Category: Books: SVK

Jessica the TV Star (Sweet Valley Kids #16)

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tvstar

The Basics

Title: Jessica the TV Star
Series: Sweet Valley Kids #16
Published: March 1991

The Plot

When Elizabeth stays home from school one day with a stomach ache, Jessica goes by herself. As she isn’t wearing her name bracelet, the other children don’t know for sure which twin she is, so she decides to pretend to be Elizabeth for the day, just for fun.

But then Todd tells Jessica a secret, thinking that she’s Elizabeth—a TV show is going to be filmed at his house, and he’s going to be in it. He’s allowed to ask a female friend to be in the show too, and he wants that friend to be Elizabeth.

Jessica knows that she should tell the truth, but she really wants to be on TV. So she keeps up the pretence and sneaks around behind Elizabeth’s back, lying where necessary to make sure she stays away from Todd’s house. Elizabeth is completely confused, both by Jessica’s strange behaviour and by the fact that Todd keeps saying things to her that don’t make any sense. Meanwhile, Jessica hasn’t been able to resist telling Lila and Ellen about the top secret TV taping. They’ll be able to keep it a secret, right? …Right?

Eventually, Elizabeth heads over to Todd’s place of her own accord, determined to find out what’s going on. The Wilkins’ house is surrounded by film crew and excited second grade kids. Unsurprisingly, Lila and/or Ellen has let the cat out of the bag. Jessica’s deception is revealed, no one is quite as angry as you’d expect, and both of the twins end up getting to be in the TV show, although it’s hardly a starring role.

The Verdict

I enjoyed this one. It feels very much like the Jessica of the later series—this is absolutely the kind of thing she’d do as a twelve-year-old or sixteen-year-old, and older Todd would probably be just as bad at realising he’s talking to the wrong twin.

Major Characters

Bit Parts

The Places

  • The Wilkins Home: A few blocks away from the Wakefields’ house.

The Themes

  • Lies, twin swap, film and TV

 

Jessica the Baby-Sitter (Sweet Valley Kids, #14)

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babysitter

The Basics

Title: Jessica the Baby-Sitter
Series: Sweet Valley Kids #14
Published: January 1991

The Plot

The Wakefields’ next-door neighbours, Mr. and Mrs. DeVito, have just had their first baby. Her name is Jennifer—Jenny for short—and she has blue eyes and blonde hair, just like Jessica and Elizabeth. The twins go to the DeVito house to meet her and are so enamoured of her that they start dreaming of a new baby sibling of their own.

At first, they simply plan to try to talk Alice into producing this new baby for them but, after a conversation in class about pregnancy symptoms, Jessica and Elizabeth start to wonder whether their mother might already be pregnant. After all, she has been tired lately and she ate two pickles in one sitting.

Still baby mad, the girls go next door to “help” Mrs. DeVito with Jenny. For those worried by the title of the book, the only baby-sitting these two seven-year-olds do is sit beside the baby and run to tell Mrs. DeVito once it starts crying. A lot more crying and a nappy change later, and the twins are beginning to wonder whether babies are so wonderful after all.

Jessica and Elizabeth start to question whether they want a new sibling at all. They realise that they would have less time with their mother if a baby came along, which makes them sad, because everyone knows that the Wakefield twins are meant to be the centre of attention all the time. But Alice has baby wallpaper samples, so she must be pregnant!

Actually, she’s not. The wallpaper is for a project she’s doing for her interior design course and that’s why she’s tired as well. The twins are relieved. Babies are more trouble than they’re worth.

The Verdict

This feels very age-appropriate for the audience for this series, but it also feels extremely generic. Change the names and it could be any two kids wishing for a baby sister. I prefer the books where the twins are more obviously their Sweet Valley selves.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Places

  • Sweet Valley Mall: contains a baby boutique

The Themes

  • Jumping to conclusions, babies, family

The Case of the Secret Santa (Sweet Valley Kids, SS #1)

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santa

The Basics

Title: The Case of the Secret Santa
Series: Sweet Valley Kids Super Snooper #1
Published: December 1990

The Plot

Elizabeth, Jessica and their friends decide form a junior detective group—The Snoopers Club—but at first they can’t think of any mysteries to solve. Elizabeth suggests to Jessica that they could find hidden treasure and Jessica suggests looking for their Christmas presents, although most won’t arrive until Santa brings them on Christmas Eve. Elizabeth says that she doesn’t believe in Santa any more, but Jessica is convinced that he’s real.

At school, the twins are sent to the custodian’s office to get a spare key. In the place of the usual custodian, Jim, they find a jolly old man named Chris, who knows Jessica and Elizabeth’s names and has a long list of other names on his desk. Jessica thinks that Chris might really be Santa and the Snoopers Club decides to make the custodian’s true identity their first mystery to solve.

They collect several clues: the new custodian is from Alaska, which is near the North Pole; his full name is Chris Kreeger, which sounds like Kris Kringle; he has a map to plan the route of his next big trip; and he has a Santa suit in his office. The suit, it turns out, is for his job as a department store Santa, but when the kids visit him there, he somehow knows exactly what they want for Christmas without them telling him.

The twins’ parents tell them that Chris isn’t Santa, but Jessica isn’t convinced. Mrs. Otis’s class invite Chris to their Christmas party, where Alice is helping out as class mother. Chris gives out presents to all the children and somehow manages to get the adults just the right gifts, including a box for Alice that looks just like one she desperately wanted as a kid.

Soon after the party, Chris leaves the school as he has a big job coming up. Elizabeth doesn’t know whether she believes in Santa again, but she does know that Chris personified the spirit of Christmas, whether he was Santa or not.

The Verdict

I was utterly fascinated by the way that this book dealt with the Santa question. I was surprised that it actually talked about some children believing in Santa while others were equally certain that he didn’t exist. Would it cause some young readers to question their own beliefs? I don’t know. I do appreciate that it brought the question into things, though, as it’s a far more complex mystery when it isn’t just “is Chris Santa?” but rather an examination of belief.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Places

  • Charles Department Store: a shop at the Sweet Valley Mall that hires a Santa during the holiday season

The Themes

  • Christmas, belief, mystery

The Extra-Curricular Activities

  • The Snoopers Club
    • Members: Elizabeth, Jessica, Lila, Ellen, Todd, Winston, Amy and Eva

 

Starring Winston Egbert (Sweet Valley Kids, #13)

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starring

The Basics

Title: Starring Winston Egbert
Series: Sweet Valley Kids #13
Published: November 1990

The Plot

Every year, Sweet Valley Elementary School puts on a Thanksgiving play. This year, it’s the turn of the first, second and third grades, and Jessica, Elizabeth and their friends are excited that they’ll get to take part. At the park with the other second-graders, Winston declares that he’s going to be the star of the play. Jessica is horrified, because Winston is the class clown, and the play is a serious thing.

Auditions are held, and Jessica does a dance and recites a poem, while Winston does a humorous version of the head Pilgrim’s speech. Elizabeth opts to remain backstage, volunteering to paint the set. When the parts are announced, Jessica is horrified to learn that Winston will be playing the Indian Chief, while she will only be the leader of the Indian dance. (From what you can tell, it sounds like there weren’t any decent female parts anyway, unless you count Amy’s role as a turkey.)

In the lead-up to the play, Winston is unbearable, bossing everyone around and boasting about his starring role. Eventually Jessica snaps, mocking Winston by pretending to act like him in front of the other kids. Elizabeth disapproves, but it’s hard not to side with Jess on this one. Coming from her, pay-back could’ve been a lot worse.

The play goes on and Jessica performs her role perfectly. When it’s Winston’s turn to speak, however, he gets stage fright and freezes, forgetting all his lines. Jessica steps in and saves the day, feeding him lines and improvising where needed. The play is a success and everyone is friends again.

The Verdict

This was a gentle kind of drama after the bullying nastiness of Crybaby Lois. It wasn’t the most exciting book in the series, but it was nice to have Jessica save the day for a change, instead of Elizabeth.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Places

  • Charles Freemont Park: Has swings, a seesaw and a jungle gym.

The Themes

  • Thanksgiving, school play, pride comes before a fall

The Play Cast

  • Crystal Burton: Indian dancer
  • Winston Egbert: Indian Chief
  • Lila Fowler: Indian dancer
  • Ken Matthews: Pilgrim
  • Eva Simpson: Pilgrim
  • Amy Sutton: Turkey
  • Jessica Wakefield: Leader of the Indian dance and audience welcomer
  • Todd Wilkins: Pilgrim

 

Crybaby Lois (Sweet Valley Kids #11)

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crybaby

The Basics

Title: Crybaby Lois
Series: Sweet Valley Kids 11
Published: September 1990

The Plot

Everyone always teases Lois Waller for being chubby and for crying about absolutely everything. Elizabeth knows that Lois is a nice kid, even if she is scared to do things that the rest of their second grade class finds simple, so she decides to try to help Lois to fit in.

Lois is the last of the children to take the training wheels off her bike, so first Elizabeth teaches her to ride without them. Lois falls off her bike more than once, but is determined to keep trying, even with scraped hands.

Elizabeth’s attentions do nothing to stop the bullying of the other children in her class. Encouraged by Lila, and embarrassed by the suggestion that she might like Lois too, Jessica joins in with the teasing. She, Lila and Ellen Riteman pretend to cry like Lois, much to the delight of the other kids. Angry, Elizabeth invites Lois to come over the next day.

Jessica has Lila visiting the same afternoon, so they walk with Elizabeth and Lois, along with Steven and Todd Wilkins. Steven joins in the bullying (Todd has been participating from the start) and Jess and Lila dare Lois to climb a neighbour’s apple tree. Despite her fear, Lois tries to do so, but freezes when still close to the ground.

Then she spots a kitten stuck in the higher branches of the tree and, wanting to help it, manages to climb to its rescue. The neighbour comes out and yells for a bit before helping Lois out of the tree and sending the children home to the Wakefield house with a barrel-load of apples. The kids all think Lois was clever to rescue the kitten and play nicely with her for the rest of the afternoon, with no bullying in sight.

The Verdict

This is quite an entertaining book, but the bullying in here is quite horrific and I really found it difficult to read. I also felt like Mrs. Otis is quite negligent (here and in other books) when it comes to protecting Lois from the awful behaviour of her peers. There’s a real sense that no one will intercede in a useful fashion; it’s just up to Lois to stop being scared. (Never mind that being so dreadfully bullied would contribute to Lois’s fears in a very real way. The poor kid would have a genuine anxiety disorder at this point for sure.) Is it realistic? Absolutely. Is it what small children should be reading? I’m not so sure.

One thing I found interesting was the obvious (to an adult reader) suggestion that Lois’s mother was responsible for a lot of Lois’s fears. I wish that had been made clearer to the younger readers of the book.

Also interesting is that here the ‘good’ characters are bullies along with the ‘bad’ ones. We expect Lila and Jess to be mean girls, but here Todd and Winston are just as cruel. There’s a good point to be made there, but the book falls short of making it.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Themes

  • bullying, courage

 

Sweet Valley Trick or Treat (Sweet Valley Kids #12)

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trick

The Basics

Title: Sweet Valley Trick or Treat
Series: Sweet Valley Kids #12
Published: October 1990

The Plot

It’s Halloween in Sweet Valley and all of the kids in Mrs. Otis’s second grade class are excited about the upcoming jack-o-lantern competition and costume parade. Elizabeth and Jessica have grown out of their matching clown costumes from the previous Halloween, so Alice buys a box of new costumes from a yard sale. Two are the right size for the twins: a witch costume and a princess costume. The trouble is, they both want to be the princess.

Meanwhile, Steven is doing his best to show his Halloween spirit by scaring his younger sisters with a rubber spider. When he teases them for being chickens, Jessica warns Steven that they’ll get back at him.

The twins struggle to decide which of them will get to be the princess. Finally, Jessica comes up with the perfect plan: Elizabeth will wear the princess costume for the school parade and Jessica will wear it for trick-or-treating.

Mrs. Otis’s class win the pumpkin costume, Mrs. Otis herself wins best teacher costume in the parade and the twins take turns to scare Steven while dressed in the witch costume. All up, not a lot happens, but it’s an enjoyable Halloween.

The Verdict

This has to be the most boring book in the series so far, which doesn’t make sense at all when Halloween is such a great event to play with. There’s very little conflict in here at all, and no real stakes, even in seven-year-old terms. Even at 71 large print pages, it dragged.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Costumes

  • Charlie Cashman: Cowboy
  • Winston Egbert: Alien
  • Lila Fowler: Mexican lady
  • Ken Matthews: Footballer
  • Mrs. Otis: Blackboard eraser
  • Caroline Pearce: Genie
  • Ellen Riteman: Ballerina
  • Eva Simpson: Bumblebee
  • Amy Sutton: Cheerleader
  • Alice Wakefield: Mustachioed man
  • Elizabeth Wakefield: Princess/Witch
  • Jessica Wakefield: Princess/Witch
  • Steven Wakefield: Space traveller
  • Lois Waller: Tooth fairy
  • Todd Wilkins: Ghost

The Pairings

  • Elizabeth/Todd – implied mutual crush

The Themes

  • Halloween, sharing, pranks

 

Elizabeth’s Super-Selling Lemonade (Sweet Valley Kids #9)

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lemonade

The Basics

Title: Elizabeth’s Super-Selling Lemonade
Series: Sweet Valley Kids #9
Published: July 1990

The Plot

Mrs. Becker is getting married! Everyone in her second grade class is invited and the kids all decide to chip in together to get her a present. If each child contributes $2, they’ll have plenty for the perfect glass paperweight Lois spotted in a catalogue.

Elizabeth and Jessica—well, mostly Elizabeth—decide that the present will be more special if they earn the money themselves. Their mom suggests they set up a lemonade stand. Unsurprisingly, Jessica gets sick of it about two minutes in and, when Lila and Ellen ask her to join her at the park, she readily leaves Liz to do all the work. Luckily for Liz (and unluckily for those of us who find the pushing of the Liz/Todd pairing when they are SEVEN really kind of gross) Todd turns up and helps her until the rest of the lemonade is sold. All up, the twins earn $3 of their $4 from the stand.

In class on Monday, Lila is boasting as usual about her latest acquisition: this time, a glow-in-the-dark bracelet. She invites Jessica to go shopping with her after school; Jessica decides that she will take the $3 with her—not to spend, but just to show Lila that she has money too. Of course, this goes about as well as you can imagine. Lila pressures Jessica into buying her own glow-in-the-dark bracelets, and Jessica spends all of the money that Liz had earned.

When Liz spots the bracelet and Jess is forced to confess, Liz actually tells on her for a change. Their mother says that she will contribute Liz’s $2, because she had already earned it, while Jessica is to re-earn her share. Before long, she has charmed Elizabeth into helping her with the chores that Alice sets her.

The second-graders buy Mrs. Becker’s present and watch her get married to Mr. Otis, a town librarian. She appears to like their present… or perhaps has just grown very good at pretending to like children’s gifts during a long career as a teacher.

The Verdict

This one feels the most like the high school Sweet Valley out of all the Kids books so far. Jessica is so very Jessica, while Elizabeth is dull and reliable and hanging out with Todd. I thought that the shopping trip with Jess and Lila was particularly well done. Jessica’s dilemma was very believable—peer pressure when you’re a kid is difficult to resist.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Places

Sweet Valley Mall: Contains a shop called “Heavenly Dolls”, where Lila purchases Barbie doll clothes.

The Fashion

  • Mrs. Becker’s wedding outfit: A lavender silk dress and a bouquet of pink flowers

The Pairings

  • Elizabeth/Todd – implied mutual crush

The Themes

  • Peer pressure, weddings, money, jobs

Jessica’s Zoo Adventure (Sweet Valley Kids #8)

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zoo

The Basics

Title: Jessica’s Zoo Adventure
Series: Sweet Valley Kids #8
Published: June 1990

The Plot

Mrs. Becker’s second grade class is off to the zoo for an excursion, and Jessica and Elizabeth are particularly excited because Alice Wakefield is class mother for the trip. They agree that they want to see the monkeys most of all.

On the big day, Jessica thinks that having Alice with them will mean that she and Elizabeth will get special treatment. When Alice tells her off for pushing in line and trying to get better seats on the bus, Jessica feels hurt. (To be fair, I think Alice could have explained nicely that things aren’t different because she’s there, instead of telling Jess off in front of her friends.)

When they get to the zoo, the class finds out that the monkey house is closed, as a chimpanzee has escaped. Best not to think too much about the peculiar logic of shutting off the one part of the zoo the keepers know doesn’t contain the missing animal. Jessica is disappointed and, after Alice is dismissive another couple of times, Jess decides that she’s going to visit the monkey house anyway—and that Elizabeth has to join her, because they’re excursion buddies. Todd and Winston decide to tag along too.

The monkey house is all locked up and boring, but then the four get the great idea to look for the chimpanzee themselves. They try in lots of places, but with no luck, and the more responsible children (aka not Jessica) decide that they really should get back to their class. Jessica realises that she’s lost her bracelet, though, so they retrace their steps in an attempt to find it. Jessica looks inside a pipe in a construction zone and spots, not her bracelet, but the missing chimpanzee! She and Winston try to lure it out with a banana, while Liz and Todd go for help.

The chimpanzee is returned to the monkey house, the children are reunited with the rest of the class, and the chip is named “Jessica” in honour of the person who found her. Alice is cross again, but this time Jess doesn’t mind.

The Verdict

I think I would’ve enjoyed this one a lot at the target age for the books. As an adult, I wished that more of the story had been devoted to the time at the zoo, with a little less of the preamble about Alice being class mother.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Places

The Zoo: Has a monkey house (with chimpanzees and squirrel monkeys), a feeding zoo (with baby goats, piglets, fawns and lambs), snakes, bears, tigers and elephants.

The Themes

  • Animals, getting your own way, lost and found

 

Jessica’s Big Mistake (Sweet Valley Kids #7)

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bigmistake

The Basics

Title: Jessica’s Big Mistake
Series: Sweet Valley Kids #7
Published: May 1990

The Plot

Mrs. Becker’s second grade class at Sweet Valley Elementary School is super excited, because a famous author is going to visit their class. Elizabeth is especially looking forward to it, because Angela Daley is her favourite author. Mrs. Becker tells the kids that one of them will be chosen for the special (i.e. dubious) honour of helping Daley sign books. The lucky winner will be the person who does the most special thing to welcome the author to their class.

The kids all want to be chosen, so they think of the best things to do to impress Mrs. Becker. Jessica and Caroline compete to be the most helpful student during class, and Lila boasts about her wealthy father’s connections to everyone famous in Hollywood. (Apparently all authors are extremely rich and famous and wear diamonds while riding around in limousines. This small-time author would beg to differ!)

Elizabeth decides that she wants to write a story for Angela Daley to read, and writes what she thinks is her best story ever: a tale called The Otter’s Daughters. She’s then silly enough to leave her draft in the twins’ shared bedroom bin, meaning that Jessica just happens to stumble upon it when putting something in the bin herself. Jessica realises that a story would be the perfect thing to hand in for the contest and justifies stealing Elizabeth’s because they’re twins and that means that they’re basically the same person.

Of course, in the end Jessica finds out that Elizabeth has submitted the same story to Mrs. Becker and she rushes to get her version back before anyone finds out. Mrs. Becker has already worked out what happened, however, and Liz discovers Jessica’s betrayal as well. It’s all okay, though, because Liz forgives Jess (as always) and Angela Daley loves Elizabeth’s story and reads it out to the class. As her reward, Liz gets to take books out of a bag and hand them over to be signed. Now that is a prize worth vying for.

The Verdict

I enjoyed Jessica’s mental gymnastics in this one. They made her seem more like the older Jess than she has up to now in Sweet Valley Kids. On the whole, the story struggles a little to keep up momentum, with the discussions between the kids about what they intend to do for Angela Daley feeling a bit like they were inserted to make up the standard 72 or 73 pages.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Fashion

  • Angela Daley’s outfit: a bright blue dress and a red scarf with a colourful design around the edges

The Pairings

  • Elizabeth/Todd: Liz thinks Todd is cute

The Themes

  • Plagiarism, lies, celebrities, competitions

 

Jessica’s Cat Trick (Sweet Valley Kids #5)

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cattrick

The Basics

Title: Jessica’s Cat Trick
Series: Sweet Valley Kids #5
Published: March 1990

The Plot

When playing in the Wakefields’ back yard in book four, Jessica and Elizabeth discovered a stray cat in the bushes. In this book, the weather changes and the girls decide that the only thing to do is take the cat inside out of the rain, even though Ned and Steven are both allergic to cats.

The girls name the cat Misty, and set up a home for her inside their wardrobe. Surprisingly enough, Misty is quite content to be shut in a cupboard for most of each day, with only a blanket and a box of dirt as her toilet. She somehow remains undetected, despite the twins acting very strangely and asking for glasses of milk and sneaking cans of tuna out of the kitchen.

At school, Jess and Liz tell a couple of friends about their secret cat, but soon everyone knows all about Misty. Their classmates all want to go to the Wakefields’ class to meet her. They’re particularly worried when tattletale Caroline Pearce turns up on their doorstep and asks to see Misty, but she actually saves the day, covering for the twins when Alice hears a sound from the cupboard and smells fish in the girls’ room.

Ned and Steven, by this point, are quite ill from their allergy to Misty. The twins feel guilty, but it is only when Misty starts acting very strangely that they finally confess to Alice, worried that the cat is sick. Alice is remarkably calm about the revelation (probably because she’s used to much worse—just wait until Jessica’s in high school, Alice!) and reassures the girls that Misty is perfectly healthy: she’s just about to have kittens.

All ends well, with Caroline’s parents allowing her to adopt Misty and three of the five kittens finding homes before the end of the book.

The Verdict

This is quite an unusual one, in that the twins are not punished at all for doing something that they know they shouldn’t—very rare for a franchise that delights in heaping karma upon Jessica’s head. I like that they put the emphasis on the good intentions of the twins and that Liz and Jess worked out a way to solve the problem themselves, instead of being rescued by adults.

As an aside, I wonder how many small children tried to hide animals in their cupboards after reading this.

Major Characters

Minor Characters

Bit Parts

The Themes

  • Secrets, pets, problem solving