Young Adult Revisited

Deena just got a new phone thanks to her dad who works at the phone company. Her friend Jade thinks it would be fun to make some prank calls. After calling a few people, Deena pranks this guy from school, Rob, telling him in a sexy voice that she has the hots for him. Things are about to change though because her half-brother Chuck is moving to town after getting tossed out of his last school. Deena thinks everything will be sunshine and lollipops, but it is pretty far from that. On the way home from picking Chuck up, they get into a car accident. Their dad tells them to get out of the car because people are crashing in front of and behind them. Chuck manages to save a dog from one of the wrecked cars right before it bursts into flames. He follows that up by getting into a fight with a kid at school and pulling a knife on him, which gets him suspended. Jade thinks Chuck is super hot even when he's being a dick. She comes over and convinces Deena to make some more ...

I stumbled across this earlier and had to share it. 1 Bruce 1 has some pictures up that show the covers of the new Sweet Valley Confidential sequels: The Sweet Life. Even though Francine herself said it several interviews that these were short installments, it looks like they are actually books . If not, I want to know who the heck is paying $14+ for an ebook! It also looks like the original serials will cost $1.99 per book. Francine said the ebooks would come out in May (last month for those who don't pay attention to dates), but the first book will actually come out next month. The hardcover version hits stands in October, so I'm betting that you get all six ebooks for one price. I'm still on the fence about whether or not I want to buy these. On the one hand, it's new Sweet Valley books. On the other hand, it's Sweet Valley 2.0. I wasn't a fan of Sweet Valley Confidential at all. I've read some of the older books 20 times or more, but I haven't y...

Stacey gets asked to join the Mathletes, the math club at SMS. She keeps turning them down because math people are always geeky and she is anything but geeky. She finally agrees to come to one meeting, but only because Ms. Hartley tells her that she had the highest standardized math scores in the school. She goes to the meeting and complains to herself that everyone there is a dork. Ms. Hartley buys her special sugar-free snacks and everyone is sweet to her so she feels bad. When they get into doing the actual work, she’s surprised to learn that she knows almost all the answers. She does better than anyone else at the meeting. Ed shows up unexpectedly in town, driving a brand new car. He lets it slip that he lost his job, but he’s sure that he can get another one. He makes dinner for her and her mom and spends a lot of time in Stoneybrook. He shows up at all her meets, takes her out to dinner and generally acts like the perfect dad. He even takes her back to the city to c...

Trina and her brother Dan have a ventriloquist obsessed dad. He had a dozen of the dummies stuck up in the attic, in a space he calls his own museum. He brings home a new dummy that he found in a dumpster and fixed up his head. Trina finds a slip of paper in its pocket and reads the funny words written on it. The dummy winks at her and then slaps her across the face, but no one believes her. A few days later their cousin Zane comes to spend a week. When he visited the summer before, they scared the crap out of him with the dummies, so his dad makes them promise not to do it again. Of course weird crap starts happening right off the bat. One night they find a dummy sitting at the kitchen table and on another night, the same dummy seems to follow them around the house. Zane takes a bunch of pictures and develops them in their dad’s darkroom in the basement. He gets pissed off when he finds that over half the photos are of the dummies. Trina and Dan start wondering i...

Animals are pretty much everywhere in this book from the very beginning. Mary Anne tells Dawn about Mojo and James, two gorillas on loan from the San Diego Zoo. Then they go to the movies and see signs about a store that bought an elephant from a circus and use it as a display. Little Babar has a collection and donations go towards saving him. They go to school and see a giant cardboard box outside and all the science teachers wearing trench coats and sunglasses. The classes all meet in the auditorium and they bring out the giant box. The teachers open their jackets and reveal shirts with the slogan of the Bedford Zoo on the front. Then they learn that they are all getting divided into groups and each group must study animal behavior. Buses will take kids to the zoo. Mary Anne gets stuck with Alan, while Dawn, Claudia and Logan end up in another group. Kristy is most pissed because she’s in a group with Stacey. This book comes during the timeframe where Stacey qu...

You probably can’t tell by the cover, but that is Tina and she’s so beautiful that everyone thinks she will become a model. I also want to point out that I’m fairly certain I had that dress. Tina and her cousin Holly are heading to visit her boyfriend Josh at college. Tina wanted to go on her own, but her parents made her take her cousin. Holly just wants to party and check out the drama department, while Tina wants to do some heavy making out. They get to the bus station and there’s no sign of Josh. Tina sees a flash and some creepy guy attacks them. A handsome guy jumps out of the shadows, chases the guy off and reveals himself as Josh’s roommate Chris. Josh went on a camping trip with his friend Steve, had car trouble and won’t be back until late. Chris takes them to their dorm room because he’s staying at his photography shop. He convinces them to go to a party with him and leaves so they can get ready. A girl walks in, sees Tina and freaks out. She calms down and sa...

Stacey’s favorite teacher is leaving for a few weeks, turning his class over to a student teacher named Wes Ellenberg. Stacey feels bad for him because he has a geeky name and she’s sure he’ll be a huge dork. When he arrives in class, she’s struck dumb because he looks just like Tom Cruise. Of course she develops a huge crush on him, thinks about him all the time and starts dressing up for class. After a few days, she decides that he doesn’t like pants, so she only wears dresses to school. She spends a lot of time on her homework and even incorporates jokes, so he’ll think she’s funny. On their next big assignment, she’s the only one to get a perfect score and he singles her out in class. He starts calling on her more and asking her to show other people how to do hard work. One day she stays after class to talk to him and he asks her to stay late and help him organize his paperwork. A few days later he asks for her help again because he can’t find some of the thin...