19 posts tagged “sweet valley”
(No, it's not the Movie Project.)
Liz Cheats On Todd (or Sweet Valley #14, Deceptions).
Liz and Jessica throw a big party to celebrate Liz not dying at the hands of Carl the kidnapper. Nicholas Morrow falls in love with Liz in about three seconds and keeps asking her out, even after he learns that she and Todd are in love.
Liz finally says yes, because (a) Nicholas is a good guy and (b) it's the polite thing to do.
Unfortunately, Todd is already jealous of Nicholas because he monopolized Liz's time at the party and Jess has decided that she and Nicholas are meant to be, so Liz doesn't tell either of them about the date.
Meanwhile, Jessica starts hanging out with Randy, a math-and-computer nerd. She wants to learn about computers because that's what Nicholas' dad does and Nicholas helps out at the company a lot. And she wants math help because if she fails, she's off the cheerleading squad. She convinces Randy to change her grade to a C- (the school recently got a computer for grades, thanks to Nicholas' dad). Of course, right after he changes her grade, she starts blowing him off and so when he goes to change it back, he realizes the school changed the access code. He calls Jess to tell her that he's going to the principal to confess everything...except he doesn't realize he's really talking to Liz. Liz and Jess meet with Randy and Mr. Cooper and Liz convinces the principal to basically let Jess and Randy off scot-free because they made a mistake. (Seriously. Not even a detention.)
Anyway, back to the date.
They go out on Sunday, because it's Todd's mom's birthday, so she knows that he won't call or stop by. She and Nicholas go to Cote d'Or, which is this really fancy restaurant about an hour away. So she's all relieved, because she'd never run into anyone she knows there, since the restaurant is really expensive and is generally more of a celebration place and not, say, a hangout place.
Right. A celebration place...like, say, the place you'd take your mom on her birthday.
So yes, Todd and his parents show up and Liz pretends to be Jessica. After Todd leaves, he knows Jess will tell Liz, "Oh, your boyfriend sucks; he can't even tell us apart" so he heads to the Wakefields to tell Liz himself. When he finds a twin in a bathrobe, he kisses her and Jess is all, "Ew, what's wrong with you?" and then he realizes Liz lied. So now he and Jess are both pissed at Liz.
Jess gets over it pretty quickly because Nicholas wasn't into her so she decides she wasn't really into him and that he's boring (he's working at his dad's company and that takes up a lot of his time) and after Nicholas tells Todd that nothing happened, he forgives Liz, too.
Todd the basketball star wins the championship for Sweet Valley. All's right with the world.
As we left Sweet Valley last time, Liz got kidnapped from the hospital parking lot by weird orderly Carl. In this one, we learn that Liz arranged to take Jessica to the Morrows' party (more on them later) after a shift at the hospital and a tutoring session for one of the Droids musicians--seems Max has a hard time with Shakespeare. Anyway, Jess gets sick of waiting for Liz and heads off to the party so she can be the first one there and snag Nicholas for herself.
(The Morrows are new in town and are throwing a welcome party for their kids so that they can make friends. Nicholas is around Steven's age and Regina is the twins' age. She's also deaf. I forgot that, but I do remember that she falls for Bruce and I remember what happens to her.)
So yeah, uber-cool Jess is the first one at the party and is flirting with Nicholas. Seems to be working, and then Todd comes and tells her how he's so worried about Liz. She doesn't want to risk losing Nicholas to Lila and says, "Oh, yeah, she's babysitting for Mr. Collins' son for an hour or two" so that Todd will leave her alone.
Once they realize that it's really late and Liz still isn't there, they start to get worried.
Todd and Jess drive around looking for Liz, but she's nowhere to be found.
(This is because she's tied up in Carl's creepy house in the middle of nowhere.)
Yup, Carl decides that because Liz is the only person to be nice to him, they're destined to be together. He's also a trusting guy--he takes her gag off and she screams; he unties her and she tries to run away. So he's like, "Yeah. Don't worry, Liz--we're going to run off to the mountains and then you'll be able to walk around 'cause if you run, you'll get lost and die."
Meanwhile, Max (Droids guy) is pissed that Liz blew him off so he heads to the hospital and finds her car. With the door open. And with her purse on the floor. Not a good sign, right? So instead of calling the cops, he gets in and starts going through her stuff so that he can see if she left a clue behind. Except that's when the cops show up. Oops.
So yeah, Max gets arrested.
The Wakefields think he's innocent, but Todd isn't sure. The two get into a fight the next day at school (parents decide that Jess, Todd and Max all need to resume their normal routine) and then Jess breaks it up. They decide to go to the hospital, retrace Liz's steps and talk to anyone who may have seen her on Saturday. While there, Jess sees Carl, who freaks out, thinking she's Liz. He asks how she escaped, leading Jess to believe that he may be responsible for Liz's disappearance. Who could think she's the dumb one with deductive reasoning like that?
Thanks to Carl screwing up, they learn where Liz is and she's reunited with her family. Jessica's really excited to have her sister back...until she learns that Liz is going on the Jeremy Frank show (not Johnny like I put in the last Sweet Valley post...sorry about that) and is pissed that the episode will air before hers will.
Seriously. I hate Jessica.
In this Sweet Valley High, Steven is sad because his girlfriend Tricia is blowing him off and Jess says she's probably cheating on him. Turns out she has leukemia and only a few months to live and she thinks it'd be better if he didn't watch her die.
In a subplot, Jessica learns that Sweet Valley Celebrity Johnny Frank is in the hospital and she decides that she and Elizabeth should be candy stripers. Except she gets stuck on the maternity ward and Liz gets to meet the guy. Not to be outdone, Jess sneaks onto his floor and goes to sign his cast and loses her balance. When she goes to catch herself, she jams the pen into his knee. Later, she comes in while the nurse is giving him a sponge bath and drops cold water on him.
Seriously--when did she become such a freak? I thought she was always pretty smooth with the guys.
Anyway, Liz learns Tricia's secret and tells Steve. He tells Tricia that he wants to be with her for however long they have left.
At the end, Liz got kidnapped as a fitting lead in to book 13, Kidnapped.
In this installment (Too Good to Be True), Jessica goes to New York and Suzanne Devlin comes to Sweet Valley. Ned Wakefield and Suzanne's father were college roommates, so they decide that a twin can go to New York to stay with the Devlins and Suzanne will come stay with the Wakefields.
Thanks to a coin toss, Elizabeth will go to New York...but wait! Jessica tells her parents that Liz volunteered to let her go instead. This is technically a total lie, but she gets to go anyway.
Enter Suzanne. At first, she seems totally sweet and nice. While acting like Liz's best friend, she steals her necklace (you know, the gold lavaliere she and Jess got for their sixteenth birthday). And she tries to seduce Mr. Collins. When that doesn't work out, she rips her blouse and said that he attacked her. Mr. Collins almost lost his job. Fortunately, Liz finds the necklace in Suzanne's suitcase (while leaving a blouse and scarf she bought as a going away present) and realizes the truth.
After she confronts Suzanne in private, Suzanne tells Cara (at Lila's birthday party) that Liz hit her head and has been acting really weird, blaming Suzanne for Mr. Collins' attack. (Yes, she's horrible, but you have to really admire Suzanne 'cause that was brilliant.)
Fortunately, Winston "accidentally" spills punch on Suzanne's really expensive white dress and she freaks and starts yelling at him.
Kids at Sweet Valley are stunned and disgusted. Why would you yell when someone spills punch on your really expensive white dress?
Best part of the book: Liz and Todd are discussing whether Suzanne is evil or not and Todd says that appearances can be deceiving and reminded her of when Jess pretended to be Liz to date Bill Chase and how Bill totally bought it. And Liz said, "But that was just Jessica. She's never done anything really bad." Except for, you know, trying to ruin Enid's life and driving Annie to try to commit suicide.
Meanwhile, Jess isn't exactly having a great time either. Suzanne's parents leave her alone in the apartment except for when they threw her a big "Welcome to New York!" party and invited only one other teenager, "a dorky thirteen-year-old girl named Martha who wouldn't talk about anything but her horse and the summer she'd spent at a camp for overweight kids." She also went to a party with Suzanne's friends, where she drank too much and passed out in a cab. (That's pretty much all we're told about that.) She went out with Suzanne's boyfriend Pete, who tried to rape her. Fortunately, the Devlins came in and were horrified and broke up with Pete for Suzanne.
But now Suzanne and Jess are back in their respective homes and all is right with the world.
In this installment (Racing Hearts), Lila Fowler (Jessica's best friend and one of the two richest people in Sweet Valley) gets a crush on Roger Barrett. Roger is poor and his secret shame is that he works as a janitor after school. He's provoked into running this big race and wins (that's why Lila gets the crush) and worries that he'll have to drop out of the even bigger race (that would get him a full scholarship to college) because his boss is a jerk and won't give him time off to practice and race.
Jessica decides her mission in life is to become a lawyer so she persuades her dad to give her an after-school job. Not surprisingly, she ends up hating it and wants to quit until she meets a boy who works at the ad agency across the hall from her dad's law office. Sparks fly and they meet every night to make out at the office...and then she learns that he's 15. Not able to face the stigma of dating a boy who doesn't drive, she breaks up with him.
Anyway, Jess learns that Roger is a janitor and wants to tell everyone but Liz blackmails (!!!) her into keeping her mouth shut, saying that she'll tell their dad about the boy Jess is seeing.
But Roger tells everyone himself, making Lila hate him 'cause he's poor and cleans toilets for a living. Liz engineers it so that he can run (turns out it's a law that you get days off from your job) and he wins the big race. Lila starts flirting with him again but he turns her down for Olivia Davidson. This is the second book in a row where a boy is in smit with a popular girl only to later ditch her for the true love that comes with dating someone who isn't popular but is True To Themselves. (High school girls, take note.)
We open on a rehearsal for Sweet Valley High's spring play, Splendor in the Grass. I don't know if you've seen it, but I have. It's about a young couple, desperately in love. The guy (Bud, Warren Beatty) wants to have sex, but the girl (Deanie, Natalie Wood) won't because she's basically been told all her life that nice girls don't do that. Anyway, so she can't stand the thought of her life without him, so she tries to kill herself. (The moral of the story? If you don't have sex, you lose the guy and get committed.)
I'm oversimplifying and it's a great movie, but maybe not high school-appropriate. (Back in my hometown, there was a huge furor over one of the high schools performing Miss Saigon because it's about prostitution. Except it's about prostitution like Pretty Woman is about prostitution.)
Anyway, so Jess is Deanie and Bill Chase (he of the surfing championships) is Bud. Jess asked him out once and he turned her down. Toward the end of the last book, she pretended to be Elizabeth and went on a date with him and he fell hardcore for her. So this book, she basically jerks him around and has him getting food for her and picking up her script and everything. Then she ignores him, until she sees him start to pay attention to DeeDee. Whenever that happens, she turns on the charm untl he's back following her around again...then she ignores him. The cycle continues until Bill gives DeeDee a surfing lesson. She nearly drowns (it's a stormy day) and he gives her mouth-to-mouth and notices how beautiful she is. We also learn that he loves Jessica because she looks like his dead girlfriend, Julianne. (Creepy, creepy, creepy.)
Meanwhile, Todd's first girlfriend moves back to town and Elizabeth gets really jealous because every time she sees them together, they're hugging or he's putting suntan lotion on her. It doesn't help when Olivia helpfully tells her that they were in love and never really broke up; they just stopped seeing each other when Patsy (the first girlfriend) moved away.
So she gets jealous and starts avoiding Todd. When he finally corners her, he explains that (a) he and Patsy are friends, (b) friends hug, especially when one of them gets a letter from her boyfriend breaking up with her and (c) he loves Elizabeth. Elizabeth is embarrassed that she went through 134 pages of doubt, jealousy and misery when she could have just talked to Todd, a lesson she should've learned back in book one.
Elizabeth comes out of her coma but, instead of being her usual smart-but-dull self, is essentially Jessica on steroids. She copies Winston's term paper (and apparently does a crappy job of it, since she got caught), uses her column to try and break up Ken and his girlfriend (in the gossip column, she says that the girlfriend is cheating on him) and totally blows off Todd and Enid.
Jessica is also bitter because Liz is basically being a better Jessica than she is. This forces her to be the responsible one. Also, since the Wakefields are watching a couple of 12-year-old twins, she has to do a lot of babysitting. The first night the twins are staying over (their parents went to Europe), Ned and Alice go play bridge...but Liz and Jessica both have dates. So Liz leaves first so that Jess has to take the younger twins along on her date. Go Elizabeth!
Liz also makes out with Bruce Patman. So they go back to his beach house to have sex and he leaves her alone in a bedroom--in the dark--and she gets up to go find him, trips and hits her head. And our old Elizabeth is back.
In food news, "`Good thing you lost those last two pounds, Jess,' she told herself. `Dan wouldn't want to put his arms around a blimpo.'"
But we now have only one Jessica to worry about so all's right with the world. :)
In this installment of Sweet Valley High (Dangerous Love), Todd buys a motorcycle. We learn that Elizabeth and Jessica's cousin died the day after buying one (head on collision) and the girls have promised never to ride one. Liz, of course, waits until after Todd buys the bike to tell him this.
She gets jealous 'cause he gives a couple of girls rides on his bike and he gets jealous because she gets a ride from the Droids' drummer, Guy.
He goes to Enid's Sweet 16 party to tell her that he's selling the bike and she insists that he take her to the afterparty on the motorcycle. Unfortunately, since he stopped giving rides to other people, he's been leaving the extra helmet at home. Elizabeth--who, up to this point has been the smart one--says that the trip will be a short one.
Bike crashes (ironically enough into the van of the guy who wanted to buy it--who, incidentally, was driving drunk). Liz is in a coma.
I can't really make fun of this one.
Went to Book Thing today. They had two of the Sweet Valley High books I didn't already have, plus a couple of Sweet Valley Senior Year and Twins books. And, possibly best of all, I now have Ramona Quimby, Age 8. Very excited. :)
I brought Dangerous Love with me to work, but I also have the DVD player and The Prestige and Dirty Dancing (can't decide if I want to think or not, which probably means not). We'll see what ends up getting done, right?
Plus, a coworker brought back the movies she loaned, so I have Talladega Nights, Red Eye, Flightplan and Roman Holiday to pick from as well. (It'll probably still end up being Dirty Dancing.)
So you can see Scott Daniels for yourselves...
