Shannon's Sweet Valley High Blog

The Moral of the Story: If you work too much, your boyfriend is going to make out with some other chick.

Synopsis:

Andy is starting to get seriously annoying. He picks up Six for a date and gets totally flustered because she’s showing a little cleavage. And not just flustered, but scared. He still doesn’t know exactly how he feels about her so he’s basically afraid to be alone with her because then she might try to make out with him or something. In the car after dinner, Six starts unbuttoning her shirt and Andy just about has a heart attack. He goes to sleep that night wondering why he’s not attracted to Six. Andy, I’d like you to meet Tom McKay. I think you two might have a lot in common.

Conner is still being a whiny little bitch about Liz’s job. And I guess he kind of has a reason to be: his mom is coming home from rehab and he really wants Liz to be there for moral support the night before she gets there. Surprise, surprise, Liz has to work, so Conner walks over to Tia’s in the pouring rain. Tia gives him some of Angel’s old sweats to change into while Conner’s clothes dry, and they start talking about the fact that Conner’s afraid of what his mom is going to be like. They’re sitting very close together and looking very intense when Liz suddenly bursts in to surprise Conner. She gets a little weirded out when Tia and Conner nervously say they were just talking.

Ken’s father’s girlfriend, Asha, apologizes to Ken for her and Mr. Matthews missing the awards banquet on Friday night. She insists on making dinner for the Matthews men on Monday night. Maria comes over and gets along great with Asha, but then Ken’s dad calls and says he has to work late and won’t be able to make it. Asha looks really disappointed and Ken is pissed at his dad because it seems like he’s just avoiding his girlfriend. He’s a senior reporter and he should have been able to delegate the assignment that made him miss dinner.  A couple days later, Ken wakes up in the morning feeling really good about his father’s relationship, but when he goes down to breakfast, some woman who is not Asha is hanging out in Mr. Matthews’ bathrobe. Gross.

Andy goes on a couple more dates with Six, but it’s becoming increasingly obvious to him that he’s just not at all attracted to her. He does have a great time talking to Six’s brother, Travis, but doesn’t think anything of it until he notices himself checking Travis out and his heart actually skips a beat. He eventually comes to terms with the possibility that he might be gay, and he manages to break things off with Six without hurting her too much.

Tia comes to the mall the next day to see Liz on her break, and she gets really uncomfortable when Liz starts interrogating her about what she and Conner were talking about the night before. Liz is really upset that she’s not involved in every aspect of Conner’s life, and she’s a little jealous of the closeness Conner and Tia share. Meanwhile, Conner’s mother comes home and actually seems better. She cooks for the first time in years and makes Conner’s favorite dinner. Conner is feeling pretty good about this and calls Liz later to tell her all about it. Mrs. Wakefield says Liz is at work, so Conner sighs and calls Tia. They meet at House of Java, and Tia can’t believe how upbeat and happy Conner seems. She gives him a hug and is shocked when she feels a less than platonic emotion.

Maria decides to stick her nose in where it doesn’t belong and tell Conner that Liz is feeling insecure about him talking to Tia and not her about all his home stuff. Conner dwells on it all day and gets angrier and angrier that Liz has been talking to Maria about what’s going on with his mom. They’re supposed to go out that night, but Conner calls and says he’s sick because he doesn’t want to deal with her. He goes to Tia’s instead and they fall asleep watching a movie. They wake up facing each other in the morning and suddenly start kissing. They both think maybe they should stop, but it just feels too good. Inevitably, Liz barges in (doesn’t she ever knock?) and starts crying when she sees them. Then Mrs. Ramirez comes into the room and sees Conner and Tia in bed together. This is bad news, folks.

The Cover: This is the cheesiest picture. Does Liz’s hat say “LOL?” And I hate Conner’s stupid face. And Maria’s. I think this is the worst one yet.

The Moral of the Story: If you have to keep telling yourself you’re over it, you’re probably not actually over it.

The Big Deal: Swim meet, athletic awards ceremony

Synopsis:

Ken Matthews goes to take a shower one morning and finds the bathroom door locked and the shower running. This is odd because he and his father live alone and Mr. Matthews is usually out of the bathroom by this time. Ken knocks on the door and a woman in a bathrobe opens it. She introduces herself as Asha and says she’s heard a lot about him.  And bad parenting rears its ugly head once more. Ken isn’t sure how he feels about his dad having a girlfriend.

Liz and Conner have a really pointless fight about Jessica ditching Evan at the Riot the other night. I don’t know, Conner’s pissed because he thinks Jessica’s being snobby or something. It’s really stupid. Everyone teases Jessica at lunch and accuses her of not liking Evan because he dresses grungy. Whatever, who cares? Jessica is sick of people acting like she’s so shallow, so to get everyone to back off, she announces that she’s going to ask Evan out. She finds him after school and is dismayed to see him looking especially grungy, but she asks him to go out with her the next night. He says yes and Jessica is surprised to realize she’s actually excited about the date.

Andy is still freaking out about Six kissing him and he tries to avoid her. Tia says he needs to tell Six he’s not interested, so Andy marches off to do just that. When he finds her, she puts his arms around her and Andy starts to think maybe this having-a-girlfriend thing might not be so bad.

Ken gets a call from Dan Murphy at the Tribune, which is where his father and Asha work. Mr. Murphy wants to know if Ken will be able to receive his award at the athletic awards ceremony the Tribune hosts. He’s won the spirit award for rejoining the team to cheer from the bench after being MVP last year. Ken is upset that his father didn’t tell him about the award and he’s sure this lack of communication is somehow Asha’s fault. A few days later, Ken finds a card in his backpack from Asha, congratulating him on the award. Seems like a pretty sweet thing to do, but Ken is pissed that she invaded his space and is breaking up his little family. Whine, whine, whine. He tries to talk to his dad about it, but Mr. Matthews is unresponsive and tells Ken to mind his own business.

Evan takes Jessica to some weird health food restaurant because he wants to “challenge” her. He really likes putting her in uncomfortable situations to see how she’ll react. When she turns out not to be just a dumb blonde, he’s totally surprised. What a guy. Jackass.

Conner’s acting like he’s pissed about Liz’s job. He clenches his jaw moodily and tenses up whenever Liz mentions going to work. He feels like she’s spreading herself too thin and missing out on what’s “really important.” Meaning him, I guess. Evan asks Conner and Liz if they want to come to his swim meet, and Conner gets all agitated when Liz says she’d like to go. Andy starts talking to Conner about his date with Six and looking for advice about dating, and Conner tells him to run. What is this guy’s deal?

Jessica, Tia and a few other cheerleaders go to Evan’s meet and cheer him on as he wins two races. The whole time, Jessica thinks about how different this is from football and pats herself on the back for being so totally over Will. Jessica goes to work that night and Jeremy tells her he’s getting one of the Tribune’s athletic awards. He asks Jessica to go to the banquet with him. She tells him she’s kind of seeing someone, but he says he still wants her to go as a friend, no pressure. Jessica mentally berates herself for breaking up with such a nice guy to go out with Will. She says she’ll go with him, and tells Evan the next morning. He doesn’t take it very well. He says he wants to “cool it” with Jessica until she can stop being a flake. He and Conner go out and play pool that night to try to forget about the Wakefields.

Jessica goes to the banquet the next night and almost chokes when she sees Evan walk in with some really hot chick on his arm. Jeremy notices her staring at Evan when he accepts an award for swimming, and he says she should go talk to him. Dammit, Jessica, why can’t you just love Jeremy? He’s such a nice guy! Evan asks Jessica about the ex she arrived with. Will is there, too, so Jessica is having a very “this is your life” moment. She starts crying when Evan asks her who she really wants to be with. Meanwhile, Ken is pissed when his father never shows up, and even more pissed when his dad’s boss says he overheard Mr. Matthews making a dinner reservation for that night.

After the banquet, Jessica and Liz go to the Riot. Conner and Liz make up, so that’s all good. For now. Andy makes Six angry when he dances with Tia and leaves Six alone with Conner. She tells Andy she wanted to spend some time alone with him, and he promises to take her on a real date the next day. He isn’t totally sure he really likes Six that way, but I guess he’s going to find out.

The Cover: Blah.

The Moral of the Story: Will Simmons is a douche.

The Big Deal: Big Mesa party

Synopsis:

Liz is pretty much going to be grounded for the rest of her life for sneaking out and going to that party, and she goes to school the next day worried that she acted like an idiot in front of Conner. But surprisingly, Conner is nice. He asks her how she’s doing and then gives her a kiss before going off to class. So I guess they’re a couple now. FINALLY.

Will and Jessica are together, but Jessica really doesn’t like showing it at school. They have an argument at lunch because Will wants to hang out that night but Jessica promised Tia they’d go shopping. Don’t forget, Will’s kind of an ass. Melissa comes out to the courtyard, so Jessica gets up and leaves in a hurry. After school that day, Jessica works her first shift with Jeremy since the breakup. She feels pretty awkward. The phone rings and Jeremy answers it. Of course it’s Will, so Jeremy gets irritated. Jessica tells Will he probably shouldn’t come see her at work tonight.

At lunch the next day, Jessica asks Liz and Conner to double date with her and Will. Nobody actually knows they’re together at this point, so the whole table stares at them and Conner looks like he’s going to pass out. These fucking kids. Liz reminds Jessica that she’s grounded, but Jessica is sure she can talk their parents into letting Liz go. After lunch, Conner tells Liz he doesn’t like Will and isn’t interested in going, but he ends up saying he will if Liz’s parents say it’s okay. It turns out Will isn’t too happy about the idea either, but he tells Jessica it’s fine and if a double date with Liz and Conner is inevitable, they might as well “get it over with.” What a prince. Ned and Alice have a talk with Jessica, and then tell Liz they will unground her if she agrees to get a job, pull up her grades and spend more time on the Oracle. Since Liz has already decided to do all of that, she readily agrees and she and Jessica go upstairs to get ready for their double date.

The date is pretty horrible. Will talks about football all night and then gets annoyed when Jessica asks Conner about his guitar playing. Will doesn’t seem to notice that Jessica is still eating when he says he wants to leave and be alone with her somewhere. Jessica says it would be rude to leave Conner and Liz, but really she’s just sick of Will trying to decide everything about what they do. She tells him she’s not Melissa and she’s not just going to give in to everything he says. Will gets pissed and leaves. When he gets home, his mother tells him Melissa came by and dropped off a box full of stuff he gave her while they were together, including a sweater he gave her as a gift. Will’s a little bummed.

Jessica calls Will on Saturday morning to apologize for the night before and ask him to get together later. He kind of says, “Yeah, sure.” Jessica can tell he’s still upset about her bringing up Melissa, so she’s determined to make their date totally awesome. After talking to Jessica, Will goes to Melissa’s with the sweater. Melissa is outside sunbathing in a string bikini (you know she planned that shit). Will can’t stop staring at her, and he’s depressed when she thanks him for the sweater and then gets up and goes inside. So now, of course, Will can’t stop thinking about Melissa, just like he couldn’t stop thinking about Jessica when Melissa was his girlfriend. I hate this guy. Hate him, hate him, hate him.

So, Will takes Jessica to some Italian restaurant and starts talking about colleges. He says she should apply to a small school because she’ll be happier there, says he’ll sign her up for an SAT prep course (she’s already taken her SATs) and then he orders for her when the waitress comes. She gets upset and tells him to stop doing that, and he says, “Chill out, Melissa!” Smooth. Jessica tells him to take her home.

Conner’s friend, Evan, asks him to go to a Big Mesa party Saturday night. Conner thinks it could be the perfect thing to make him forget about Liz. Ugh, why does he want to forget about her now? I thought they were doing so well. Liz calls and Conner invites her to the party before he can stop himself. He worries he’s turning into a “boyfriend” guy. He’s really annoyed when he gets to Liz’s house and she says her parents want him to come in and say hello. But he deals with it and they go off to the party, taking Jessica with them because Liz didn’t want her sitting around at home all night.

Will wants to apologize to Jessica, but she’s not home. He finds out about the Big Mesa party and drives all the way out there. When he finds Jessica talking to Jeremy, he tries to get her to leave with him. Jessica says she doesn’t want to and this starts a whole thing with Jeremy and his friends. Will invites them all outside where I guess he’s going to beat them all up, but Jessica pleads with him not to fight them. He finally just leaves.

Conner and Liz go into a bedroom to make out for a minute. When they leave, another couple slips in. It’s some tall, good-looking black guy and Tia. Jessica and Jeremy dance together and she realizes how much she misses him and also how mad Will would be if he found out she was dancing with Jeremy. Meanwhile, Will goes to Melissa’s house. Well, that didn’t take long.

The Cover: At no point in this book do Will and Jessica look that happy.

This book apparently used to belong to some girl named Holly (her name is written in sparkly green ink on more than one page). Holly seems confused about someone named Alice. I wonder if White Rabbit was playing while she was reading this book.

Well, Holly, if you’re listening to the song this brings to my mind, the answer is “Jefferson Airplane.”

(As Sarah points out in the comments below, Holly is actually probably looking for Smokie – Living Next Door to Alice. Thanks, Sarah!)

Synopsis:

Jeremy wants to take Jessica out and do something special, but he’s too poor to do anything really awesome. He calls a friend and manages to score free tickets to see Romeo and Juliet at some theater, but Jessica’s useless mother writes down the address wrong when Jeremy calls so Jessica goes to the wrong place and can’t figure out why Jeremy isn’t showing up. They both call Alice and finally meet up at a video arcade. Jessica seems to have fun playing video games and just hanging out, but Jeremy is disappointed that his magical date didn’t turn out the way he wanted. Dude, you’re with a chick who doesn’t mind playing video games all night. Just go with it.

Conner tells Liz he thinks they should cool things off while she deals with Maria. Liz doesn’t like the idea, but is too much of a doormat to disagree with the mighty Conner and his iron will. She calls Maria and leaves a teary message about how sorry she is. Maria doesn’t pick up because she doesn’t want to talk to Liz at all. On Monday morning, Liz sees Maria in the hallway and apologizes again. Maria hardly looks at her when she says whatever, she’s over it. Liz tries to talk to her again the next day, and Maria flat out says she doesn’t want to be friends anymore. Way to go, Maria. FINALLY someone doesn’t want to be friends with Liz just because she’s Liz.

Everyone has heard about Melissa’s suicide attempt and they’re all giving Will their condolences. He’s really annoyed. He goes to the hospital to see Melissa and he gets really pissed when she refers to him as her boyfriend, as though things are just going to go back to normal now. He starts to set her straight, but then a nurse comes in and starts yapping about how having such a devoted boyfriend is really going to help Melissa get back on her feet more quickly. Meanwhile, Cherie and Gina start going off on Jessica at cheerleading practice, telling her it’s all because of her that Melissa tried to kill herself. Jessica has had enough and she totally wails on them. She says she never did anything wrong and she’s sick of their crap. She also says that if they were such great friends of Melissa’s, they would be worrying about their friend right now instead of harassing Jessica. Melissa’s minions seem suitably sheepish.

Jessica and Jeremy go out Tuesday night, but the date is another disaster. The freeway is jammed and the comedy club they try to go to is twenty-one and up, and yes, this is apparently enough to ruin a date. They go for ice cream, and Will is in line in front of them. Things are awkward and tense, and Jeremy can tell there’s something weird between Will and Jessica. Jessica calls Jeremy the next day and invites him to have dinner with her family. Jeremy gets all excited about it, but then his mother says he has to stay home and watch his sisters because she’s been called in to work. When he calls Jessica to tell her, she says maybe their relationship just isn’t meant to be since all their dates keep getting screwed up. What a quitter. Jeremy asks her to give him one more chance and let him take her out Friday night.

When Liz gets home after dinner at Fowler Crest, she runs into Conner in the hallway. He’s pretty much gone back to acting like he doesn’t like her. Liz tells him Maria is still really upset, and Conner says she just needs more time and he and Liz will pick things up again soon. In reality, he’s hoping this reprieve will last a while because, I don’t know, he’s weird about girls. He’s sure things with Liz will just get bad as soon as they start making out on a regular basis again.

Megan (in case you can’t remember because she’s hardly ever mentioned, Megan is Conner’s sister and the reason Liz lives at Conner’s house) has her first article published in the Oracle and she asks Liz to take her to the country club so she can show her mother. When they get there, it’s obvious that Mrs. Sandborn is completely trashed. On their way out the door, someone tells Megan that her mother is no longer welcome at the club, as she’s been warned about her behavior many times. Liz and Megan get her to the car and drive her home. Along the way, Liz remembers all the times Conner went to go pick up his mom in the middle of the night and the excuses he’s made for her. Instead of feeling bad about him having to deal with all that, she’s hurt that he hasn’t trusted her enough to “let her in.” Because it’s all about Liz. When they get home, Conner comes running out of the house all in a tizzy. He yells at Megan for “surprising Mom” and then at Liz for interfering. Then he carries his mother inside. Later, after holding his mom’s hair while she throws up for a while, he tells Liz he doesn’t want her to live there anymore. Liz throws some clothes in a backpack and hits the mean streets of El Carro, but she really doesn’t have anywhere to go. Luckily, Jessica is driving around the neighborhood because Megan called her. She takes Liz back to Fowler Crest.

Will goes over to Melissa’s house when she gets out of the hospital on Friday. He tells her he meant it when he said he didn’t want to be with her anymore and she’s just going to have to accept it. She goes nuts. She punches him in the face and starts throwing things at him. He manages to get out the door just as Melissa tries to break a mirror with his face. It’s not the best breakup, but Will feels pretty good now that it’s over and done with. Uh, yeah. I’d be afraid of her breaking into my house and stabbing me in my sleep.

Will decides he needs to makes things right with Jessica now. When he gets to Fowler Crest, he sees Jeremy driving off and Jessica waving goodbye to him with a dreamy expression on her face. Will is dismayed when he realizes she’s just been on a fabulous date. He runs up to her and apologizes for everything. I guess Jessica is still feeling good from her date because she accepts his apology.

Somewhere along the way, Jessica and Tia try out for a school play.

The Cover: I don’t feel comfortable looking at teenagers kissing at this zoom level.

The Big Deal: Football game

Synopsis:

Jessica wakes up totally depressed on Saturday morning because Jeremy never came after her when she ran out of the party last night. Meanwhile, poor Jeremy is at the hospital. His father is awake, but he still looks like crap. There’s a football game that afternoon and Jeremy’s dad is for some reason adamant that Jeremy get out of the hospital and play in the game. Jeremy has no intention of playing that afternoon, but he tells his dad he will.

Liz calls Maria and asks her to go to brunch. Maria picks her up and says she wants to ask Liz something about Conner. Liz is sure Maria found out about the kiss, but Maria just says she saw Liz’s crappy love poem about him. Liz makes something up and somehow gets Maria to believe the poem wasn’t about Conner and that she still doesn’t like him. When Maria drops her off, Liz tries to tell Conner they should stay away from each other because she doesn’t want to hurt Maria. Then they make out a little.

When Melissa wakes up and goes downstairs on Saturday, Will is sitting in her kitchen. She assumes he’s there to apologize for leaving her at the party, but he instead tells her he’s breaking up with her. Will leaves, and Melissa puts on her cheerleading uniform and gets ready for the game. By the time she gets to the school, she’s convinced herself that everyone is going to know she was dumped and they’ll all be laughing at her. During the game, it becomes clear that nobody knows. She finds Will after the game and says she assumes he didn’t tell anyone because he’s having second thoughts. Will says sorry, but no. He just wanted her to be able to tell her friends in her own time. Melissa is appalled. She makes Will promise not to tell anyone until she’s told her friends.

Liz goes to Riot with Tia, Andy, Angel and Maria, and she gets all freaked out when Conner shows up and sits down next to her. When he asks her to dance, she says she needs something to drink. She goes to the bar and Maria goes with her, ranting the whole time about how Conner is such a jerk to ask Liz to dance when he knows she doesn’t like him. While Maria is at the bar with her back turned, Conner comes up to Liz and takes her upstairs to the makeout room. After they kiss for a while, Liz says they need to go back downstairs because Maria, Maria, Maria. Conner gets annoyed and storms off.

Melissa goes to a victory party and tries to avoid Will most of the night. Suddenly, her stupid friend Cherie comes up to her, dragging Will along behind her. Cherie says she’s noticed Will and Melissa haven’t spoken all night and she wants them to make up and dance. Melissa asks Will to dance with her just once to keep up appearances, and in his protests he makes it clear he’s been planning to break up with Melissa for a while. She starts shouting and making a scene, so now everyone knows Will dumped her. She leaves the party, humiliated.

Jeremy and his mother go home to get a few hours of sleep, and then they have dinner together. Mrs. Aames mentions that Jeremy’s father needs to get a job because she thinks the not working and not providing is what stressed him out and made him sick. Jeremy freaks out because he thinks everyone should be taking care of his father and not trying to force him to work. He’s incredibly childish as he runs out the door and drives to the hospital to spend the night in a chair in his father’s room.

At two in the morning, Conner goes to Tia’s house and taps on her window to tell her he’s been messing around with Elizabeth and to ask her advice about it. Tia tells him to let Liz handle the Maria situation in her own way. At the same time, Liz goes to Fowler Crest and wakes up Jessica to do the same thing. Jessica tells her to tell Maria what’s going on.

When Jessica goes to work on Sunday morning and finds out Jeremy called in sick, she gets all upset because she thinks he’s just avoiding her. Wow, such ego. When she gets off work, Jessica finds Jeremy’s address and drives out to his house. He opens the door and she yells at him. When she’s finished, Jeremy takes her inside and shows her his big empty house from which most of the furniture has been sold and tells her everything that’s been going on with his family. Then they make out a little bit. After that, Jessica’s confidence makes a stunning comeback and she decides to go to Melissa’s and tell her off. But when she gets there, Will comes running out of the house looking distressed. He says Jessica can’t talk to Melissa because she’s at the hospital. She’s tried to commit suicide. Again. Apparently, the big mysterious thing in Melissa’s past that has been alluded to this whole time is that she tried to overdose back in eighth grade.

Maria insists on coming over to Liz’s because she’s decided not to let Conner’s presence keep her from hanging out with her best friend. Naturally, she gets there just in time to see Conner and Liz kissing in the kitchen.

The Cover: I hate Melissa’s face. She looks like such a bitch.

The Big Deal: Big Mesa party

Synopsis:

To sum up the last book: Melissa is furious because she assumes Tia and Jessica tattled on her to Coach Laufeld and that’s why Tia was named captain. Jessica is heartbroken because she assumes the other cheerleaders told Jeremy about her reputation and now he’ll never want to talk to her again.

Tia and the gang go to a movie on Saturday night and Maria invites herself along in the hopes that Conner will join them. Sadly for her, Conner decides to stay home and have pizza and play Monopoly with Liz and Megan. Maria talks about Conner all night and Tia and Andy finally tell her they know she’s not over him and the chances of her getting him back are slim. Meanwhile, Liz and Conner almost share a moment, but Liz gets nervous and makes things awkward.

Jeremy gets home Saturday night and finds a For Sale sign in front of the house. He’s pissed at his father for failing to get a job and at his mother for putting the house up for sale. Everything sucks until he goes to work the next morning and finds Jessica there. Liz felt bad about getting her fired from Healthy, so she talked to the manager of House of Java and got them to let Jessica work there in her place from now on. Jeremy and Jessica flirt for a while and she realizes the other cheerleaders must not have said anything to him. Jeremy asks Jessica to go to a party with him on Friday, but Jessica gets shy and says she can’t.

Maria is paired up with Ken Matthews on a history project, which kind of sucks for her because Ken has been a zombie since Olivia died. He’s quit the football team and stopped hanging out with people. He doesn’t show up for their study date in the library on Monday afternoon, and Maria finally decides to bail and head over to Andy’s house. He’s having people over and Maria wants to see Conner. When she gets to the school parking lot, she finds one of her tires flat. Conner comes out of nowhere and gives her a ride to Andy’s, but then he just drops her off and goes home. The next morning, Ken tells her to do whatever she wants on the project, but he won’t be helping.

Jeremy asks Jessica again if she wants to go to the party with him, and she says she can’t because she has to finish a project for her drama class. She’s supposed to cut out pictures from magazines and make a collage that shows who she really is. She tells Jeremy she’s having a lot of trouble with it. Later that night, Jeremy sees a bunch of his mom’s magazines and gets inspired. He makes a collage for Jessica and when he gives it to her, she starts crying and asks if he really sees her as beautiful, delicate, perfect and whatever else the collage says. He says he does and she says she’ll go to the party with him.

Jessica goes to the Sandborns’ house Thursday morning and has breakfast with Liz. They get to talking about Conner and Jessica realizes Liz likes him. That day at lunch, Maria opens Liz’s notebook to find that day’s English assignment. She sees Conner’s name written all over the place, right alongside some horrible love poetry. She doesn’t say anything, but seethes about it all afternoon. By the time she gets to the library to meet Ken, she’s livid. Ken asks her what her problem is, and she goes off on him, screeching about Elizabeth and what a bad friend she is. Ken, grateful that someone else is having a problem and not trying to get him to snap out of his misery, takes an interest and tells Maria to just talk to Liz.

Liz has to read her crappy love poem out loud in creative writing class. It’s obviously about Conner, and he stops her after class so they can talk about it. They end up kissing. Maria has chosen this moment to confront Liz. She and Ken come upon them right after the kiss, while they’re standing really close together. Maria can tell there’s something going on between them, but Ken says he doesn’t see anything.

Jessica is having a great time at the party Friday night, but then, of course, Will and Melissa show up with Melissa’s bitchy friends. Cherie calls Jessica a slut and starts to make a scene. Will tells Melissa to make them stop or he’s leaving. Melissa doesn’t do anything, so Will takes off. Jessica has been a big hit all night with the Big Mesa kids, and they surround Melissa, Cherie and Gina and tell them to get lost. When Jeremy turns around, Jessica is gone. He searches the whole house but can’t find her. He goes outside and thinks he sees her, but just then his mother comes driving up. She says Jeremy’s father has had a heart attack.

The Cover: So this is Jeremy. He’s much cuter than either Conner or Will.

The Big Deal: Football game, party at Andy’s

Synopsis:

Jessica has a meeting with Coach Laufeld, who tells her if someone hadn’t told her Jessica was sick, she’d have been really worried about her when she didn’t show up for the pep rally and probably would have kicked her off the squad. Jessica thinks the whole squad hates her, so she wonders who bailed her out. Jessica hasn’t spoken to Liz since the night before at the Riot, so Liz calls her mother and tells her she’ll pick Jessica up. After practice, Liz runs into Tia, who offers to hang around and explain herself to Jessica. Jessica doesn’t want to hear it at first, but Tia tells her Melissa and Cherie lied to her to make sure Jessica didn’t get to the pep rally. She hugs Jessica and tells the twins she wants to do something to get back at Melissa.

Tia goes up to Melissa the next day and yells at her in front of everyone. Melissa insists she didn’t do anything wrong and tries to cry on Will’s shoulder later about how mean Tia’s being, but Will says he overheard Melissa and Cherie planning to sabotage Jessica. He asks why she can’t stop being so mean to Jessica, but Melissa just starts sobbing and asks Will to take her home. Will starts thinking it might be time to break up.

Liz asks for Tia’s advice about Conner, but makes sure to keep it anonymous. She says she has a big crush on a guy who treats her like crap, and Tia says she should kiss him to find out if there are any sparks. While Liz sits there fantasizing and wondering if she would ever have the guts to do that, Tia hopes her advice helps Liz and Conner get together because of course she knows that’s who Liz is talking about.

At lunch one day, Maria insists on sitting with Conner and his friends so she can show him how over him she is. Conner says his guitar teacher is the lead guitarist in some band that’s opening for Silver Chair on Friday (I don’t know if that’s supposed to be Silverchair or some other made up band), and he’s given Conner free tickets and backstage passes. Liz says she wants to go, so Maria says she does, too. Liz can tell Maria is totally not over Conner. Liz is supposed to work Friday night, so she asks Jessica to cover for her. Jessica says that’s fine as long as Liz covers for her on Saturday afternoon.

Melissa and Will make plans to meet for dinner Thursday night, but Will doesn’t show. She calls his house, but his mom says he’s at his friend Josh’s. So Melissa calls over there and he blows her off, saying he forgot about dinner and now he’s promised the guys he’d play basketball with them. Melissa is furious, so she makes him hang out with her and her friends on Friday at House of Java, which pisses him off because it’s the night before the first football game of the year and he wants to be hanging out at Todd’s with the rest of the team. He finally realizes he can just get up and leave, so that’s what he does. Melissa is pissed.

There’s some guy named Jeremy Aames who goes to Big Mesa and works at House of Java with Elizabeth. His dad lost his job a year ago and Jeremy hasn’t told anyone because he wants everyone to think his family is perfect or something. Anyway, Liz has told him about Jessica covering for her so he can help her out Friday night, but she apparently didn’t tell Jessica she told him. Jessica keeps calling him Justin, and Jeremy keeps pretending he thinks she’s Liz. Lila and Amy walk in and Jessica turns pale and runs off to the bathroom. All in all, though, Jessica has a good night. It’s the first time she’s been out of the house in a while and Jeremy flirts with her. After work, Jessica admits she’s not Elizabeth, and Jeremy says he knew all along.

The concert sucks because Maria spends the whole night trying to make Conner jealous by flirting with his friend Evan, who spends the night trying to get Liz’s attention. Liz doesn’t notice Evan because she’s too busy noticing how sickening Maria is being and hoping Conner isn’t jealous of her flirting with Evan. She doesn’t get home until like three in the morning, and she calls Jessica to ask her to cover her morning shift at the coffeehouse. Jessica is more than happy to hang out with Jeremy again.

Liz gets a call from Andy the next day. He invites her over to hang out at the pool and says everyone will be there, including Maria and Conner. Liz can’t stand the thought of Maria and Conner being in the same place at the same time, so she dolls herself up with a bunch of makeup and puts on a skimpy bikini and goes to the party. Conner ignores her the whole time, but Evan and Andy try to get her to play volleyball. She says no, so they throw her in the pool. When she surfaces, Conner is laughing at her and Liz realizes her mascara has run. Maria takes her inside to fix her face.

Jessica goes to the high school Saturday afternoon for the football game and sees Jeremy in a Big Mesa football uniform. They talk for a minute, and then all the other cheerleaders show up and start whispering when they see her talking to a guy. Jessica runs away and the other cheerleaders go meet the coach, who has promised she’s going to announce who she’s assigning captain. She gives the title to Tia, and Melissa and her friends assume she and Jessica must have told the coach they lied to Jessica about the pep rally. Jessica, who decided to just skip the game, wanders over to Healthy, which is I guess the name of the place where she works. Her boss fires her for not showing up for her shift, the one Liz was supposed to cover.

Melissa’s in a bad mood because she got a message from Will asking her to meet him after the game because he wants to talk. When Melissa never comes outside after the game, Will goes back inside and finds her surrounded by her friends, crying. She tells him Tia and Jessica told on her so Tia would be named captain. Will starts to say that doesn’t make sense, but Melissa starts crying harder and saying Jessica’s trying to steal everything from her. Will knows that if Tia and Jessica tattled they would only be telling the truth, but he thinks it’s his fault that Melissa has become such a bitch and he decides he has to stay with her.

After washing her face, Liz gets in the Jeep to leave Andy’s party, and Conner jumps into the passenger seat. He asks Liz if Maria is okay since she’s been acting weird lately. Liz drops her keys between Conner’s seat and the center console, and they both reach for them at the same time. They kiss the biggest kiss of their lives, and then Conner says he has to go.

Quotes:

“Jessica, is everything okay?” Mrs. Wakefield asked… “You just seem a bit down lately.”

Alice Wakefield, as observant a parent as ever.

The Cover: Ew, horrible kissy face cover that looks like just about every teenage girl on Myspace.

Synopsis:

Alice and Ned take the twins to First and Ten, a sports bar and grill where Maria works, to have dinner and catch up. Conner comes in to see Maria and Liz gets all antsy and weird when her parents insist on an introduction.

When Jessica and her parents get back to Fowler Crest after dinner, Jessica runs upstairs to find Lila. Even though they live in the same house, Jessica hasn’t seen Lila since Friday night when she chose to stay at Riot with Melissa instead of leave with Jessica. She asks Lila what the hell is going on, and Lila says she can’t believe Jessica would try to steal Melissa’s boyfriend and then rub her face in it. She’s apparently forgotten that Jessica didn’t do either of those things.

Jessica stays home from school on Monday because she just can’t face seeing anyone. This unfortunately means she’s going to miss the first cheerleading practice, which won’t look good since she and Melissa are both up for captain. Oh, well. At lunch, Melissa and her minions talk about Jessica and spread more gossip. Will can’t stand it. He really cares about Jessica (really?) and feels bad for her, but he doesn’t want to defend her and make Melissa angry. Wuss.

Liz goes to Fowler Crest after school to convince Jessica that giving up is just admitting defeat. She says Jessica needs to get her act together in time for the upcoming pep rally, where she can show everyone what she’s made of. But at cheerleading practice, Lila and Amy purposely drop her during a stunt. Jessica leaves practice, and Tia yells at Melissa, accusing her of putting Lila and Amy up to it. The next day, Jessica decides she just can’t stand the thought of going to practice, so she asks Tia to tell the coach she couldn’t make it. She goes to the parking lot to get in the Jeep and go home, and Will comes running up to her. He kind of tries to apologize, and Jessica gets pissed and almost runs him over. Anger is just what Jessica needed, and now she’s decided she’s not going to let Melissa walk all over her.

In an attempt to get over Conner, Liz goes through her diaries from last year and old notes from Todd to remind herself that she was really in love with Todd and the way she feels about Conner is just a passing phase. That doesn’t work because all the diary entries and notes are from times when she’d cheated on Todd or he was mad at her about something. She decides to go to Conner’s bedroom because she knows he’s a slob and his messy room will turn her off. It works at first, but then she sees his bookshelf, which is full of pretty leather-bound books. Desperate to get over the guy, Liz actually picks up a dirty t-shirt from the floor…and smells it. I’m so grossed out. But it doesn’t smell bad, it just smells like Conner, and now Liz is hopelessly in love with him.

Conner is getting annoyed with Maria already because he apparently can’t stay in a relationship for more than two days. She’s meek and timid and lets him decide everything, and he wishes she would stand up for herself and show some backbone. Meanwhile, Maria is falling in love with him. She calls him and wants to know where she stands, so Conner tells her he was just having a little fun and he’s not having fun anymore. Maria meets Liz at the coffeehouse and tells her the whole sad story, and even though Liz is overjoyed that Conner is now single, she’s really upset that he hurt Maria so badly. When she gets home, she yells at him for being such a jackass. Then she runs upstairs and slams her door. Conner is totally turned on.

The cheerleaders decide to meet at Melissa’s house and caravan to the pep rally, but the night before the rally, Melissa and Cherie plan to call everyone except Jessica to say they’re going to just meet at the gym. Will overhears their plans and leaves a note in Jessica’s locker telling her what’s really going on, but I guess he doesn’t know it’s Friday afternoon and she’s not going to be coming back to her locker before the rally. He’s real smart.

Conner has been taking guitar lessons for years, and his instructor has landed him a gig at House of Java, where Liz works. He’s all closemouthed about it, so Tia takes it upon herself to make sure everyone shows up to cheer him on. Friday night comes and the House of Java is packed. Conner plays like a rock star and impresses everyone, especially Liz when he plays the song he wrote about her. After his set, he breaks away from everyone congratulating him and offers to give Liz a ride home. When they get to the house, Conner leans over and Liz thinks he’s going to kiss her, but he just opens her door. She gets out and Conner is glad he stopped himself from kissing her because it just would have ended the same way it ended with Maria and he likes Liz too much to let that happen.

Saturday night rolls around and Jessica drives all the way out to Melissa’s house in El Carro to meet the cheerleading squad, who is, of course, at the gym already. Since Tia is the one who told her to go to Melissa’s, she now thinks Tia is just as bad as everyone else. Meanwhile, Tia is at the gym, totally disgusted that Melissa and Cherie would make Jessica miss the pep rally. Jessica gets to the gym just in time to see the squad run out onto the court. She goes outside to go back home, but Will sees her and follows her. Again, he apologizes, and again, Jessica tells him to leave her alone.

Liz goes to Fowler Crest after the rally to cheer Jessica up and invite her to hang out with her and her friends the next day. So Jessica goes to meet her at the Riot and gets totally upset when she sees her with Tia. She yells at Tia for trying to get her kicked off the squad and then at Liz for hanging out with the enemy.

The Cover: Is that supposed to be Conner? I’m so not impressed.

Synopsis:

The rumors Will and Melissa have been spreading about Jessica are getting out of hand. Half the school is laughing at her behind her back, and “Jessica is a slut” is written across blackboards throughout the school. Lila’s playing both sides. She knows the El Carro kids are going to end up being important so she wants to get on their good side to remain popular, but she does feel kind of bad about hanging out with the girl who’s making Jessica’s life miserable.

Liz and Conner still have big crushes on each other, but for some reason they both feel like they need to keep pretending they hate each other. It’s annoying. Liz starts getting cozy with Conner’s friends and she hangs out with them one night while Conner picks up his alcoholic mother from the country club where she’s making a scene.  Liz has been neglecting Maria and Enid while she hangs out with Andy, Tia and Tia’s boyfriend, Angel, and Maria is getting sick of it. Liz finally invites her to join them at Riot, some crappy club the El Carro kids go to, and Maria gets all emo when Liz doesn’t devote her undivided attention to her. Maria goes to the second floor to get something to drink, and she runs into Conner. They start talking and hit it off. When Maria meets Liz outside the club later, she’s all starry eyed over Conner. When she says she and Conner kissed, Liz feels like throwing up.

Liz tells Tia about Maria and Conner, and Tia says Conner kind of sucks at relationships. Instead of wiping her brow because she dodged a bullet or feeling bad for her friend, Liz hopes this means Conner and Maria will break up soon. The next day at school, Liz tells Maria what Tia said and tells her Conner doesn’t really care about her. Maria thinks Liz is being a bitch because she doesn’t like Conner.

Cheerleading tryouts are coming up and Melissa Fox wants to be captain of the squad. The day of the tryouts, all the hopefuls practice their moves in the courtyard at lunch. This is apparently some kind of tradition. Melissa and her friends make sure to practice near Jessica and try to intimidate her. During tryouts, Jessica does great on the cheering part, but when she starts to do the dance sequence, she finds Melissa has switched her tape with another, and she has to try to do the routine to some unfamiliar song she hasn’t practiced with. She does a horrible job, but the coach takes pity on her and lets her on the squad.

The new cheerleaders go to the Riot to celebrate. Jessica decides she should just go and apologize to Melissa, explain she didn’t know Will had a girlfriend. But when she gets there, Melissa just glares at her, and her friend, Cherie, calls Jessica a slut. Jessica says she’s leaving and asks Lila, Amy and Annie to come with her, but they just look down at the table. Jessica leaves by herself and runs into Todd in the parking lot. Happy to see a familiar face, Jessica asks Todd why everyone is being so mean to her. He asks her what she expected would happen when she slept with another girl’s boyfriend.

Liz gets home from her job at the coffeehouse one day and sees Conner and Maria making out on the couch. She calls Enid and asks if she can move in with her. Enid’s wearing camouflage shirts with peasant skirts these days and hanging out with some pale girl who carries a lunchbox, and she doesn’t sound all that jazzed about the idea of Liz staying with her. She says she’ll ask her mom, though. That night, Liz wakes up when Conner comes into her bedroom. He’s about to kiss her, but Liz realizes he’s drunk and snaps him out of it.  He goes back to his room, and the next day Liz tells Enid not to worry about it, she’ll just stay at the Sandborns’ house. Enid looks relieved.

There’s some stuff I don’t care about going on with Tia and her boyfriend, Angel. He’s leaving for Stanford in January, so Tia’s feeling sad. She decides to break up with him because she just won’t be able to handle the heartache of seeing him leave. But then she makes the cheerleading squad and Angel comes over to take her out to celebrate and Tia realizes she can’t just dump him because he’s the sweetest guy ever.

Mr. Collins is the Oracle’s adviser again. I guess he just missed the first day of school or something.

Quotes:

“I had the best night. Ileana and I went over to Judith’s house and had a Xena marathon. Judith has, like, every episode on tape. Then we went on-line and hung out in this chat room with these really cute guys. I mean, they sounded like really cute guys.” Enid giggled.

It seems the ghostwriters have given up and are just going to let Enid embrace her inner nerd.

The Cover: I’m guessing crooked-head-girl must be Melissa. She just looks like a bitch. And if that’s Will back there, I’m totally not getting the appeal. These covers suck.

The Big Deal: Beginning of the school year dance.

Synopsis:

A new school year is about to start and Sweet Valley is still feeling the aftereffects of the earthquake. The Wakefields are living at Fowler Crest while their house is being rebuilt. Five hundred kids from El Carro High, which was destroyed in the quake, are going to be attending SVH. Nobody is happy about this, including me. It’s just like on Degrassi when Lakehurst burned down and all these badasses had to switch to Degrassi. The El Carro kids wear Doc Martens and black t-shirts and make Liz feel like a goody-two-shoes in her yellow sundress.

Some of the new kids are:

• · Conner McDermott. Conner expects SVH to be painted pink and be full of airheaded bimbos. He’s a judgmental ass and I hate him.
• · Melissa Fox. Kind of weird. She’s happy that her locker number has all her favorite integers in it. Melissa was captain of the cheerleading squad at El Carro. She’s kind of a manipulative bitch and I hate her.
• · Will Simmons. Melissa’s football player boyfriend. Also kind of an ass. Melissa’s friends think she can do better, but they’ve been together since eighth grade and Will is always thinking of something mysterious that happened in Melissa’s past that keeps him with her.
• · Tia Ramirez. Conner’s best friend. Tia actually appeared in Party Weekend. She was the only El Carro student who was nice to the SVH kids.

There are a few other changes as well: Penny Ayala seems to have disappeared, so Liz is now editor-in-chief of The Oracle. Mr. Collins must have run off with Penny, because this year’s faculty adviser is someone named Mrs. Halsey. The cheerleading squad now has a coach who appears to be calling the shots, and Jessica has to try out again along with everyone else. I haven’t seen a few of the usual suspects around, like Winston or white Maria.

Liz: Conner McDermott is in Liz’s creative writing class. On the first day of school, Conner makes fun of Liz and says she probably writes stupid girly poems. The first assignment is to write an essay on loss. Liz writes about Olivia. Conner is assigned to read Liz’s essay aloud to the class, and she’s assigned to read his. They realize they’re both good writers and now they have crushes on each other.

Liz hates living at Fowler Crest. She thinks it’s terribly stuffy and she hates Lila because she plays her music too loud and Liz can’t sleep. I find it hard to believe that in this ridiculously huge mansion, there’s not another bedroom Liz can move into where she won’t hear Lila’s music. Lila shows up at the first Oracle meeting of the year and says she thinks there should be a fashion editor and it should be her. Liz absolutely refuses to put Lila on the staff, but everyone convinces her to create the fashion editor position and ask interested parties to submit sample articles. Luckily, Lila’s article sucks and Liz can in good conscience appoint someone else to the position. Liz and Lila have an argument about it at dinner one night, and Mrs. Wakefield decides to let Liz move in with her new friend, Megan Sandborn, who knows Liz is unhappy with the Fowlers and has offered her the use of her family’s spare bedroom. Megan keeps talking about her brother and how much he won’t mind having Liz around and sharing a bathroom with her. And the brother, of course, turns out to be none other than Conner McDermott. He and his sister have different fathers, hence the different last names.

Jessica: Jessica has decided Will Simmons will be her boyfriend. She does all her flirty Jessica things and gets him to come over to Fowler Crest one night to study. When he gets there, they end up making out and don’t stop until Will reaches for the zipper at the back of Jessica’s dress. The next day, Will tells Jessica that Ken Matthews, still mourning Olivia’s death, has quit the football team and Will is now the big deal quarterback. He takes her out that night to celebrate, and Jessica tells everyone in the drama club all about it. Tia Ramirez tells her Will has a girlfriend. Jessica doesn’t believe it at first, but it turns out to be true. She’s beyond pissed, and she yells at Will and tells anyone who will listen what a bad kisser he is. Melissa overhears some of this, and she goes to confront Will. He says Jessica is a troublemaker who came on to him but he never kissed her. Melissa decides she doesn’t care whether or not he’s lying. She still loves him and she hates Jessica.

Melissa spreads a bunch of rumors about Jessica, and then she invites Lila and Amy to hang out with the El Carro kids before the dance on Friday. Will tells his football friends a few nasty things about Jessica, so when she shows up at the dance all alone, nobody wants to talk to her and the guys make snide remarks. She sees Will and Melissa dancing together and runs out of the room. At the end of the book, Will feels bad, but I guess not bad enough to do anything about it.

The Cover: That shirt is hideous. I don’t even know who that’s supposed to be. I’m also not sure to what the title is referring. Who can’t stay away from what?