feels bad for Cara, but then rationalizes his feelings with all kinds of thoughts about how Cara would understand and he’s only attracted to Ferney because she looks so much like Tricia and really there’s nothing to worry about. Yeah, right. We’ll see. Ned and Alice are worried about Steve, but they decide the best course of action is to do nothing and let Steve come to them when he needs to. Man, they are really excellent parents. Steve starts ignoring Cara’s calls and spending all his time with Ferney.

Liz and Jessica go jogging, but Jessica turns back after a while because she’s tired. She meets a boy named Marc. He’s kind of funny looking, but Jessica thinks he’ll do. They agree to meet in an hour for him to take her to the beach. It ends up being a nude beach and Jessica is all excited about not having tan lines. Back at the house, Liz overhears an argument between Avery and René. René doesn’t want to take the twins out and show them around. He says some things about selfish Americans and something about his father leaving and Liz doesn’t put two and two together and figure out that René’s father was an American who left the family at some point. Let’s see if I’m right. Oh, it only takes her ten pages to deduce that! Well done, Liz. René reluctantly takes Liz out to meet his friends at a café, and while he’s in the bathroom, his friends confirm her suspicions about his father. They also stick up for Liz when René humiliates and makes fun of her. He kind of freaks out when Liz asks if they can go to the beach. He’s a real jackass.

Back at the house, Liz goes outside to write in her diary and finds a lost puppy. She figures out where he lives and takes him to his owner, who turns out to be a countess. She invites Liz in and they have a marvelous chat. She goes back the next day and meets the countess’s grandson, Jean-Claude, who is, of course, gorgeous. Jean-Claude tells Liz that René’s best friend died a couple years ago while René was swimming with him. So now Liz understands why he was all pissed off about the beach and she’s all torn about him. Is he an asshole or is he just a tortured soul? Either way, he’s treating you like crap, Liz, so just leave him alone.

Liz has plans to go out with Jean-Claude again, but Avery calls and asks her to run an errand for her. When Jean-Claude gets to the house, Jessica falls in love with him on sight and pretends to be Liz to go out with him. Liz gets home and has an argument with René because he’s a jackass, but then she feels bad for him and tries to reach out. He rejects her efforts because he’s a jackass. The next day, she tries to get him to read a letter from his father and is just starting to get through to him when Jessica flounces in and says something really mean about René being afraid of water. The moment’s over and René leaves the room in a huff.

Back in Sweet Valley, Steven finally introduces Ferney to his friend David, a French student. When David starts translating for them, Steve is shocked to learn that Ferney is more interested in lipstick and fashion magazines than science and books. He wises up and realizes Cara’s soul is more like Tricia’s, even though she doesn’t look like her. Steve hasn’t really learned anything here if he thinks he needs his new girlfriend to have Tricia’s soul. I hate Steven.

Funny-looking Marc shows up to ask Jessica to go to an art exhibit, but Jessica is out so Liz goes with him instead. Of course, she handles it correctly, explaining to Marc that she’s not Jessica but that she’d like to accompany him. At the exhibit they meet a girl named Veronique and the three of them hit it off. When Liz gets back to the Glizes’ house around five, she’s concerned that Jessica isn’t back yet. She said she’d be home at three-thirty. At seven Liz is starting to get panicky when René comes home and says Jessica is with Jean-Claude. Liz calls the countess and finds out Jean-Claude took Jessica sailing. There’s a horrible storm raging outside, so Liz is all freaked out. She asks René for his help and he drives her to the beach where he puts aside his hydrophobia and jumps into the water with Liz to help her save Jessica and Jean-Claude. When Jessica comes to, Liz can see the love on her face when she looks at Jean-Claude (gag) so she introduces herself to Jean-Claude as Jessica, thereby letting Jessica get away with pretending to be her to steal her boyfriend. I HATE when Liz is a doormat. UGH.

Jessica ends up coming clean to Jean-Claude and he still loves her. René apologizes to Liz for acting like a piece of crap and they make a date for the next day. Steven apologizes to Cara and she takes him back and everything is just terrific.

Quotes:

His tightly fitting jeans were unmistakably French.

What the hell do French jeans look like and how does Liz know?

If only Jean-Claude would quit calling her Elizabeth. It was the one dark cloud in an otherwise flawless day. But she couldn’t tell him the truth. Not now, at least. It was still too soon. She would have to wait until he was so much in love that he wouldn’t care who she was.

I hate Jessica.

“I know you think I’m like that, the kind of person to meddle in other people’s business, but that’s not true.”

Since when, Liz?

He kept anticipating Tricia’s wit, intelligence, and maturity in Ferney’s answers, and he was getting none of that. Perhaps he was asking the wrong questions.

Perhaps. Or perhaps she’s not Tricia, you psycho.

Jessica and the Number 137:

“Look, I’ve thanked you a hundred and thirty-seven times for pulling me out of there, and I appreciate your concern, but I’m absolutely fine.”

The Cover: Jessica looks like she’s doing some kind of evil villain laugh and Liz looks like she’s found something shocking in her little France booklet there. And why is she dressed like an old woman?

The moral of the story: All you have to do to get into Jessica’s good graces and secure your spot on the cheerleading squad is attempt suicide.

The Big Deal: Everyone goes to the Beach Disco. I can’t decide if this is a party or a dance or what.

Synopsis: So, Annie Whitman lives with her single mother, who had Annie when she was only sixteen. You know what that means in Sweet Valley: trouble. Lack of a normal two-parent home has made Annie a slut. She goes out with a different boy every night. She probably even has sex, though it’s unclear. She and her mother live in an apartment, rather than a nice split-level ranch home. That’s how you know they aren’t the sort of people you want to hang around with. Mrs. Whitman’s boyfriend, a greasy jackass who flirts with Liz, lives there too.

Annie wants to be on the cheerleading squad more than anything in the world. But Jessica can’t let someone like that on the squad! What would everyone think? Most of the rest of the book consists of Elizabeth doing her damnedest to get Annie on the squad and Jessica trying equally hard to keep her off. All the while, Annie herself has no idea that she has a reputation that has earned her the nickname Easy Annie. Is she mentally challenged? How can she not know that if you go out with lots of different boys nobody wants to be friends with you? Wait, I seem to recall that Jessica goes out with lots of boys, too…

When Annie finds out she’s one of the eight finalists she tells Liz that she’s going to cut back on dating. She used to feel like she needed all that attention from boys, but now that she’s got cheerleading, she feels better about herself and blah, blah, blah. Really? It only takes sixty-two pages and a cheerleading tryout to undo all the whatever that made you that way in the first place?

Thrown in just for fun is a scene at Todd’s house. Elizabeth doesn’t want to tell him what’s bothering her for some reason and Todd gets all weird and accuses her of being interested in another guy. They make up on the next page. Todd’s mother is inexplicably baking a cake.

When it comes time to vote on the new cheerleaders, Jessica tells the squad she’ll quit if they vote Annie in. Annie has a fit about not being chosen and Ricky Capaldo tells her it was all Jessica’s doing. She disappears for a few days and then Ricky calls Liz to tell her Annie’s tried to kill herself. Seriously.

The twins race to the hospital where they meet Ricky. Jessica is feeling sorry for herself for having caused such a horrible thing. The doctor tells Mrs. Whitman that Annie has no will to live. Upon hearing this, Jessica tells the doctor everything, explaining her part in what happened. And instead of telling her that nobody can be blamed for a suicide except the victim, he tells her to tell Annie she can be a cheerleader.

Are you fucking kidding me?

Anyway…

So Annie’s on the squad, she and Ricky are boyfriend and girlfriend, Mrs. Whitman breaks up with her slimy boyfriend and everyone lives happily ever after. The end.

Quotes:

Elizabeth tried to imagine what life would be like without her mother and father. Impossible, that’s what! She was so proud of her tall, dark-haired, good-looking father…

Is it sad that the adjectives she uses to describe her father all pertain to his looks? Really, at sixteen, did we care in the least how attractive our parents were?

The Surfers’ Waves began whipping up a foam of music, and Todd and Elizabeth happily plunged into the rhythm…

*facepalm* Oh come on! I can’t decide if it would be better if this was done on purpose or not.

“How could they do this?” he snapped suddenly, sitting up. “What kind of stuck-up, mean kids could do this to a poor, scared girl?”

Jessica was crying now, tears running down her face.

Ricky saw her and slumped back into his chair. “Oh, no, Jess, I didn’t mean it. I – you – I don’t know what I’m saying!”

No, Ricky! Come on, give her hell! For once, someone knows for certain that Jessica really fucked up, but even when she’s caused an attempted suicide she’s too perfect to be called out on it.

“Mrs. Whitman, I don’t know why your daughter did this to herself, but she seems to have no will to live.”

Laughing hysterically, all I can think of is the doctor on South Park saying, “he needs more time.”

Jessica and the number 137

“The two of us together would be sensational!” she’d told Elizabeth at least a hundred and thirty-seven times. p. 2

The Cover: We have to talk about this cover. First of all, is that really Annie Whitman, the chick who’s supposed to be so beautiful that she turns heads wherever she goes? She looks like a reject from Fame or something. And what’s with Jessica’s expression? Either that’s her evil “I’ll get you, my pretty” face, or the artist started drawing Liz but threw a SVH cheerleading sweater on her when he found out what the tag line was going to be. And if you look carefully, you can see a tear rolling down Annie’s cheek. Go on, click on it. I linked it to a larger image just so you could see for yourselves.

The moral of the story: You can go from fat and ugly to skinny and hot, become co-captain of the cheerleading squad, learn to be a bitch, win Miss Sweet Valley High and snub a sorority. And you can do it all in 150 pages.

Dance: Discomarathon

Synopsis:

Robin Wilson’s mother calls Liz begging for her help. She says Robin is going to drop out of school because she thinks she’s so unpopular, but a nomination into Pi Beta Alpha would solve all her worries. She stops herself before actually asking Liz to nominate her. Robin comes over to drop off some books for Jessica. She totally doesn’t mind running errands for her because she thinks she and Jessica are best friends. Liz knows Jessica is never going to nominate Robin, so she offers to do it herself.

So Liz puts Robin’s name up and Jessica, Lila and Cara go to Robin’s house to tell her the news. Jessica tells her to meet them after school the next day to start her first pledge. Robin is so excited she eats an entire cherry cheesecake. The next day, Liz is horrified when she goes to the track after school to find a bunch of other kids watching Robin jogging. She has to do five laps every day for a week while everyone heckles her.

Robin manages to survive her week of jogging, and her next task is to put on a bikini and play volleyball on the beach on Saturday. She doesn’t think she can do it, but Liz tells her it’ll be fine. She says she and Enid are going with Todd and George and says Robin can be on their team. With Liz’s help, Robin makes it through the day, but her next task will be impossible: she has to get Bruce Patman to take her to the upcoming Discomarathon dance. Liz tells Bruce she’ll write an article about him for the Oracle if he takes Robin to the dance. He does take her, but then deposits her in the middle of the dance floor and walks away. Robin runs to the restroom, and Liz runs after her. She tries to convince Robin she has a pretty face, but Robin’s not buying it. She runs out the door, determined never to come back to school again. Liz starts to go after her, but Enid says Todd is about to beat up Bruce. Liz wants to stop him, so she gets some nerdy kid named Allen Walters to go get Robin. He catches up to her in the parking lot and gets her to come back inside with him. They dance together and then Allen takes Robin home. Aw, how sweet.

The Pi Beta Alphas hold a vote on Robin, and Jessica blackballs her. The twins meet Robin at Casey’s Place to tell her the news. She doesn’t take it very well. She says there’s “no reason for me to go on,” and leaves in tears. Liz is disgusted with Jessica and she writes an article for the paper about snobbery at Sweet Valley High. Robin doesn’t come back to school right away, but Mrs. Wilson calls Liz after a while and says Robin was visiting an aunt in L.A., but she’s back now and doesn’t want to talk to anyone.

When Robin comes back to school, she walks around like a robot, not talking to anyone and being really bitchy and cold to anyone who talks to her. She runs on the track every morning and afternoon, and Liz notices that she’s losing weight. Unable to stop herself from interfering, she asks Robin if she’s starving herself and then says she thinks Robin is just terrific.

So now that Robin is hot and thin, she starts to be less of a bitch. She tries out for the cheerleading squad and is named co-captain with Jessica, Bruce starts following her around everywhere, and she even wins the title of Miss Sweet Valley High. When she’s crowned football queen, she disses Bruce and asks Allen to be her escort. Good for you, Robin.

My biggest problem with this book is the complete personality change in Robin. When she’s fat she seems mentally challenged (“Omigod, Jessica is my best friend!”). Then she gets thin and acts like a zombie for a while. When she gets over it, she talks about her old self like she’s a totally different person. Ugh, what kind of character development is that?

While we all love a good story about retribution and revenge, the B story was pretty interesting, too. Lila’s been shoplifting to get daddy’s attention. It all gets straightened out by Liz when mall security gets involved (because even though they don’t like each other, Lila called her first, of course), and everyone lives happily ever after.

Quotes:

“My mom is soooooo excited! She always told me that being best friends with the Wakefield twins could be great for me,” [Robin] gushed.

Of course she did.

She had been awake much of the night, unable to forget her suspicions. Should she confront Jessica about the gifts from Lila?

Really? That kept her up all night? Ah, Liz. You and your damn morals.

The day after her confrontation with Jessica, Elizabeth decided to make it up to Todd by getting him a special gift for his birthday…She’d get him a really nice new band.

Just what every high school boy wants, a watchband. How special! And how nice of Liz to make up for a fight with Jessica by getting a gift for her boyfriend. What?

“You’re too much, Liz. You know that? You can’t see the rottenness in anybody! She’s the one who blackballed me.”

“Jessica? No!” Elizabeth couldn’t bear for Robin to be so hurt, so disillusioned. “She was your friend!”

Wasn’t Liz the first one to point out that Jessica was only using Robin? Sometimes Elizabeth’s twin worship can be a little much.

“If you never expect too much, you’ll never be disappointed.”

That’s right, Robin. Teach everyone that if they just keep their standards low, they, too, can become beautiful and popular and win contests.

Jessica and the number 137

“Robin can get carried away four hundred and thirty-seven times a day, you know?” p. 14

“She’s taking about thirty-seven extra courses.” p. 16

“And everybody knows we have thirty-seven dollars and fifty cents in the treasury, so there’s no need for a treasurer’s report.” p. 19

“Maybe if she ran around the track about a hundred and thirty-seven times a day for the next five years, she might lose some of that fat!” p. 29

“Oh, my head is going to burst into at least five hundred and thirty-seven pieces!” p. 50

“If I told her once, I told her eight hundred and thirty-seven times that blimps were not popular people!” p. 83

Nothing but the usual hundred and thirty-seven disasters and boring business and politics. p. 123

“Bruce Patman is the jerkiest person in thirty-seven states and Mexico.” p. 124

“Oh, Liz, that nonsense is about seven hundred and thirty-seventh on my list of concerns.” p. 148

The moral of the story: If you mess with Elizabeth, she will make you dance with Winston Egbert.

The Big Deal: Some unnamed fall dance at which Jessica gets crowned queen, party at Lila’s

Synopsis:

Enid is freaking out. She’s suddenly sure her new boyfriend, Ronnie, is going to break up with her. When Liz asks why, Enid reveals her dark past. Enid used to take drugs (gasp!) and, because this is Sweet Valley, her wild days ended when she and her drug-buddy George went joyriding and hit a kid. Enid and George have been pen pals for the last two years and now George is coming to Sweet Valley for a visit. Ronnie is a jealous asshat and Enid is sure he’ll break up with her just for having a male friend, so she makes Liz promise to keep George and Enid’s past with him a secret.

Let’s just get one thing straight: Ronnie is a jerk. And Enid apparently knows it, but she’s so in love with him that it doesn’t matter.

There’s a dance coming up. Jessica wants to be crowned queen because she’s sure Bruce Patman will be king and then he’ll have to notice her. Enid is her only competition and normally this wouldn’t worry Jessica. But Ronnie is head of the dance committee, so Jessica is afraid that he’ll somehow get people to vote for his girlfriend. Jessica finds one of George’s letters to Enid in Liz’s room, and she figures the best way to make sure she’s crowned queen is to ruin Enid’s life. She shows Ronnie the letter and then he breaks up with Enid. This plan has the added benefit of making Enid think Elizabeth betrayed her. Jessica is never happier than when Liz has no friends but her. Then Jessica goes to a party at Lila’s and gets Ronnie to agree to go to the dance with her.

Meanwhile, there’s a terrible rumor going around that Ms. Dalton, the French teacher, is having an affair with Ken Matthews. Ms. Dalton stays home from school for a few days, but Enid feels like she really needs some advice so she goes to her apartment to get it. Ms. Dalton tells Enid to hold her head high and go to the dance even if people are talking about her. So Enid goes home and starts getting ready, and then who should show up unexpectedly but George Warren. He takes Enid to the dance and everyone thinks he’s the most gorgeous guy they’ve ever seen.

Liz has figured out that Jessica is the one who told Ronnie about George, so to get even she makes sure Jessica and Winston are crowned king and queen at the dance. Jessica is humiliated when she has to dance with the geekiest kid in school. Enid apologizes to Liz for being such a bitch, and everyone is happy. Except Jessica.

Quotes:

Elizabeth hugged her best friend, forgetting the fact that they were both covered in chocolate-chip cookie batter. Enid Rollins was spending the night at the Wakefields’, and Elizabeth had initiated Project C. C. Cookie in the hope it would distract Enid from whatever it was she’d been so jumpy about all evening.

Liz is so perfect. She makes cookies…

But the best thing about him was that he didn’t give a darn whether he was popular or not.

…she has the niftiest boyfriend…

Elizabeth went back to her room and to the book she was reading, but she couldn’t seem to concentrate. She was thinking about Enid, worrying over the fact that she hadn’t called.

…her concern for her friends knows no bounds…

Elizabeth relented at the sincerity in her sister’s tone. “I’m sorry, Jess,” she said. “I know you’re just trying to help.”

…she worships her twin sister…

Among other things, Jessica had led him to believe her sister was too busy dating other boys to bother with him. She’d told Elizabeth a story about Todd attacking her, when all he’d done was reluctantly kiss her on the cheek…

Elizabeth defended her twin. “Jessica means well…”

…a little too much.

Jessica and the number 137

“Your room is already so disgustingly neat. It’ll take a hundred and thirty-seven years to clean up mine,” she wailed. p. 87

Best outfit: Dana Larson – “tight black velvet jeans, a pair of sparkly pink leg warmers, and a purple satin blouse”

The cover: Sorry about the cover, I don’t know why someone would scribble on a book with a marker.

The moral of the story: If your twin sister is a psychopath, just keep letting her be a psychopath.

The Big Deal: the Phi Epsilon – Pi Beta Alpha dance

Synopsis:

The series opens with Jessica staring in the mirror, complaining about how fat and ugly she is. This affords the narrator the opportunity to tell us that Jessica and Elizabeth are, in fact, the most spectacular looking identical twins in the whole world. I feel like throwing up already.

Liz has a major crush on Todd Wilkins and he seems to like her, too. They agree to meet after school one day, but Liz ends up running late. She gets out to the parking lot just as Todd drives off with Jessica, who thinks Todd is totally hunky. The next day, the whole school is buzzing with the news that Todd and Jessica are the hottest new couple in town. Jessica  tries to hint to Todd that she wants him to take her to the upcoming fraternity/sorority dance, but Todd just keeps asking if Liz has a date. Jessica gets pissed and implies that Liz always has a date, if you know what I mean. Then she stalks away and decides to walk home to see if she can get some horny guys to notice her swinging her hips.

Seventeen-year-old Rick Andover, who dropped out of school six months ago, pulls over and offers Jessica a ride. He takes her home, saying he makes it a point to “know where all the foxiest chicks in Sweet Valley live,” (creeper) and tells her he’s taking her out the next night. Jessica is thrilled with this attention. Rick takes her to Kelly’s Roadhouse, the baddest bar in town, and proceeds to get drunk and start a fight. A cop shows up and takes Jessica home, calling her Elizabeth as she gets out of the car. Caroline Pearce hears this and tells everyone at school that Elizabeth was at Kelly’s with Rick Andover and started a riot. Liz tells everyone she never went there, but nobody believes her, despite the fact that she has an identical twin who would totally do something like that.

Liz’s best friend, Enid, has her knickers in a twist because the new guy, Ronnie Edwards, has asked her to the dance. Things are just swell between them, but Ronnie believes Liz was at Kelly’s and doesn’t think Enid should talk to her anymore. Todd believes it, too, especially after hearing Jessica’s stories about how many guys Liz has gone out with. But when Jessica confesses to Todd that it was actually her at the bar, he thinks she’s covering up for Liz. Then he kisses her for being so noble and asks her to the dance.

Todd spends the entire dance watching Liz, and at the end of the night he kisses Jessica on the cheek. Now she’s super pissed and wants to “get even.” She goes upstairs and tells Liz that Todd “tried everything” and she had to beg him to stop grabbing her. Over the next few days, Todd tries to talk to Liz and tell her he forgives her for seeing Rick Andover (insert big eye-roll here), but Liz is ignoring him because she thinks he tried to have his way with Jessica.

One night, the twins are driving home from the Dairi Burger together when they realize they’re being followed by another car. At a stop light, Rick Andover pushes the twins over and jumps into the driver’s seat of their mother’s Fiat. He’s totally drunk and decides he wants to take them to Kelly’s. He drives them through the Dairi Burger’s parking lot, and Todd can see the twins are terrified. He gets in his car and follows Rick and the twins to Kelly’s, then he beats up Rick and gets the twins home. Jessica says something about never wanting to see the inside of Kelly’s again, and Todd realizes she was telling the truth about Liz having never gone there. Todd and Liz work out all the lies Jessica has told them, and then they kiss.

In a subplot, the Fowlers and the Patmans are having some stupid feud over the football field. The school board stupidly let the lease on it run out, so now the Richie Riches are trying to buy it. Ned Wakefield is a lawyer on the case, working to keep the field in the hands of the high school. The football field storyline is good for only one thing: to make the twins suspect their father of having an affair with his partner when he works late on the case. He’s not.

Sadly, there was no drama at the dance in this book. All that happened was that Todd and Jessica were terrific dancers and the rest of the students cleared the floor for them in true 1980s fashion.

Also, the twins get into the Pi Beta Alpha sorority.

Quotes:

“This sounds like a job for my new tuxedo shirt,” Elizabeth offered…

“Could I wear the pants too? … And the little bow tie?”

Oh, the eighties, how fashion misguided they were!

“I’m sure you’ll be allowed to drive again soon,” she said encouragingly.

But Jessica wasn’t listening to a word. She was out of the car in a flash, slamming the door so hard that Elizabeth winced.

[The next page:]

She threw her arms around Elizabeth and gave her a swift, powerful hug, almost lifting her off the ground.

“I’ve decided to forgive you,” she announced, beaming.

…

Then she shoved her hand into her pocket to feel the car keys. They were gone! And then she remembered Jessica’s sudden hug – that was when she had filched the keys.

This was my first inkling that something was seriously wrong with Jessica’s mental state. Mood swings, trickery, bursts of anger…

“My whole life is going to go right down the tubes! How could he do this, Lizzie?” She began to cry… “Our brother, a member of the Wakefield family, has been spending every weekend…with Betsy Martin! …I will be totally ruined forever when this gets around school!”

…narcissism…

She didn’t like Elizabeth being close friends with anyone but her.

…possessiveness…

Elizabeth wondered how her sister could possibly descend from cloud nine with Todd Wilkins to the pits of depression so fast – and simply because she had to do a little thing like help fix dinner.

…manic depression…

No guy – not even Todd Wilkins – could take Jessica Wakefield to a dance and treat her like a piece of furniture. He wasn’t going to get away with it, she vowed.

…and a vengeful mind.

“I can’t ever stay angry with you…”

And that about sums up Liz, loyal to an insane sister who spreads lies about her, steals the boy she likes and lets rumors that she’d been arrested go uncontested.

Jessica and the number 137

“You’ve got to be seven hundred and thirty-seven kinds of idiot not to be excited about associating with the best girls at Sweet Valley High.” p. 35

“He has got to be the most wonderful boy in a hundred and thirty-seven states!” p. 108

“This family has got to be the biggest bummer in five hundred and thirty-seven cities!” p. 111

“I’ll never forgive you, not if I live to be a hundred and thirty-seven years-” p. 182