Sweet Valley Twins #85: Elizabeth the Seventh-Grader

Elizabeth and Jessica are sitting at home and waiting for their parents. The principal called and asked for a special meeting about Liz. Jessica keeps teasing her about how their mom cried for five minutes after getting the call, and Elizabeth starts worrying that they'll kick her out of school. The truth is that she's been doing so well in school that they decided to let her skip into seventh grade.

After giving it some thought, she decides it's a great idea. Ned and Alice take the whole family out and announce the big news. Jessica instantly flips out because she's the one with older friends, so she thinks that if anyone should move up a grade, it should be her. They point out that it's about brain power and intelligence and not social maturity. Not sure if that's a compliment or not.

Elizabeth thinks that jumping up a grade will be super exciting. She gets her new schedule, which includes a ton of classes she never took before. That means she has to spend most of her time trying to catch up. It must be okay though because she gets a B+ on her first test and can answer multiple math questions when picked in class. Of course that just makes her spend even more time studying because she wants to be more than just a B+ student.

Jessica turns to Steven for help in making Liz come back to the sixth grade. He basically convinces her that reverse psychology is the best option. Jessica joins the staff of the Sixers, starts hanging out with Liz's friends, and generally acts like her twin. The only downside is that Liz gets an invite to a party thrown by Tom McKay, which is only open to seventh and eighth graders.

Steven and Jessica make it sounds like seventh grade parties are crazy. He even starts to tell a story before saying he can't say anymore. Ned and Alice decide that it's just too crazy and tell her she can't go. She then decides to sneak out of the house and go anyway. Jessica and Steven also make up a story about a girl who gets ostracized at one of those parties to scare her off but it doesn't work. So Jessica makes her change to a more grown up outfit and does her makeup. Liz hates it and tries to wipe it off, which just makes it look worse, and Jessica just lets her go anyway.

Luckily, she catches a glimpse of her reflection and has time to fix her makeup before the party. She hangs out with some girls from her class who are super mean to another girl, which makes her feel bad. After some random dancing and eating, they sit down to play spin the bottle. Liz has no idea what's going on until the bottle lands on Bruce and they tell them to kiss. She refuses and somehow gets drawn into a game of Truth or Dare. Mary feels bad for her and suggests they leave, which leads to Janet warning her that she'll get a dare in school on Monday.

Elizabeth tries to play it off like she had an amazing time and even tells Jess that that she can't talk about the party but she'll find out all about it the next year. Mary and Janet then tell her the truth about what happened, which makes her realize that her plan is working. She spends even more time with Maria, Amy, Todd, and Winston to plan the big sixth grade camping trip even though she kind of hates them all.

Janet finally gives Liz her big dare: she has to go up to Bruce in the cafeteria and kiss him on the lips. She keeps freaking out about it and tells her friends what happened. They try to convince her she doesn't have to go through with it, but she thinks it's the only way people in her new grade will accept her.

There are other things going wrong for her too. Amy gets her job as editor in chief of the Sixers since she can't work on the paper anymore. The editor of the seventh and eighth grade paper gives her a gopher job. All she does is deliver papers, make copies, and do stuff for everyone else. Liz tries to tell her dad about it, but he's so excited and keeps saying how proud he is that she runs off with her tale between her legs.

Steven finally suggests that Jess sit down and talk with her twin because he really doesn't want to see his sister forced to kiss some dude. Jessica refuses because she thinks that this will finally push her twin over the edge. She starts egging her on, telling her about how guys keep picking on Todd about his girlfriend kissing another guy and how people keep making bets on what she'll do.

When the day finally arrives, she goes right up to Bruce before changing her mind and walking away. Janet and other mean girls sneer at her and call her a chicken, but she just blows them off. Liz does tell Jess though that she's staying in her new grade. She goes to see her friends off on their camping trip before going home and moping around for a few hours.

Alice asks her to run an errand with her and ends up taking her to the campground. Everyone welcomes her back to the sixth grade, including her friends and teachers. The teachers tell her that they noticed how unhappy she was and while she's smart enough, she isn't socially ready for moving up a grade. They all celebrate and go crazy on their camping trip, and Liz asks Amy to become her co-editor on the paper.

*Jessica really learned her sociopath behavior early! Since she didn't really want to write for the paper, she told Liz that Amy was a mess as editor and assigned everyone multiple articles so she needs some help. She then has Liz write the one and only article she was actually assigned and gives it to Amy as her own article.

*Lila is the only one in the entire school that bets Liz will actually go through with it and kiss Bruce. Jessica says she'll make a mint if Liz does it.

*Bruce is gross even as a kid. When she walks up to him in school, he says something along the lines of, "I knew you'd do it," and, "I've been waiting for this." Ew.

*The mean girls practically call this one girl at the party a slut. They go on and on about how she's always surrounded by guys and acts like a huge flirt. Liz feels bad for her because she's clearly unhappy and wants to hang out with the girls. I wonder how those same girls will feel when Jess turns sixteen.

*Did anyone in your schools ever skip a grade like this? I always wondered how it would work. They basically give Liz her new books and tell her to get caught up on her own. No one offers her any help or tutoring either. She somehow has to just figure it out.

*Jessica tells Elizabeth she looks like a giant green bean in what she plans to wear to the party. She wears green jeans, a green tee, and a green headband. Yup, she does look like a green bean.

*The whole book is pretty ridiculous though. Jessica is always hanging out with kids older than her, and I'm pretty sure Liz had some older friends too. Now it's suddenly some huge difference between the two grades.