The Moral of the Story:

The Big Deal: Sixth grade class presidential election, party at Lila’s

Synopsis:

Linda Lloyd, sixth grade class president, has to move to Texas, so the sixth grade gets to elect someone new. The Unicorns, of course, think the new president should be a Unicorn. To complicate matters, there’s a question of what should be done with the money the book fair brings in. The Unicorns think the money should go toward a big party for the sixth grade, while Liz and Amy think it should buy a VCR for the library. (LOL, remember VCRs?)

Amy and Julie nominate Liz, and the Unicorns nominate Jessica. Oh, disaster. Jim Sturbridge nominates Randy Mason as a joke. Jessica is sure she’s got this thing in the bag, considering Randy is a great big nerd and Liz isn’t far off. Lila calls Amy and says the Boosters are having a campaign pool party at Lila’s, and when Liz mentions it to Jessica, Jessica accuses her of spying.

So now the twins are fighting, and the next morning Liz’s stack of campaign flyers goes mysteriously missing from the school library. Liz gets in trouble later because they’ve been thrown into the school fountain. While she, Amy and Julie fish them all out, they see Lila and Ellen watching them and giggling. When Jessica finds out what Lila and Ellen did, she gets it into her head that Liz is going to do something awful to get back at her. She goes snooping in Liz’s room and finds out Liz is planning to hold a rally after the soccer game on Friday. Jessica and Lila decide they have to figure out a way to stop it.

Because of her rich daddy, Lila is able to get her hands on a few boxes of Johnny Buck’s not-yet-released single. The Unicorns spread out through the crowd at the soccer game and tell everyone they need to get out to the parking lot now if they want a copy. By the time the game is over, the stands are empty and Liz’s rally is ruined. In retaliation, she draws mustaches on all Jessica’s flyers. A big fight ensues and the twins aren’t speaking to each other.

Randy Mason has his own little rally, and he says he would use the book fair money to throw the party, but he’d sell tickets to get in and use the ticket money to buy a VCR. Liz is too dumb to have thought of that and she thinks it’s a great idea. She’s pretty sure Randy won’t get elected because he’s such a nerd, so she decides to say that’s what she’ll do with the money. She’s sure she’ll get elected that way, and then the school can have the party and the VCR, as opposed to just the party if Jessica wins. However, she feels like it might not be the right thing to do, even if she gives Randy credit for the idea.

At the assembly the next day, Jessica gives a speech that makes it clear she has absolutely no idea what a class president does. All she wants to talk about is the party. When it’s Liz’s turn to speak, she tells everyone she’s dropping out of the race and she hopes all her supporters will vote for Randy instead because he has the best ideas. Then Randy talks about all his ideas and it’s obvious he’s the best man for the job. He wins the election and asks Liz to be his “special executive assistant” and asks Jessica to help him organize the party.

Quotes:

Julie looked worried. “I hope Lila isn’t planning any dirty tricks to play on you.” Lila was famous for her clever schemes.

Elizabeth shook her head firmly. “Even if she does, Jessica would never go along with it. She wouldn’t do anything like that.”

Since when?

The Cover: Liz needs to stop baring her teeth like that. She looks like she’s going to bite someone. And holy Jesus, that button is as big as her head. Literally.

The Moral of the Story:

The Big Deal: Student council elections

Synopsis:

While helping Ellen’s brother Mark bury his dead parakeet in the backyard, Ellen and Jessica find a mysterious box. How fortuitous that Mark would pick that exact spot to start digging. Ellen and Jessica contrive an excuse for Mark to get out of their hair, and they open the box while he’s gone. They find two hundred dollars in cash and some old love letters and photographs. Some rich girl was in love with the gardener’s son but apparently they didn’t end up together. Ellen and Jessica think it’s terribly romantic. They take their two hundred dollars and go to the mall.

Elizabeth is running for student council treasurer. Amy is her campaign manager and she makes some glittery posters. Liz thinks they’re a little flashy, but she goes with it. Way to live a little, Liz. Olivia’s posters are pretty and artistic, but Peter DeHaven’s are super boring because he’s a big nerd. He comes to school one day wearing brown socks with white sneakers and everyone makes fun of him. Poor Peter.

Ms. Wyler’s class has been selling candy to raise money for a trip to Disneyland. When the money goes missing, Liz starts to get suspicious about all the new stuff Ellen and Jessica have acquired lately. She goes searching in Jessica’s room for a sweatshirt Jessica borrowed, and she finds the receipt for a Walkman Jessica said she’d found on a bench at the mall. Liz starts having a panic attack about Jessica possibly being a thief. She interrogates Jessica and is convinced she must have stolen the Disneyland money.

Mark Riteman is starting to get suspicious about what Ellen and Jessica found in the box, and he goes snooping in Ellen’s room. He has to hide in the closet when Ellen and Jessica come in and start talking about the money. They find and he demands his share of the money or he’s going to tell on them. Jessica takes the box of letters and photographs home with her, so when Mark tries to tattle, he doesn’t have any proof.

Amy is feeling down because she was in charge of the Disneyland money and everyone thinks she stole it. Trying to cheer her up, Liz tells her she thinks maybe it was Ellen and Jessica. Amy gets pissed and tells Caroline that Ellen and Jessica stole the money, so by the end of the day everyone is giving them dirty looks. Liz tells Amy she doesn’t appreciate her spreading rumors and Amy is a little bitch about the whole thing. Ken sees Liz is upset and tries to make her feel better, and of course Amy thinks this means Ken has the hots for Liz. She tells Liz she can’t be her campaign manager anymore, and instead goes to the Peter DeHaven camp.

Liz tells Jessica everyone thinks she and Ellen stole the money, and she’s pissed because nobody wants a class treasurer whose sister is a thief. It’s all about YOU, Liz. And the next morning, Peter comes to school looking like a normal person instead of a nerd. Amy has given him a fakeover, so now he wears jeans and t-shirts instead of brown slacks and button-down shirts. When it comes time for the campaign speeches, Peter sings a song and does a dance and the audience goes wild. Liz can’t find her speech because Jessica took her notebook to copy her math homework. She has to wing it and she does a crappy job. Afterward, Jessica confesses to taking her notebook, and Liz goes crazy, accusing Jessica of trying to ruin her life.

Mr. Bowman sends Liz and Amy to the supply closet to get some paper. They get locked in. Before they’re rescued, they manage to make up and also find the missing class money. Hooray! They hurry home to tell Jessica she’s off the hook for stealing the money, but Steve says she and Ellen are hiding out somewhere. In fact, they’re waiting on Ellen’s front porch, with the treasure chest, ready to confess everything. Mrs. Wakefield and Mrs. Riteman have both been called to the school because even the teachers have heard the rumor about the class money.

While they’re waiting, Ellen and Jessica see a woman walking up the street toward Ellen’s house. She looks exactly like the girl in the pictures they found, so naturally, they assume she’s a ghost who wants her two hundred dollars back. She’s not. Her name is Laura and she’s the granddaughter of the treasure chest girl. She wanted to see her grandparents’ old house while she was in town on business. Mrs. Riteman and Mrs. Wakefield pull up right then and the girls confess everything. And then Amy and Liz show up to tell them the class money has been found. Laura reads her grandparents’ letters and it helps her make a decision about her own love life, and she tells Ellen and Jessica they can keep the money they found. Liz wins the class treasurer election and everything is great.

Quotes:

Elizabeth closed her eyes. This was worse than any nightmare she had ever dreamed.

Liz must have pretty tame nightmares.

The Cover: That’s pretty much exactly how I always pictured Ellen. Minus the “OMG there’s a ghost coming up my driveway” expression on her face.

Y’all ready for this?

Here we go!

Elizabeth Wakefield has left Sweet Valley and is now living in New York City, working for a crappy online magazine that nobody’s ever heard of. When our story opens, Liz and her boss, David Stephenson, are returning to Liz’s apartment after grabbing a post-workday dinner. Liz thinks David is handsome enough, but she doesn’t really want to sleep with him because he made her leave the tip at the restaurant. Get over yourself, Liz, it wasn’t even a date. The phone is ringing when they come in, but Liz lets the machine pick it up. It’s Jessica, begging Liz to talk to her.

Liz ignores Jessica and gives David a glass of wine. He asks whose voice that was on the answering machine and marvels at how much it sounded like Liz. Liz considers sleeping with him to get him to stop asking questions, but in the end the tip thing just bothers her too much and she tells him she’s tired and kicks him out. Once he’s gone, she curls up on her couch and feels sorry for herself.

FLASHBACK! We’re suddenly treated to a present-tense-first-person account of the day Todd Wilkins asked Jessica out back in high school. It’s kind of weird.

PRESENT DAY Back in Sweet Valley, Jessica is whining to Todd about Liz not answering any of her calls, texts, emails or Facebook friend requests. There’s kind of a lot of nonsense, but I gather that Liz and Todd were engaged at some point and Jessica slept with Todd. Then there’s another weird first-person-present-tense passage. It’s the exact same scene from before, this time from Jessica’s point of view. Anyway, Todd and Jessica are now living together and are going to be married in four weeks. Todd writes a successful sports column and the two of them spend most of their time trying to avoid the judgmental stares of their friends.

Todd and Jessica go to a party at Lila’s house, and we learn the latest about all our old faves:

• Lila and Ken Matthews are in the middle of getting a divorce, but Ken is apparently still at the house most of the time. Ken is a successful NFL star. Lila doesn’t work, of course.
• Caroline Pearce is a successful real estate broker and a cancer survivor. She’s still a big gossipmonger.
• Jeffrey French is a successful dentist and is married to someone whose name Jessica can’t remember.
• Enid Rollins and A. J. Morgan are having an affair or something and it’s bad for their image, but I don’t know why.
• Robin Wilson is a successful caterer and restaurant critic, but somehow manages to keep herself slim.

You’ll notice that with the exception of A. J. and Enid, everyone’s life has the word successful in it. Sweet Valley is magic.

Everyone seems surprised to see Toddica, but Caroline is the only one who actually dares to ask about Elizabeth. Instead of answering, Jessica tells Caroline what a nosy bitch she is. Then she turns on Lila and hollers at her for inviting her to a party Caroline was going to attend, accusing her of wanting her there only for the drama.

All of Jessica’s chapters are like so infused with instances of like and so and they so make me want to like stab my eyes out.

Meanwhile, Liz goes to some crappy theater to interview William Connolly, a playwright who is currently auditioning actors for his debut play. He acts like a jackass and hardly even looks at Liz, but when he finally does, Liz freaks out a little because he looks exactly like Todd. Sigh. Of course he does. His resemblance to Todd throws Liz down memory lane and she thinks about a time in college when she was sick and made Jessica go to a party with Todd. As far as she knows, it’s the only time they spent any time alone. I guess that whole thing after the prom doesn’t count. And, of course, Liz doesn’t know about the other stuff.

Coincidentally, Todd and Jessica are also thinking of that party in college and…

FLASHBACK – COLLEGE, SENIOR YEAR Jessica doesn’t really want to go to the party, but Todd is the guest of honor and Liz really wants him to go. Neither Todd nor Jessica has any fun at first, but people keep assuming Jessica is Liz so she and Todd pretend to be a couple and have a good time tricking people. When they get in the car to leave, they apparently forget they were just pretending and they start making out like crazy. They eventually end up at the apartment Todd and Winston share. Winston isn’t home, so Todd goes ahead and has sex with his girlfriend’s twin sister. God, what a fucked up piece of fuck this guy is. Jessica’s wrong too, of course, but if I’ve accomplished nothing else with this blog, I know I’ve at least established that Jessica is insane.

For the next month, Todd and Jessica meet every day at a diner nobody they know ever goes to. They don’t have sex again, but it’s still an affair. The guilt finally gets to be too much for Jessica and she breaks it off.

PRESENT DAY Elizabeth runs into Will Connolly at the bar across the street from the theater. They both get a little tipsy and end up talking. Will isn’t really the jerkface he’s made himself out to be, and Liz thinks it’s okay to like him because his eyes are blue and not brown like Todd’s. They introduce themselves to the gorgeous Irish bartender (Liz mentions that her cheating twin would go crazy for him) and then Will invites Liz back to his apartment. They make out for a minute.

Liz’s mother calls that night and tells Liz she’d like her to come home for her grandmother’s eightieth birthday party. (She would also like Liz to come to Jessica’s wedding because she’s a fucking idiot.) Liz tells her there’s no way in hell she’s going to sit through a dinner with Todd and Jessica. Then she gets to thinking that it would really show those bastards if she came home with a new man. She calls Will and asks him if he wants to go. He says he can’t get away, but jokingly suggests Liz take Liam the bartender and try to make Jessica fall in love with him. Liz doesn’t take it as a joke.

FLASHBACK – EIGHT MONTHS AGO Jessica has married some guy named Regan and they’ve been traveling the world. It’s been about six months since the wedding, and that means it’s about time for Jessica to move on. Not one to waste time, she decides she has to leave Regan immediately. She’s in France, but she calls Liz, who tells her to just come home and stay with her. Todd isn’t super happy about this, but he agrees to be civil.

In this flashback, we learn that brother Steven married Cara Walker, but he apparently has frequent affairs and at this moment might be involved with Lila. What a tool. We also learn that nobody likes Winston anymore because he “changed radically” after making a bunch of money.

PRESENT DAY Liz goes to the bar and insinuates herself into Liam’s life. They hit it off after Liz finds out Liam’s parents live in L.A. and he owes them a visit soon. After about five minutes of friendship, Liam agrees to schedule his visit so it coincides with Liz’s grandmother’s party and he can be her date.

Jessica goes out for a friendly drink with one of her coworkers and wonders if she should hook up with this guy instead of Todd and then she could have Elizabeth back in her life. But alas, her love for Todd is too strong to be denied. Then she thinks about when she came back from France and lived with Todd and Liz for a while.

FLASHBACK – EIGHT MONTHS AGO Todd is working from home and the house is beginning to seem very small. Jessica and Todd try to avoid each other, but he gets on her nerves one day and she goes to the beach. That’s where she sees her brother in a loving embrace with…Aaron Dallas. Yep, Aaron is gay now and so is Steven. Steve asks Jessica not to tell anyone, but she thinks she’ll be doing him a favor if she tells Cara. Oh, Jessica. This is why you’re the bad twin. Well, this and the whole stealing-your-sister’s-fiancé thing.

PRESENT DAY Liz has lunch with Will and tells him she’ll be taking Liam with her to Sweet Valley. Will was only joking when he suggested getting Liam to seduce Jessica and he does not approve. Liz, who has been telling herself that she’s only bringing Liam home so she’ll have some company, gets defensive and actually says, “fuck you,” and storms out of the pub. Nice. She talks to Bruce Patman on the phone (they’re best friends now) and tells him she’ll be bringing a friend home for her grandmother’s party. Bruce gets a little weird. Liz is irritated and Bruce hangs up on her. Then we get to spend some time in Bruce’s head. And wouldn’t you know it? He’s in love with Liz!

FLASHBACK – EIGHT MONTHS AGO Bruce and Liz became friends a few years ago when Bruce’s parents were in a car accident. Liz came to the hospital every day for moral support. (Both Patman parents wound up dying.) Bruce has always known about Todd and Jessica’s affair in college (he saw them together at the diner), but he didn’t want to tell Liz because it would hurt her. But now that Jessica is staying with Todd and Liz, and Liz wants to set a wedding date, Bruce thinks it might be time to clue her in. He takes Liz out for pizza (I believe the pizza place used to be the Dairi Burger, but now it’s called Napkin) and tries to get up the courage to break her heart, but just then Ken Matthews comes running in to tell them that Winston is dead.

What the frak?

Meanwhile, Steven goes to Liz’s house to yell at Jessica for outing him to Cara. He calls her a selfish bitch and then leaves. Jessica starts crying and Todd hugs her to comfort her, and OF COURSE they start kissing. That’s when Liz comes home, crying about Winston. Todd and Jessica manage to cover up pretty well and Liz doesn’t notice anything is amiss, but Bruce is giving them the hairy eyeball.

PRESENT DAY Liz flies into LAX, where she’ll meet Liam. She’s going to change at the airport and drive directly to the club for the party. On the flight, she remembers – FLASHBACK! Winston’s funeral. Winston got super drunk and fell off his balcony. People are sad, but Winston had turned into such a total misogynistic jackass that most people are mourning the kid he used to be. Jessica starts looking at Liz intensely and yapping about forgiveness and junk. Liz thinks it’s weird, but figures it’s just funeral stuff.

PRESENT DAY Jessica is getting ready for “Grandmommy’s” party (ugh, grandmommy?) and thinks about the day Liz found out about her and Todd.

FLASHBACK Which is totally lame. Jessica’s husband shows up, I guess to talk to her, but she’s afraid of him so she asks Todd to be in the room. Regan walks in and immediately accuses Jessica of sleeping with Todd. I don’t know why. Words are exchanged and the boys start scufflin’. Liz comes home and breaks up their fight. Regan yells at her and says there’s something going on behind her back, and then he leaves. Liz asks Toddica what Regan was talking about and Jessica says he’s just crazy jealous, which seems reasonable. But Liz has one of those moments where she suddenly realizes how blind she’s been. She calls them cheating liars and storms out.

And that’s it, that’s how she found out. Maybe I’m sick in the head, but I was really kind of hoping she’d find them in bed together or something. Something more exciting than a “sudden realization”.

PRESENT DAY Dinner at the country club seems like it might be okay at first. The twins manage to ignore each other for the most part, but Liz is a little irritated that Liam seems completely smitten with Jessica. She was supposed to fall for him, not the other way around. He hangs on her all night, which pisses Todd off. Liz can’t help but smirk when Toddica start arguing, and the smirk gets Jessica going. Pretty soon, Liz is yelling at Todd, Steven is yelling at Jessica, Bruce and Aaron are telling people to shut up, and Alice is trying to keep everyone from killing each other. She yells at Ned to “bring out the fucking cake.” Grandmommy Robertson is the only one not yelling. When Liz leaves to go back to New York, Todd and Jessica aren’t speaking to each other, and Liz is pissed at Liam for flirting with Jessica so much.

Liz still has to interview Will for her job, and she can tell he wants to apologize for accusing her of being crazy for revenge. She doesn’t want him to do that because then she’ll have to say he was right. So she does the interview and then goes back to his place and has sex with him. I’m not sure why she feels like she always has to have sex with a guy to make him shut up.

She gets home from Will’s to find Jessica asleep outside her apartment door. Jessica says she’s left Todd and wants Liz’s forgiveness. It only takes about thirty seconds of Jessica crying for Liz to forgive her. And just like that, they’re talking everything through. Liz, who only needed to find a new man to realize she really doesn’t love Todd anymore, tells Jessica to go back to Todd. Jessica leaves the next morning and Todd is waiting for her outside Liz’s apartment building. He gives her a big hug and they go home to Sweet Valley. Liz meets Will later and tells him everything. He still thinks she’s the bee’s knees and they go back to Liz’s.

Will and Liz become friends with benefits, and things are going really well. Her article comes out and she gets another job offer from a magazine. By the time Will’s play opens, Liz has decided she’s not in love with Will, but they have a really good friendship. On opening night, Will’s parents show up with the fiancé Will left behind when he came to New York to be a famous playwright. It’s clear to Liz that Will and Wendy love each other. She’s happy for them.

When Liz goes home for Jessica’s wedding, Bruce tells Liz he’s selling his house and moving to New York because he’s in love with someone who lives there. Liz is an idiot and Bruce has to spell it out for her that Liz is the one he loves. They go up to Bruce’s bedroom where they get naked and we learn that Liz has “taut nipples.”

EPILOGUE: FOR ALL SWEET VALLEY FANS OF OLD

Everyone in the world shows up to Jessica’s wedding, and Francine gives us a little bio of what’s been going on with all our old friends…

• Bill Chase – Lost his right leg to a shark during a triathlon three years ago. Now teaches surfing to handicapped teens. Married someone named Lianne Kane.
• Roger Collins – Mr. Collins has quit teaching and is a successful writer. His son is now nineteen and named Sam (pretty sure he used to be named Teddy).
• Jeffrey French – Lila’s date for the wedding. Now Francine tells us he’s single, even though Jessica talked to his wife in the second chapter.
• Dee Dee Gordon – Working as an artist
• Charlie Markus – Married Annie Whitman. He writes for a car magazine but wants to be a novelist. He is referred to as the boy who “saved” Annie, but I think Francine has confused him with Ricky Capaldo.
• Betsy Martin – An alcoholic who sleeps around. I guess art school wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.
• A. J. Morgan – Sells shoes at the Nike store in the mall.
• Roger Barrett Patman – A successful Hollywood producer. He married Zoe Jones, a rock star.
• Caroline Pearce – Caroline’s cancer is in remission these days. She puts out a gossip blog six days a week.
• Enid Rollins – Enid is a successful gynecologist, but she’s arrogant and extremely right-wing. She plans to run for city council, and that’s why she wants to keep her relationship with A. J. a secret. She doesn’t think a shoe salesman is an appropriate partner for someone as important as she is.
• Nicky Shepard – I don’t know why we care about this guy since he was really only important in one book, but Francine tells us he hit rock bottom two years ago and is now living in Utah, teaching at an AA center.
• Cara Walker – She and Steven are now divorced, but she still remains friendly with Ned and Alice.
• Annie Whitman – Annie is a lawyer in San Francisco. She and Charlie have a two-year-old boy.
• Robin Wilson – Catered Jessica’s wedding. She’s also senior editor of Bon Appétit.
• George Warren – A representative for a Silicon Valley company. Lives in England.

We get a rundown of some dead folks. Winston, Regina and Tricia are mentioned, but strangely, Olivia Davidson is not. Maybe because of her zombie appearance in SVU. Surprisingly, Suzanne Devlin is among the dead. We’re told she returned to Sweet Valley six years after the Mr. Collins scandal, but she had multiple sclerosis and crashed her car after taking her medication with champagne. Wait, I thought she just had mono. I’m confused.

And now the Wakefields…

• Ned Wakefield – Still a successful lawyer. He’s so awesome that even the mayor came to the wedding.
• Alice Wakefield – Now has her own interior design company. It is, of course, successful. Alice was diagnosed with breast cancer a few years ago, but she had a lumpectomy and some radiation and is good to go.
• Steven Wakefield – Steve and Aaron are living together and hoping that someday they’ll be able to get married.
• Elizabeth Wakefield – Liz was Jessica’s maid of honor. I think that’s gross, but what do I know? She and Bruce are totally in love.
• Jessica Wakefield – Was fifteen minutes late for her own wedding because, as you know, nothing starts until she gets there.

Quotes:

Unless, of course, she were to arrive, unexpectedly, at her grandmother’s party on the arm of a handsome New York playwright. That certainly wouldn’t be pathetic.

It’s a little pathetic if he looks exactly like the ex-boyfriend you’re so eager to show up.

…its main financial backing had come from Richard Fowler, Lila’s father.

Didn’t his name used to be George?

One time when we were in high school, this lunatic madman came at her with a sledgehammer. I jumped in between them, and I didn’t even have a weapon. All I had was crazy fury and determination to save my sister’s life.

What’s funny is that I thought I would try to give you guys a link to the book this is from and make a snarky comment about it, but the twins escaped death so many times that I don’t know which book to link to.

I’m in my black Porsche convertible, the last vestige of the old Bruce that I can’t give up.

1BRUCE1 is still alive, people!

“I remember once I had this thing with Caroline way back when we were in the seventh grade. She told everyone that I let A. J. Morgan touch my breast.”

That’s so weird, you know, because he didn’t move to Sweet Valley until junior year.

She was twenty-seven years old and this was the first person she’d ever told to go fuck himself. What was wrong with her?

Oh, Liz. You’ve just been suffering from Valleyitis. Folks from the SV don’t say fuck. Except Alice Wakefield, apparently.

The Cover: Is boring. I really do like the endpapers though.

The End.

The Moral of the Story:

The Big Deal: Dance recital

Synopsis:

The twins’ ballet class is going to be performing Coppelia in a few weeks. Jessica is dying to play the lead, but Madame Andre seems to have eyes only for Elizabeth. Liz thinks the reason Jessica gets ignored is because she’s always dancing next to Amy Sutton. Jessica does this because she thinks Amy’s crappy dancing will make her look better by comparison, but Liz thinks Madame Andre is too busy criticizing Amy to notice how good Jessica is. Jessica could just go dance next to someone else, but the twins decide to make Amy a better dancer instead.

Naturally, Jessica bails on Amy’s first practice in the Wakefield basement, so Liz does her best to go it alone. Despite Liz’s best attempts to help out, Amy still sucks at ballet when her mother comes to pick her up. She does manage to do a plié correctly at the next class, and Jessica becomes filled with rage when Madame Andre compliments Elizabeth for helping Amy out. This somehow sparks a fight and now the twins aren’t speaking to one another.

On the day of the Coppelia audition, Liz and her mother go to the mall while Jessica stays home to put in some extra practice time. Madame Andre calls and says that for no good reason she’s changing the time of the audition from three to eleven. Jessica leaves a note for Liz and her mom, but she’s sure they won’t make it back in time and Madame Andre will have no choice but to give the lead to Jessica. She’s super pissed when Liz still manages to show up and audition.

Liz gets the part and Jessica’s life is totally ruined. She tells anyone who will listen how unfair Madame Andre is, but nobody cares. The stupid Coppelia doll disappears and Liz wonders if Jessica stole it, though how she would have stashed a life-sized doll under her tutu isn’t even pondered. Amy, who knows she sucks at ballet, offers to sit in a chair and take the doll’s place. Liz practices her solo every day while the rest of the class rehearses their part, and she finally sees that Jessica really is a much better dancer and Madame Andre was being unfair all along.

Liz pretends to hurt her ankle just before the recital, and she begs Jessica to go on and take her place. Jessica is only too happy to comply. Amy feels bad that Liz won’t get to dance at all, so she decides to dance in the corps and let Liz be Coppelia. Jessica dances beautifully, and when Madame Andre finds out it was Jessica and not Elizabeth, she chastises herself for being so blind. Amy confesses to stealing the doll and everyone goes back to the studio for a party.

Quotes:

“We need to leave for the Dance Studio in fifteen minutes.”

What an original name for a dance studio.

“I’m sure that nobody else has a chance against you,” Lila Fowler said confidently. “After all, you’re the only Unicorn in the class. Everybody knows that Unicorns are very pretty and very special.”

I’m not sure Madame Andre cares about that.

Jessica, about the Mercandy house: Don’t those windows upstairs look creepy? They look like devil’s eyes, and they’re staring straight at us.”

That goat has devil eyes.

Jessica and the number 37:

“Madame likes you three hundred thirty-seven times more than she likes me!”

The Cover: Look at the mug on Jessica! Liz is looking kind of smug, so I guess I’d be pissed, too.

The Moral of the Story:

Synopsis:

Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield are just the cutest identical twins alive and they do everything together. They share a room, they dress alike, they join all the same clubs and have all the same hobbies. So when Liz says the school is letting her start a school newspaper just for the sixth graders and asks Jessica to write for it, she’s shocked when Jessica says she’d rather hang out with Lila Fowler and join the Unicorn Club. Liz decides to ask her friends Amy Sutton and Julie Porter to help her out, figuring Jessica will want to join once she sees what a success the paper is.

At lunch the next day, the twins sit at separate tables for the first time ever so Liz can talk to Julie and Amy about the paper. Jessica sits with the Unicorns and tries to get an invitation to join the club. The day after that, Jessica stands Liz up after school to go to the Dairi Burger with the Unicorns. Just as she hoped, they ask her to join and give her three pledge tasks to complete. Janet Howell, the club’s president, tells Jessica she can’t tell anyone what her pledge tasks are, not even Liz. Jessica asks about Elizabeth’s pledge tasks, and Janet says Liz isn’t going to be asked to join. Jessica is shocked at first, but then realizes Liz wouldn’t like being a Unicorn anyway.

Jessica’s first pledge task is to take Mrs. Arnette’s lesson plan book off her desk and get it back into the teacher’s bag by the end of class. Jessica manages to get the job done with help from Lila and Winston. Her next task is to stand outside the girls’ restroom, tell people it’s flooded and get at least three girls to use the boys’ room instead. That one gets done pretty easily, too. The only task left is to come to school looking so different from Liz that nobody can tell they’re twins. Oh, calamity.

On Monday morning, Liz dresses in her yellow sweat suit (ugh) and takes the same outfit from Jessica’s closet and lays it out for her. As soon as Liz goes down to breakfast, Jessica jumps out of bed and dresses in something completely different. Then she curls her hair and puts on some makeup. She waits to go downstairs until it’s too late for Liz to change. Liz is hurt but Jessica doesn’t really notice because she’s so happy she’s completed all her tasks.

When the twins get to school, Liz locks herself in a bathroom stall and starts to cry. Then some girls come in talking about Jessica’s new look. They say they think it’s great that they can finally tell the Wakefield twins apart. When they’re gone, Liz decides to make the best of things by doing her hair in a style Jessica doesn’t usually like to wear. She decides it’s okay with her if she and Jessica stop dressing the same.

Meanwhile…

Jessica has asked her mother for dance classes and Alice has complied. The twins get to the studio just before their first class starts, but Jessica tells Liz to go ahead while she finishes getting ready. She finally comes into the classroom during roll call, and Madame Andre freaks out because Jessica is wearing a purple leotard, purple legwarmers, a purple scarf around her waist and purple barrettes with purple streamers. Also, blue eyeshadow all the way up to her eyebrows. Madame Andre yells at her, and it flusters Jessica so much that she messes up on all her ballet moves for the whole class.

Caroline Pearce comes up to Liz at lunch and says she thinks it’s super exciting that Jessica has been asked to be a Unicorn. Liz goes home crying that night about Jessica not wanting to spend time with her anymore. She talks to her mom, who says it’s really okay that the twins have separate interests. Liz doesn’t really like it, but she goes upstairs and tells Jessica she’s going to try not to let it bother her. Jessica offers to try to get her in.

Jessica goes to her first Unicorn meeting, and Liz asks Amy to come over to talk about newspaper stuff. Amy is a joy to hang out with and Liz has a really good time spending the evening with someone other than Jessica. She’s a little sad she won’t have time to do that kind of thing once Jessica makes her a Unicorn.

Liz won’t leave Jessica alone, so Jessica finally asks the Unicorns to let Liz join. They aren’t happy about the idea, but Jessica threatens to quit. Janet thinks that would make the club look bad, so they give Liz one pledge task. She has to go to the Dairi Burger with Lois Waller and replace the whipped cream on her sundae with shaving cream. Liz says no. She refuses to make Lois eat shaving cream. Jessica decides to do it herself. She calls Janet and tells her Liz is going to do it on Wednesday.

On Wednesday, while Liz is at a dentist appointment, Jessica poses as her twin and goes to the Dairi Burger with Lois. When Lois takes a bite of her sundae and starts spitting out the shaving cream, the Unicorns at the next table start laughing. Lois leaves all upset that Liz would embarrass her like that. A few days later, Jessica tells Liz she’s been voted into the club. Liz figures they must have realized their pledge idea would have hurt Lois’ feelings. Yeah, right.

Liz goes to her first Unicorn meeting and can’t believe that all they do is talk about boys and movies. Ellen comes up to Liz and congratulates her on a job well done at the Dairi Burger. Liz gets mad and goes home, where she cries to her mother. Again. Alice tells her again that twins can have different interests. Again.

Liz calls Lois and tells her it was Jessica at the Dairi Burger. Then she tells Jessica to apologize to Lois. If she doesn’t, Liz will stay in the Unicorn club and tell everyone else it was Jessica and not Liz who tricked Lois. Jessica apologizes. Liz isn’t satisfied, so she calls Lois and cooks up a scheme to get back at them. It really just boils down to Lila eating shaving cream on her sundae and Amy taking pictures for the newspaper. Good times.

Meanwhile, the twins are fighting about their room. Liz doesn’t like it being so messy all the time and Jessica, I don’t know, doesn’t like Liz’s books or something. Alice and Ned decide it’s time the girls have their own rooms. They’ll move Jessica into the guest room down the hall. What the hell? They’ve had an extra bedroom this whole time and just made the twins share because they’re twins? Not cool, man.

Somewhere in there, we hear about how some girl named Roberta Manning got kicked out of the Unicorns because she made out with a high school boy, and we find out the high school boy is Steven Wakefield. I guess he’s always liked them young.

Setup for the next book: The twins’ dance studio (which is called The Dance Studio) is putting on a production of Coppelia and Jessica wants the lead. Also, Amy’s mother is making her take ballet.

Quotes:

She undid her ponytail and let her hair fall free. Then she parted it in the middle, pulled it back from her face, and fastened it with a clip. It was a hairstyle she loved and Jessica hated…

“Hey, Liz!” Lois’s eyes were wide. “You should wear your hair like that all the time.”

So it’s Lois’ fault Elizabeth spends the next six years with her hair pulled back in clips and barrettes.

The Cover: I think the twins are so much cuter on these covers than they are on the SVH covers. I also think those sweaters look really comfortable.

The Moral of the Story:

The Big Deal: Graduation! Birthday party! Woohoo!

Synopsis:

Monday: Maria is freaking out about her valedictorian speech. She hasn’t even started it yet. She wants to be there for Ken, who is clearly upset about the upcoming anniversary of Olivia’s death, but she can’t focus on him while she still has this speech to write.

Liz tells her parents she got into Oxford, and Alice tells Jessica. Jessica freaks out and tells Liz she doesn’t want anything to do with her on their birthday, which is Thursday. Jessica calls Jeremy and gets pissed when he says his parents planned a graduation party for him on Thursday night. Jessica somehow turns this around to mean that Jeremy doesn’t care about her anymore. Oh, boy.

Tuesday: Liz decides to make things better with Jessica by planning a surprise party for their birthday. Again? Didn’t we try this last year? I recall it ending in tragedy. Liz talks to Conner and Tia and they decide to have it at the Riot. Maria sits around feeling sorry for herself all day because she needs help with her speech, and she’s annoyed when Liz says she needs to work on the party plans and can’t help her. Jessica decides she’s going to throw a party and not invite Liz, but Tia tells her Liz is already throwing one and the entire senior class is going. Jessica is pissed that Liz is having a party and not inviting her. Oh, Jessica.

Tia, Andy and Conner are all excited about their post-graduation road trip. It’s supposed to be just the three of them, but Tia has told Trent he can come along. She tells Andy, and he says that in that case, Dave is coming, too. Before Andy can tell Conner, Conner says he appreciates Tia and Andy leaving Trent and Dave behind for three weeks so the three of them can have their special best friend alone time.

Jessica’s home ec teacher tells Liz that Jessica never made up her risotto assignment, and she won’t be able to graduate unless she makes it up the next day. Liz knows Jessica has plans with Jeremy the next afternoon, so she decides to pull a twin switch and do it herself.

Wednesday: Liz has a meeting with a rep from Oxford. She kind of hopes the meeting will suck so she’ll have an excuse not to go, but the rep tells her all the wonderful things about Oxford and makes Liz want to go there more than ever.

Conner overhears Tia talking about how excited Trent is about the road trip, and he loses his shit. He tells Tia and Andy to uninvite their boyfriends, but they don’t want to. So Conner says they can all go together and he’ll just stay home.

Liz is the salutatorian, so she and Maria meet in the library to work on their speeches together. Liz says she hasn’t even started hers yet, and Maria flies off the handle because Liz isn’t taking it seriously enough. Then Liz gets really stupid and says she should have been valedictorian. So now Liz and Maria are in a fight. Liz heads to the home ec room to make a risotto.

Jessica goes to dinner with Jeremy and his family, who are all in town for graduation. As the family catches up on stuff, Jessica keeps thinking of how awful it’s going to be next year when she’s separated from both Liz and Jeremy. She gets up and leaves the table, and Jeremy follows her. He asks her what’s wrong, and she decides she’s pissed at him for not inviting her to his graduation party the next night. He says he figured she’d want to do something else since it’s her birthday, but Jessica is beyond reasoning. She runs to the parking lot in tears.

Evan gets off Berkeley’s waiting list. Thanks, Tia.

Thursday: Jessica wakes up in a terrible mood. Liz tries to make up over breakfast, and she tells Jessica she saved her from having to make a risotto. Jessica accuses Liz of thinking she’s so flaky that she can’t even do her own schoolwork. An argument ensues and Jessica takes the Jeep and goes to school.

Today is for graduation practice, but neither Liz nor Maria have their speeches prepared. Liz tells Maria not to worry about it, and subtly points out Conner, who is backstage cutting the wires to the microphone. Principal Chrome Dome suddenly can’t be heard, and Maria is worried Conner will be caught. Liz tells her not to worry, and at that moment, Jade stands up in the middle of the seated seniors and yells that Evan can’t stop her if she wants to go commando under her graduation robe. She starts a “Naked!” chant, and in all the confusion, Conner manages to get back to his seat before anyone notices he’s gone. Maria and Liz apologize to each other for their fight, and then Maria takes off for the library to work on her speech.

The twins run into each other in the line for yearbooks, and Liz apologizes. It seems like Jessica is just about to lighten up and talk to her, but then the home ec teacher comes running down the hall. She says the risotto was horrible and Jessica will have to try again that afternoon. Jessica is pissed and hates Liz all over again.

Tia, Trent, Andy and Dave go to the Riot to start setting things up, and Trent and Dave say they’ve been looking over the itinerary and have some changes they’d like to make. Tia and Andy get irritated and decide they’ll just have to tell their boyfriends they can’t come. They don’t have to, though. After listening to Tia, Andy and Conner tell stories about each other for a while, they announce the three of them should go alone.

In really sickening news, Jade’s mother has written a book and a publisher has offered her a lot of money to turn it into a series. That’s not the sickening part. The sickening part is this: “It’s about a pair of twins who have very different personalities…But they’re still closer to each other than to anyone else in the world…” Barf.

While she’s cooking, Jessica says something about the dress she wore yesterday, and Ms. Goldberg realizes it was Elizabeth who made the awful risotto. Jessica explains that she and Liz have been fighting, and Ms. Goldberg actually makes her feel better about things. Jessica goes to Jeremy’s graduation that night, and they make up afterward. Then she goes home and gets ready to go to the Riot and make up with Liz. She falls asleep instead.

Liz is at the party, feeling miserable about Oxford. She decides she’ll miss Jessica too much if she goes. She goes home to tell her so. The twins make up and talk about how much fun they’ll have at Sweet Valley University next year.

Friday: Graduation day. At the ceremony, the twins sit next to Todd because of stupid alphabetical order, and Todd asks Liz to go out with him after graduation. She accepts. Dammit, we just got rid of one codependency, and now you’re going back to an old one? UGH.

Liz never actually got around to working on a speech and all she has is a bunch of note cards. She’s nervous about making a fool of herself, so Jessica takes her notes and pulls another twin switch. Two in one book! Jessica, as Elizabeth, gives an awesome speech and everyone applauds.

THE FREAKING END!!!!!

Quotes:

A few of our old friends make cameo appearances in this book, even Robin Wilson, who came all the way back from Denver. It’s like graduation day on Boy Meets World. I wonder if they’ve been hanging out with Minkus in the other hallway?

When Enid turned into the classroom, her shirt slipped down, exposing a little skull tattoo on her back. Elizabeth shot Maria a look. She didn’t know if Enid’s tattoo was real, but if there was a yearbook award for most changed, Enid would definitely win. She’d gone from geeky to goth in less than a year.

Winston Egbert handed Elizabeth her test paper and flashed her a quick thumbs-up for luck.

Robin Wilson grimaced and held her gown up to her slim body. Her soft brown hair tumbled down over her face as she looked down at the shiny fabric. “Please, Liz. I mean, you spend all this time and effort dropping weight, and then they make you wear a muumuu to graduation.”

Bruce Patman, of all people, walked in – someone she hadn’t seen since he left for college and hadn’t liked much before then. He was all prepped out in a light blue button-down and khakis, and the second he saw Ken Matthews and Aaron Dallas, he dove into the crowd and started shaking hands like a politician.

And there is actually some mention of the more bizarre happenings from junior year:

Almost every single good memory Jessica cherished had occurred inside the sprawling building. And some bad ones, of course – kidnappings, bomb threats, gang wars, that crazy Margot [sic] chick who had come to town and tried to pretend she was Elizabeth. Junior year had definitely been tumultuous.

Definitely.

[Elizabeth] turned her full attention to Maria, whose expression made her look almost exactly the same as she had when she’d broken the news to Elizabeth and Jessica that their dog, Prince Albert, had run away during the earthquake last year – very uncomfortable.

So that’s what happened to the dog. I wonder why Maria had to be the one to break the news.

“We’ve lost many friends – Olivia Davidson, Roger Patman, Ronnie Edwards, Regina Morrow, to name a few.”

I don’t remember Roger Patman dying.

The Cover: Sorry about the terrible image. This book is all shiny and metallic and didn’t scan well. I went to The Closet, but theirs is the same.

This cover is totally lame. I have no idea which twin is which. I’d guess the one on the right is Jessica, but after 180+ books in the original series telling me Liz always wears her hair in a ponytail, I don’t quite believe it. Also, I think the one on the right looks kind of stoned.

The Moral of the Story: If you’re a handsome football player, the girl will always take you back no matter how much of a jackass you are.

Synopsis:

Jessica is really pissed off when she finds out Will is her secret admirer. She screams at him about all the crap he and Melissa put her through and says she can’t believe he’d expect her to go out with him. Then she, Liz and Tia get into the Jeep and drive off, splashing mud on Will as they go. Serves him right. On the way home, Liz starts telling Jessica she’s being too harsh, and then Jessica starts remembering how good a kisser Will is. Oh, here we go. She’s going to end up with him, isn’t she? Dammit. Jessica  decides to focus on her anger and go see Jeremy as soon as she drops off Liz and Tia. Jeremy can tell something is bothering her, but she’s decided not to tell him anything because that always works out so well. On Monday morning, Will comes up to Jessica and tries to apologize again. Jessica tells him she has a boyfriend and Will needs to just leave her the hell alone. Will says he’s not giving up, and then he turns around and sees Melissa standing there looking like she’s going to cry.

Angel has a couple of hours to kill between jobs, so he decides to head over to the racetrack. He wants to press his luck a little more since he made so much money there the other night. His anniversary with Tia is the next day and he wants to be able to afford something super special. He wins two hundred bucks and tells Tia to be ready the next night at seven and to be wearing her best dress. You know this isn’t going to end well.

Todd tells Will about a Sweet Valley High tradition that we’ve never heard of: every year, the captain of the football team gets together with the head cheerleader and they organize a kidnap. Every football player and cheerleader gets dragged out of bed one morning and everyone goes to breakfast in their pajamas. Todd says Jessica and Ken organized it last year, so Will thinks this is the perfect opportunity to get Jessica to talk to him; he’ll ask to get together with her on Friday, and the whole thing can “blur into a date” after they talk about the kidnapping thing. I cannot possibly hate this guy more than I already do. Melissa goes to Will’s house that night and kisses him, saying she’s giving him a chance to get back together with her before throwing himself at Jessica. She says Jessica would never go out with him again, but Will says he has a date with her on Friday.

Maria and Ken are working on another project together, and Ken lets Maria slowly drag him into the real world, which, to Maria, means the world of schoolwork. She teaches him how to take notes and takes him shopping for a planner so he can write down his assignments. Fun times. After they leave the office supply store, Ken bites the bullet and asks Maria to have dinner with him. After they eat, they go for a walk on the beach and start having fun chasing each other around. Just when they’re about to kiss, Ken thinks about Olivia and remembers he promised himself he would never get close to anyone ever again. Sigh. Maria talks to him the next day about how unhappy he is, and he realizes it’s because he’s not playing football anymore. He decides to talk to the coach about it, but unfortunately, the coach doesn’t want to let a quitter like Ken back on the team.

Liz has been ridiculously depressed since Conner kicked her out. All she wants to do is hang out with Jessica, but Jessica has to work Tuesday night. Jessica says they can hang out Wednesday, but at dinner Alice announces that the Wakefield house will be ready to move back into in two weeks. Jessica leaves the dinner table and immediately starts packing. She calls Jeremy and invites him over to help her, and Liz gets all sad and angry about Jessica breaking their plans to hang out.

Angel and Tia go out to an incredibly expensive restaurant, and by the end of the night, Angel is pretty much freaking out about how much money he’s spent. Then when he gets home, his father tells him how proud he is to have such a responsible kid, and Angel feels guilty. Who cares? I mean, that was all his gambling winnings anyway, wasn’t it? Anyway, Angel keeps going to the track every night and he ends up losing every cent of his savings. Of course he does.

While Jeremy is helping Jessica clean her room, he finds the necklace from Will and the note that went along with it that says, “A kiss is still a kiss.” Even though the necklace and note have been shoved unceremoniously under the bed, Jeremy decides there’s something going on and he acts all weird the rest of the night. Naturally, he does not say anything to Jessica. That would be too easy. Jessica is walking to class the next morning when the jocks start catcalling her like they always do. Will comes out of nowhere and pins one of them against the wall. He finally announces that all the rumors he and Melissa spread about Jessica were untrue. All right, so maybe that gives him some points, but I still hate him.

Melissa goes to House of Java and tells Jeremy that Jessica is cheating on him and has a date with Will Simmons on Friday. Jeremy, despite recognizing Melissa as one of the bitches who insulted Jessica at that party, freaks out and starts thinking maybe the necklace he found was from Will. When Jessica comes in later, he asks her about the necklace. She tells him the truth, that it was from Will. Jeremy gets pissed and says he heard she has a date with him for Friday. Jessica gets upset and leaves.

Jessica has to blow off Liz again because she gets called in to work. Liz freaks out and yells at her. Oh, get a hobby, Liz. Then Lila comes to Jessica’s room and asks if Will’s outburst means he and Jessica are together now. Jessica is disgusted by Lila’s obvious digging for gossip and starts to leave for work. Will drives up just as she gets out the front door. Will asks her to get together with him on Friday to talk about the kidnapping thing. No fool, Jessica suggests Tia come along as well. They agree to meet at First and Ten.

Friday night rolls around and of course Tia can’t make it and of course Liz tells Jeremy where Jessica is and of course he sees her with Will. He thinks she lied to him so he breaks up with her and leaves the restaurant.

Quotes:

He filled the coffee filter, tamped it down, and twisted it into the locked position. With his other hand he stuck the metal pitcher of milk into position. Then he twisted the knob, sending hot steam surging into the milk. The steamed milk foamed and gurgled as he raised and lowered the pitcher. At the exact moment the espresso machine dribbled to a stop, he grabbed a tall glass, poured in the coffee and some chocolate syrup, and topped it off with steamed milk. He spooned some foam onto the top, dusted it with cocoa, and slid it across the counter.

This book suddenly turned into an instruction manual for making coffee drinks at House of Java. Why?

The Cover: This cover is kind of creepy, what with that big giant Jessica head there.

The Moral of the Story: If your girlfriend cheats on you and you want to win her back, start making out with another girl.

The Big Deal: Science fair

Synopsis:

After Jessica tells Todd that Liz and Devon are making out on the softball field at school, she puts her hand on his in a suggestive way and offers to fool around with him to get back at Liz. Todd is horrified at the idea. He doesn’t believe his sweet, loyal Liz would ever, ever cheat on him, so he leaves Jessica with the food and races over to the high school to see for himself. When Todd gets to school and sees Liz and Devon together, he decides he will win Liz back. Um, hello? Let the bitch go.

Jessica starts scheming. She figures if she can get Todd to start going out with someone else, Liz will break up with Devon so she can get Todd back, leaving Devon free for Jessica. She decides to get in touch with Courtney Kane and do a little matchmaking.

Since Lila is friends with Courtney, Jessica lets her in on the plan and the three of them get together. Courtney is perfectly willing to be Todd’s rebound chick, so she lets Jessica and Lila give her a makeover so she looks more “soft” and “refined.” More like Liz, in other words, and less skanky. Then they parade her in front of Todd, and he starts to wonder if Jessica is on the right track with this revenge idea. But no, he’d rather cry about Liz and try to win her back by giving her the ring he bought for her. Liz puts it in her jewelry box, and Jessica takes it, figuring it will come in handy.

The next part of Jessica’s plan is to get Devon to notice her again. To that end, she makes sure to bump into him while she’s walking down the hall reading her chemistry book. She tells him she’s having trouble in the subject and he plays right into her hands by offering to help her after school. They meet in the library for about two seconds before Jessica gets pissed because Devon makes some comment about not being surprised she sucks at chemistry. Jessica yells at him and tells him to watch out for Liz because she’s a fickle bitch. Much like destiny.

You know what I'm talking about, Lost fans.

Later, Jessica makes sure Courtney is waiting for Todd after basketball practice. While they’re talking, Jessica, pretending to be Liz, walks across the parking lot. She turns to Todd, sees him with Courtney, reaches into her pocket and puts on Todd’s ring, and then waves at Todd before turning around. Todd is at first excited that Liz seems interested in him again, but then he gets mad that she didn’t want him back until she saw him with Courtney. This pisses him off more than Liz kissing Devon did. And somehow Jessica knew it would. Todd and Courtney leave to go grab some pizza, and Jessica follows them to Guido’s. She calls Liz and asks her to meet her there, and Liz get to the restaurant just in time to see Todd and Courtney making out. Liz runs out the door in horror, but then she starts thinking about things and decides she’s really happy for Todd and she’s going to do whatever it takes to make sure his new relationship works out. That way she’ll be free to be with Devon without feeling guilty.

Then there’s the whole science fair thing. Devon and Liz are going to enter because they’re lab partners. Jessica wants to enter, and she’s sure that Devon will fall madly in love with her if she wins. Unfortunately, Bruce is her lab partner and the best idea they come up with is a volcano. At the fair, Devon is acting all weird and doesn’t really want to win. He didn’t want to enter in the first place, something about people at his old school only knowing him as a smart guy. Yeah, who wants that? When he finds out that somebody (Jessica) ruined his and Liz’s project, he thinks it’s great. Meanwhile, Todd is walking around with Courtney, totally fed up with her snobbishness, and Jessica and Bruce’s volcano blows up.

The next morning, Jessica mentions something to Liz about the ring Todd gave her. Liz decides to give it back to him so he can give it to Courtney. How very noble of her. Liz calls Todd and then goes off to meet him at the Dairi Burger. They get to talking about the ring, and Todd says he saw her wearing it that one day after school. Liz says she never wore it and doesn’t know what he’s talking about. They realize Jessica’s been messing with them both this whole time. As they talk about how much they still care about each other, they hold hands.

Aren't they cute together?

Of course, that’s when Jessica comes in with Courtney and Devon. Devon and Todd start yelling and threatening each other in their cool-guy way, and then out of nowhere, Todd gets down on one knee and asks Liz to marry him. I wish I was kidding. Liz is horrified. So is Devon. He grabs Todd and the two of them start going at it. A couple of football players come break up the fight. Liz goes home and locks herself in her room, disgusted with everyone.

Fight!

Quotes:

Elizabeth would never do this to me, he reassured himself. She would never cheat on me.

What in your experience together would lead you to this line of thinking?

She couldn’t help thinking that Todd never wanted to watch the same movies as she did anymore. They used to watch old classics together all the time. But now he seemed to prefer action movies or psychological thrillers.

Liz, Todd is a dude. You can’t expect him to just watch Casablanca over and over again for the rest of his life.

“How about if we paint it purple?” Jessica suggested. “We could even add tiny yellow flowers or moons.”

Bruce shook his head. “Jessica, volcanoes are brown. And they don’t have little moons on them.”

“Brown?” Jessica asked in alarm. “You want to paint it brown?”

Jessica, seriously, are you still twelve years old?

The Cover: Does the Dairi Burger have a pool table? Nobody has ever mentioned that before. And who the hell are these people? Neither one of these guys look like the Devon from the previous covers.

The Moral of the Story:

The Big Deal: Going away party for the twins at Lila’s, big trip to France

Synopsis:

The school year has ended and the twins are off to France to be au pairs for the summer. They’ll be watching the kids of some royal couple, the de Saint-Maries. The night before they leave, Lila throws a big bon voyage bash. Jessica is bored and anxious to just be in France already. Liz isn’t looking forward to being away from Todd for a month and she pulls him away from the party for some alone time. Todd tells her he wants them to see other people for the summer. Liz, who prefers cheating to breaking up, is totally pissed and leaves the party in tears.

The twins arrive in France and get on a train. On what turns out to be the longest train ride ever, Liz sulks while Jessica talks to a cute guy, Jacques, and his father, Louis. Jacques claims his father is the duke of Norveaux, and Jessica is suitably impressed. By the time the men get off the train, Jacques and Jessica are in love and making out. Jacques gives her a huge emerald before he leaves, and promises to come visit her at the de Saint-Maries’ castle. A little while later, a countess on the train starts screaming that one of her gems is missing. The countess is horrible and mean and thinks the twins are scum because they’re not royalty. Unfortunately, the countess and her daughter are also going to be spending the summer with the de Saint-Maries.

The twins’ first day on the job, little Pierre runs into the hedge maze and Liz goes after him. She gets lost for a while, but finally finds the kid peeking through the hedges at Prince Laurent, his half-brother, who is having a little fencing practice in front of a cottage. Prince Laurent de Saint-Marie is eighteen years old and he dreams of meeting a beautiful blond girl with blue eyes and a heart of gold. How convenient. Liz checks him out through the hedges, then Pierre leads her out of the maze. Liz yells at Jessica for letting Pierre run off and the twins start shouting at each other in front of everyone. They decide they can’t work together anymore, so they split the days into shifts so only one of them is with the children at a time.

A letter from Todd comes for Liz, but Jessica burns it before Liz can see it. Damn, I really wanted to know what he had to say for himself. Then Jessica talks to Anna, another servant, and asks what she knows about the duke of Norveaux. Anna says there’s no such thing and Jessica is disillusioned. She can’t believe some guy she didn’t even know would lie to her.

Liz goes to take a walk before dinner one day and gets lost in the hedge maze again. Idiot. It starts to rain and by the time she finds the cottage on the other side, she’s totally soaked and freezing. Prince Laurent lets her in and they spend the entire night talking. When Liz gets back to the castle the next morning, Jessica is so happy to see her that she declares their fight over. Until the next week when Liz skips out on baby-sitting duties to go horseback riding with Laurent. The prince takes her to some romantic spot and tells her he had a dream about her before they met. Liz thinks that’s totally cool because she’d had a dream about him on the plane ride over. They make out.

Back at the castle, Jessica puts the kids to bed and goes up to the tiny attic bedroom she’s disappointed to call her own. Someone grabs her and puts a hand over her mouth. She struggles and squirms, but then a “sexy voice” tells her to be still. She turns around and is overjoyed to see Jacques. She thinks it’s a little weird that he lied about being a duke’s son, and that he sneaked into the castle like a creeper, and that he was going through her bureau, but she makes out with him anyway.

Quotes:

“I just can’t wait to get out of Sweet Valley,” Jessica explained. “I feel like I’ve been dancing with the same ten cute guys my whole life.”

And I feel like I’ve been reading about it my whole life.

Jessica had traveled in the past, and she had even spent some time in England as an intern at the London Times. But still, it seemed strange to be in the midst of a non-English-speaking crowd.

This whole book, the twins act like they’ve never been to France before.

Jessica frowned. She had hoped they would eat with the royal family at the regal dinner table that they had passed.

Why would you assume something like that? You’re the baby-sitter.

“I was dating a guy named Cameron, but it didn’t work out.”

Just in case you were wondering about the relationship Jessica spent the last three books desperately pursuing, it “fizzled out” because Cameron had to travel on business all the time.

The Cover: Jessica, take off that stupid beret and the dumb scarf. You are not really French and your shoes are totally wrong for that outfit. Liz, you just keep on rockin’ your barrettes and floral luggage.

The Moral of the Story:

The Big Deal: Party at Lila’s after the SATs, big basketball game

Best Outfit: Dana, the original American Apparel model – green tunic, black leather belt, purple tights, black high-heeled boots

Synopsis:

It’s time for the SATs and Liz is freaking out. She stays up late studying every night while Jessica shops and sunbathes. Unsurprisingly, Liz is so tired and stressed that she does badly on the test. Her scores are in the four hundreds. Jessica is shocked and horrified when her own scores are in the seven hundreds. She doesn’t want to tell anyone because she’s worried about being seen as a nerd. She does tell Ken, but he doesn’t believe her. Jackass.

After the scores come out, Jessica is again horrified when she gets to school and there’s a big banner congratulating her and Winston on having the highest SAT scores in the junior class. There’s even an assembly to recognize their achievement. Everyone is congratulating her and Jessica is relieved that being smart won’t totally ruin her reputation. But then people keep coming up to her and saying how surprised they are that she did so well. Jessica is upset that everyone thinks she’s dumb.

Jessica gets called to the principal’s office and Chrome Dome tells her the school board thinks she cheated on the exam. Caroline Pearce overhears and starts spreading the gossip. By the time it gets to Liz, the story is that Jessica sneaked back into the classroom after the test and switched her exam with Liz’s. Liz gets pissed and starts a fight with Jessica.

While all this is going on, Todd is turning into a real asshat. He scored in the six hundreds and now has college scouts coming to watch him play basketball. He’s acting really arrogant and obnoxious and he doesn’t seem to care at all about Liz’s problems. Liz’s self esteem is shot. She even tries to resign from The Oracle because she thinks she’s too stupid to be a reporter, but Mr. Collins doesn’t let her. She manages to tear Todd away from his constant rereading of scholarship offers and they go to Miller’s Point. Liz tries one more time to talk to Todd about how she’s feeling, but he can’t stop blathering on about how awesome he is. Liz kicks him out of the car. Just a few feet away, Jessica and Ken have a fight because Ken wants Jessica to tell him the truth, that she really cheated on the exam. She jumps out of his car and runs into Todd. Then Liz drives by and offers Jessica a ride. They make up on the way home and Liz says she knows Jessica didn’t cheat.

The twins both decide to take the SATs again. This time, Jessica is determined to do just as well as she did the first time so she stays up all night studying and even invites Winston over to help her. Liz has decided she doesn’t even care about the SATs anymore, so she acts like Jessica and doesn’t prepare at all. This time, Liz scores in the seven hundreds and Jessica in the four hundreds. The school board is convinced Jessica cheated the first time, so she is suspended from school.

Liz is determined to clear Jessica’s name and she comes up with a plan. Chrome Dome gives her permission to hold a mock trial. Liz will act as Jessica’s lawyer and the jury will be six students and six faculty members who don’t know Jessica very well. If Liz and Jessica win, Chrome Dome will fight for Jessica’s case against the school board.

Jessica is allowed to come back to school the day before the trial, and when the twins get there they find a whole rally going on. Half the school is wearing “We Believe in Jessica” t-shirts while the football team, led by Ken, runs around yelling and the cheerleading squad (minus Heather) does a cheer. I wish I was kidding. While that’s going on, Heather and Bruce are leading the rest of the school in a display of scowling while wearing “Jessica is Guilty” t-shirts. Because everyone has an opinion. Fucking Wakefields.

To my complete lack of surprise, Liz wins the trial and Jessica’s good name is cleared. Ned and Alice decide the twins should take a few days off from school and go visit Steve at Sweet Valley University.

Oh, somewhere in there, Todd falls at his big basketball game and breaks his ankle. This prompts Liz to make up with him and everything is wonderful again.

Quotes:

“You’re really beautiful, Jessica,” ken said. He touched her fingers. “You’re without a doubt the prettiest girl at Sweet Valley High. I’ve heard guys on the football team talking about your incredible looks when they thought I was out of earshot.”

Do I really need more confirmation that Jessica is totally hot? Does Jessica really need it?

“Well, I’m not too surprised, Jess,” [Ken] said with a smile, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “It’s not like anyone expected you to do really well.”

Damn, that’s cold.

“What school should I go to, Liz? You used to know a lot about college,” Todd said.

Ha ha. Because she’s suddenly forgotten everything she’s ever learned now that she scored low on a test.

The Cover: I don’t know what’s going on here, but I don’t think anything on this cover actually correlates to anything that happens in the book.