Young Adult Revisited

Kristen asks Jessica to join her Homecoming Poster Committee, and Jessica agrees because she's still worried that she has no friends. Since Kristen is popular, she thinks that it might make her a little popular too. The next day, she shows up at school with four posters that actually seem pretty cute. There's a bunch of cats (wildcats) throwing glittery nets over dolphins (the other team) with phrases like "kill the dolphins" across the top. Unfortunately, one of the school's science teachers just read an article about dolphin slaying and vowed to make a stand. She drags Jessica and her posters into the principal's office, who clearly has no clue why these are bad until she tells him. Jess points out that it's the name of the other team, and the teacher gets embarrassed for not knowing. The principal initially gives her a week of detention, but then he decides to put her in charge of the dance since the girl who was going to do it suddenly moved...

The Wakefields go out of town because hey, if you had the twins as your kids, you need frequent breaks too. They decide that Steven is mature enough to be in charge, and he actually does a pretty good job. After track practice, Jessica runs into Lila, who can't get over how sweaty and gross she looks. Lila mentions that she's having a party that night and invites her over. When Lila calls that night, Jessica doesn't want to admit that Steven won't let her out on a school night. She lies and says she had a guy over, and she mentions that she might have a party on Saturday. Elizabeth warns her that Steven will never agree to it, but Jessica thinks she can talk him into it. He does but only if she does a bunch of chores for him. Jessica plans on having a little sleepover with some of her old and new friends. She almost doesn't invite Kristen because she's with Lacey, but she decides to bite the bullet and do it. Lacey invites herself to the party af...

Let's get the Toby/Anna story out of the way because it is easily the most boring of the group. They both got cast in West Side Story, but Toby is super busy trying to be a huge star. He keeps getting distracted by Anna because she is so beautiful and he just can't concentrate on learning his lines. Anna thinks that he isn't interested in her, especially since they are dating but he hasn't kissed her yet. Then he does kiss her and she's suddenly fine. The lead in the play gets sick and since they apparently don't have understudies, they decide to move Anna up. She has like two weeks to learn all of her lines and get ready for the show. Toby starts getting super annoying. They fight over who is the better singer, and he keeps acting like a big star. They fight all the time until her mom calls them out on it and they try to calm down. They make up just in time for the first performance and they naturally do a great job and everyone loves them. ...

There are three major storylines here, and Salvatore's is the least interesting so let's start with him. His parents live in Germany because his dad is a military man stationed at a base there. They come back to California for a visit, and his mom acts like he is a kid and his dad treats him like a soldier. He decides to hang out with the guys to be the kind of son his dad wants. Elizabeth and Anna think that he's avoiding him and feel like crap. He acts really obnoxious, shoots rubber bands at people, including Elizabeth who he hits, and generally behaves like a teenage boy. His dad keeps lecturing him on joining a team and acting like a man. His mom takes him to the natural history museum, and he and his dad share a moment when they remember buying and playing with plastic dinosaurs. His dad buys him a new one and when he starts goofing around like a kid, his dad yells at him. His parents want to take him shopping for clothes, and he brings along the girls. El...

I somehow ended up with this book, one in the middle of the series, and the last five or six books. Since I had no idea this series even existed until a few years later, I had to do a little reading to get caught up. Basically, this is the twins’ eighth grade year. Sweet Valley redid the school districts, and somehow the twins ended up at Sweet Valley Junior High, while all their other friends are still at Sweet Valley Middle School, including Winston who literally lives a block away, in the same direction as the new school . They no longer talk to any of their old friends because their new friends want nothing to do with them. Salvatore is Todd 2.0. He’s the guy who draws funny cartoons that the newspaper constantly rejects, and since this is still a Sweet Valley book, he has a mad crush on Elizabeth. He thinks about her all the time and can barely function around her. None of this sits too well with his best friend Anna because she recently developed a thing for him...