This made me LOL. I read some of the SVT books when I was in first year of high school (I’m from England we start at 11 over here so was the same age as the twins were in the books) and even back then I thought that. You could possibly get away with it when your 6 or 7 in primary school but after that you’d be considered the biggest outcasts at school, certainly not the most popular. Then again I went to school in Liverpool not perfect Sweet Valley.

Anyway, so I hadnt picked up an SVH book in YEARS when a friend showed me this site and I suddenly felt whole again! You see, like all of you, Francine’s sick little fantasies had caused me to end up with some fucked up expectations and to see that others had experienced the same thing was relieving. I now enjoy reading the books in a different way – I find myself cackling with laughter over the most inappropriate things – Liz with her hand on people’s shoulder, Jess with her sociopathic cock-teasing. Since my brother ‘accidently’ threw out the box I had my SVH books in the last time we moved, I have about 2 of the Senior Year books left and have had to some from a friend. I read the SVTAF books ‘Poor Lila!’, ‘Jessica and the Money Mix Up’ and ‘ Jessica the Nerd’.

Oh. My. God.

No WONDER I ended up a little strange! Im going through Jessica the Nerd right now and I am dumbfounded. These kids are freaks! Im sorry, I know Im probably not allowed to do my own reviews on here, but I just had to share the awesomeness (awfulness) with you guys. I will never compare to ihatewheat but ohmygod this is just so amazingly SV that I couldnt help myself.

So first off ill tell you about SVMS. Like SVH, it on a beautiful campus. Elizabeth writes for the Sixers, a middle school version of The Oracle, although Elizabeth seems to be an investigative reporter on this rag. I think she may be editor also. Jessica is in the Boosters, the school cheerleading squad (which also includes Winston Egbert, Amy Sutton and Lila Fowler). Only, in middle school, as we know, Amy is Elizabeth’s friend but she is dog ugly and likes science. Amy is half-bearable sometimes in the SVT series but int his one she was a freaking drama queen. Jessica is also part of the Unicorns, this club that includes, as we hear on every second page, the ‘prettiest and most popular girls in school’. The Unicorns are headed by this jumped up little dictator named Janet who is in grade 8. What kind of a thirteen or fourteen year old hangs out with kids two years younger that them? It seems most of the members are in Jessica’s grade. If someone had started a club and named it Unicorns and made everyone dress in purple (the colour of royalty) at my school, they would have been laughed out of the place. Or beaten up just because they’re a wanker and should have been drowned at birth.

Anyway, so in this book everyone has to sit a test for this new science program they’re doing called SOAR! It lasts for two weeks and only those that do really well are allowed in the class. naturally, Elizabeth and her mates are all “We totes have to get in!” and Jess and Lila think it will be Geeky McGeeksville and don’t take it seriously at all.

So, as one probably guesses by the title, of course, Elizabeth AND Jessica both get into the class. Because, as I think we all know, if Jessica put in a little more effort she would be doing as well as Elizabeth. Its like, the twins are so perfect that they are naturally incredibly smart as well. This really shits me, just like it’s annoying that Elizabeth is a master gymnast/cheerleader whenever the need arises. It’s insulting that Francine makes them these perfect all rounders.

I digress.

So, everyone is all surprised that Jess gets in, except Amy, who is fully down because she didn’t get into the program and all her friends did and Amy LIKES science but Jessica doesn’t but she gets to go to class. The Unicorns all feel bad for Jess and try and help her think of ways to get out of the class. Honeslty, these girls are IDIOTS. Their ‘meetings’ consist of sitting around and doing their nails and hair. Me and my friends NEVER did that shit hey. And as mentioned before, Janet is a bossy fucking cunt. Um, why doesn’t Jessica just say “Im not going” if its a problem and thats that? Its not like Nalice would really put up much of a fight because every time they do, Liz gets all riteous on them and tell sthem how to parent.

Anyway, so the first class is actually fun for Jess, only she doesn’t let on to anyone she is enjoying herself or it will be social suicide. Meanwhile, Amy starts acting all weird around Elizabeth and won’t talk to her or any of their other friends. The SOAR! class (and yes, everytime they say SOAR! it’s in capital letters with an exclaimation mark) is run by a total ‘science geek’ with crazy silver hair and a clouds-on-a-blue sky tie. I rolled my eyes into the back of my head. Jessica keeps making little mistakes around the Unicorns like suggesting they do an experiment to see which hair spray is better and forgetting Ellen Riteman’s brithday (now that one’s a TWIT). One afternoon, Amy comes over and her and the twins start studying together but in five minutes Amy has a tanty because she isn’t in SOAR! and runs out.

Oh, and Janet and Lila try and ‘help’ Jess get out of the class by sending an anonymous letter to the principal accusing Jess of cheating. There is a delightful scene where jess gets called into the office and thinks its cos she and Lila got into a hairspray fight in gym and there is a little communication breakdown. When he tells jess why she’s really there, she gets all Elizabeth on him, but gets away with being rude cos she’s a Wakefield. Finally, Janet snaps and tells Jess she has to choose between SOAR! and the Unicorns. Um, doesn’t it only last for two weeks?

I will say one thing for Amy; she has more balls than Enid when it comes to fighting with Liz. Amy is the star baton twirler on the Booster’s squad and there is a big game coming up next week that she is supposed to do a solo routine at. She just can’t get the routine down right and it is inferred its because she is so down abt not being in SOAR!. She makes all these glum comments abt ‘all the empty seats in class’.

I think Francine was trying to kill 2 birds with 1 stone in this book. The oublishers obvs wanted a book that dealt with global warming AND 1 that dealt with sexism. So she fused them into one (and didn’t really address either) so she could go back to writing the usual vapid nonsense. There is a lot in the science classes about global warming and greenhouse effects and the whole class plants some trees (Jessica forgets Booster’s practice and stays after school to finish putting hers in the ground). There is also this storyline that has Janet telling Jessica and all the Unicorns thats science is a male domain and women can’t possibly compete. She also gets angry wth Jessica when she tells her sort-of boyf (wtf?) that she knows more than him about basketball. Apparently, girls should NEVER seem to be smarter than boys because ‘they don’t like it, they like thinking they’re better at things’. I vomited in my mouth when I read that. How do they sleep at night?!

So Jessica is all upset when Janet tells her to choose but the science teacher explains to Jess without science there would be no TV. cable, beauty products etc. Jess tries to pass this on to the Unicorns, but janet throws her out anyway. It turns out Janet is actually jealous of Jess – because Jess is in the same class as the luuuuuuurve of Janet’s life, Denny Jacobson. So Jess is allowed back into the group, it’s cos the Unicorns felt Jess was dissing them that they all acted like bitches. Amy wows everyone with her baton solo at the big game and she and Liz are bffs again because the SOAR! class has ended.

So what do we learn? I think the moral is to let your friends shit on you when they’re jealous, particularly if it involves something that needs brains cos, as we all know, that’s only just in front of scurvy on the list of disgusting diseases.

Oh and just to touch on the cover, Jessica sits at a desk with four nerds clambering around her gazing in rapture over her Liz-like smirk and massive purple jumper. One of the kids wears a shirt reading “E = MC2″ and is totes channelling Harry Potter.

So to sum up, Liz is a doormat with infinite understanding (she never tells Amy to shut the fuck up and get over it) for those who arent as well off as her. Jessica will probably go back to being a total dumbass in the next book. In fact, if memory serves, Jessica spends most of her future years balancing precariously on the line between pass and fail.

And speaking of sex tapes, she was getting a little tired of it being chalked up to his ‘rumors’ and ‘lies’ and ‘fakedness’. She knew that tape existed because she filmed it herself! Heddy wished so bad that she had never allowed Maura to sign that release. The one that said we, I mean they, couldn’t tell anyone about it, you know, or they’d get sued.

It was all Chad Nutshack’s fault anyway. He was the wierdo that brought the whole thing together. He was Spengler’s mentor in the art of being a modern-today Sgve…Spen…SVENGALI, yeah, that’s it. Anyhoo, If Chad hadn’t told the girls that one night in his sauna/living room when that little Asian boy was setting off those firecrackers that they needed to remember the power of the release form…

Shirlena couldn’t write her own name, but there were so many pictures of her with boobs, without boobs, in the middle of getting said boobs that it rilly didn’t matter. Why buy the cow if the milk’s free, Heddy’s mom Marlene always says. Nasally.

Everything was cool between Maura and Heddy until that bitch with the allegedly high IQ showed up. Mo was used to being the most smartest girl in her world after growing up in Kahuna Flats and she never let anyone forget that she got the highest Iowa Test scores KF Elementary had ever seen. She came in with her high-falutin’ ideas of the ways a girl representing Kahuna Flats should be behaving and having a camera shoved right up your butt during a twelve-way wasn’t one of them.

“Oh, Jesus, what more do I want?” Maura sighed as she brushed her hair in the mirror, pausing only to pick up extensions as they fluttered to the carpet made of REAL ANIMAL SKINS her, um…oilman! Yeah, that’s it! Oilman! Daddy shot in his private game reserve. “I have everything. I got married in Calexico last year, in a real American church this year, forgot to have a wedding reception, and now my sister Dolly is dating Sanjay Mallomar from the incredibly popular hit factory/juggernaut/modern-day gong show United States Awesome Person With Moderate Talent! When am I going to let go of the incredible night of passion I shared with Maura?”

The mirrored door swung open and her one-toned husband walked in.

“Wifey, have I got some news for you!”