Young Adult Revisited

Winston is failing most of his classes because all he does is mope over Denise and then spend all his free time with her. He tells her that he can’t see her anymore because if he fails even one of his classes, his parents will quit paying for school and he’ll have to transfer out, which naturally means they’ll never see each other again. Before he makes this huge decision though, he shows a complete inability to say no, which makes me wonder if he’s ever had a girlfriend before, though I know he does. Like he tells her that he has to study, but then goes to a party with her instead. He finally asks his professor for help and the prof basically tells him that he should have come in a lot sooner, but then agrees to help. He tells Winston that he can pick up a study guide at his office. In a great scene, he discovers that the study guide is one sheet of paper saying something like, Mr. Egbert, please study pages 1-150 for the next test. Burn. Then he turns around, finds a copy of the real...

I read this book and wrote a review, but lost it somewhere. The second time, I just kind of skimmed the book so I apologize if the review is kind of off. The twins are planning a Halloween party at an abandoned mansion near campus. Conveniently, an abandoned one with running water and electricity. Liz keeps whining to Jess because she’s waiting to hear back from some internship. She and Tom both applied and instead of calling the winner, they’re sending out letters. Yup, I’m sure those will get to all applicants at the same time. Jess wisely points out that since it’s a nationwide contest, there’s no guarantee that either one will win. Then again, this is Sweet Valley and apparently the only place in the country where students do shit. Liz meets with Tom to open their letters and he of course, gets it. That means he flies out to New Orleans for the weekend to work with Nicholas des Perdu, who’s supposedly a superstar writer. Am I the only one who finds this ridiculous? Seriously, would...

Sandra Beacon is a jealous bitch. Sorry Sandy, but I call them like I see them. She’s flipping out because nominations are up for PBA (the sorority in case you didn’t know) and everyone expects her to nominate Jean West, including Jeanie. See, the two girls are best friends, but Sandy feels completely inferior. Jeannie is better than her at everything, including cheerleading. The only thing Sandy has is the sorority and she doesn’t really want to share. Despite her feelings, she nominates Jean and everyone just kind of nods their approval. She tells Jean the big news at water ballet…wait, what? Is that like the cool thing to do? I can’t imagine that being cool back then, let alone today. Any who, Sandy remembers that one of the first challenges the girls have to do, is get some poor guy to go out with them. She decides that she’ll find someone impossible and pick him for Jean. Somehow she ends up sharing lunch with Liz and Winston. Isn’t Sandy supposed to be kind of popular? Why doesn’...

I actually never read this book when I was younger, but it was actually kind of interesting. And point of reference, my cover looks nothing at all like that. Mine has a skeleton hand reaching across a train window and the part of the hand, holding the window, still has skin attached, kind of cool. Basically there’s some huge high school class taking a train trip across country to San Francisco. We have Hannah, our main/meek girl, her crush Mac, her best friend/beauty queen Kerri, her boyfriend Larry and their friend Jean Marie. Not long after boarding the train, they find a coffin in the luggage train. It’s the body of their classmate Frog, who died not long before the trip. They all sit around sharing stories about what a creep he was. Larry had him kicked out of gym class because he wouldn’t participate, Kerri and Jean Marie both turned him down for dates and Mac was the one to give him the nickname Frog. Hannah doesn’t have a “treated him like shit” story, but she feels guilty about...

Bruce Patman can’t cope with his parent’s divorce and wants to fix things. Even though Alice promised to help in the last book, here she decides that she doesn’t want to get involved, but of course the twins will help. Jessica’s horoscope says that she’s going to experience problems and she starts worrying, which becomes a major part of the book. The twins decide to send Marie a love letter from Hank, but Jessica gets her hand stuck in the mailbox. Michael Hampton, the hot new senior sees her and she pretends to be Liz. Every time he sees her do something stupid, she pretends to be her twin, not realizing that he actually prefers girls like that because he’s kind of klutzy. Bruce tries to get back together with Pamela, but she keeps seeing him with Liz and thinks he still has feelings for her. It’s kind of stupid though because he’s actually with Jessica all the time. They all decide to stop his parents from meeting with the divorce lawyers by sneaking onto the lawyers’ property and fi...

This is a stupid name for the book because Liz and Todd are nothing like married couples, except for the fighting and lack of sex. Hmm…. Well Todd comes up with a great plan that if both sets of their parents are out of town at the same time, they should stay together and Liz agrees. His parents are in Colorado, Ned heads off on a law retreat and Alice heads back to Chicago with Hank. Liz decides that she has to ask Jess for permission first (right, like Jess doesn’t owe her a shitload of times) and Jess agrees, but only if they act as her slaves, cooking and cleaning. Liz doesn’t want to, but Todd kind of forces her into the plan. Of course Liz decides to keep it a big secret from everyone because a scandal like this could ruin her reputation. Uh, didn’t she just get out of prison like two books ago? Jess ends up telling Lila and then some other friends, Todd tells a bunch of his friends and Liz tells Enid so by the second day, everyone at school pretty much knows the deal. The whole ...

There’s a heat wave striking Sweet Valley, but Jessica could care less because she’s heading to the Caribbean with Lila for Spring Break. Isn’t this like the 700th Spring Break since the school year started? Lila acts fairly cool about the whole thing, but Jessica convinces herself that it’s just because Lila is used to fancy trips like this. She even ignores the fact that Elizabeth knows the place is meant for families and not swinging singles. All she really cares about is packing a bunch of bikinis and hot dresses. Liz can’t wait for their break to start because she plans on doing a report about Alice. Kids get extra credit in English class for writing a report on one of their family members and she picks her mom. Look, if I had a circus performer in my family tree, I’d pick that person over my mom any day. At the same time, Bruce Patman is confused and upset because his parents are separating. He becomes convinced that Henry is cheating on his wife. Jess and Lila arrive in the Cari...