Sweet Valley Confidential
So, I totally bought the new SWEET VALLEY CONFIDENTIAL book. I was a huge Sweet Valley High fan back in the day, and my sisters read the Sweet Valley Twins and Sweet Valley Kids books and later Sweet Valley University. I was a particular fan of the Saga editions where we followed the twins’ ancestors around and there was a twin named Jessamyn who was in the circus!
Clearly I could not resist finding out where Elizabeth and Jessica and friends are ten years later. Nostalgia trip!
Except I was totally disappointed. (Watch out, SPOILERS AHEAD.) I’m not sure I could have been not disappointed, because after lingering in my imagination for so long, I had very definite ideas of how their future should play out. And it was not Jessica sticking around Sweet Valley and marrying Todd, who was apparently in love with her all along, and Elizabeth ending up with a fabulous sex life with Bruce Patman! NO. First, Bruce pulled a rapey Chuck Bass move on her back in the day when she hit her head in the motorcycle accident and became Slutty Bad Liz, remember? Second, Bruce is way cooler than her. (Can you tell I’m not a huge Elizabeth fan? She’s so sanctimonious and easily-manipulated.) That book was awesome though.
Anyway, in my own personal vision of the SVH future, Lila and Bruce Patman have a crazy-fun marriage and run a company together and have really good limo sex. Really, I picture them like a grown-up Chuck Bass/Blair Waldorf. They’re always swanning around in insane outfits. Jessica becomes an awesome Broadway actress and sleeps around but she totally owns it. Elizabeth stays in Sweet Valley, marries Todd, is a reporter, has 2.5 kids and a Golden Retriever. She never gets stolen by a candy striper or impersonated by an evil third twin or anything fun and she totally wears mom jeans. Winson Egbert is gay and gets fabulous and buys a vineyard. Damn, I wish Olivia hadn’t died; she’d be fun to write for. I say Caroline Pearce has fertility issues, ends up with quintuplets, and gets a reality TV show like the famewhore she is. Stephen has an early midlife crisis from being so deathly dull and divorces Cara but not for a dude (um, SVH CONFIDENTIAL spoiler!). He marries a hippie chick and they run a vegetarian restaurant on the beach and his wife slips Elizabeth her “special” brownies sometimes just for kicks.
Who’m I forgetting? What do you think happens? Did you read SVH? What were your favorite storylines?
OMG YES! I want you to write the Sweet Valley future books. Were you a fan of the BSC at all? There's a really great BSC Where Are They Now page that had me cracking up. Jessica always reminded me of my younger sister, Jessica. So, I was never a fan. I always thought she'd get to Hollywood, make it big. Then, she'd crash and burn out and return to Sweet Valley like Jillian in Practical Magic and cause a huge scandal. Cause well, she's Jessica.
I know you share the same name as her so you're probably more sympathetic to her, but my younger sister was (and still is on occasion) a terror. So, I always identified more with Elizabeth. Who, in addition to being a journalist and wearing mom jeans, will totally write a best-selling tell-all about her sister.
Ooh, that is an excellent alternative future! Jessica goes on a reality tv show, hits it big, and Elizabeth ghostwrites her tell-all autobiography and then lands a big book deal like Lauren Conrad or something! Hmmm. I wonder if being another Jessica is part of why I'm more sympathetic to her? She was kind of a sociopath…
Also: Enid becomes an alcoholic renamed Alexandra in the Sweet Valley University books, and in SVC she's a gynecologist who's dating A.J. Morgan on the sly. I don't think she's cool enough to be a librarian, honestly! 😉
Ooh. I agree with you on that. I think gynecologist is perfectly fitting for her. 😉
Also, what happened to Enid. Or did we find out during the books? I always thought that she'd end up the spinster librarian with 8 million cats.
I would totally read your version! 🙂
Thank you! I think it would be entertaining. I mean, we did not read these books for realism's sake. I didn't even get into the evil other twins!
thanks for saving me the trouble of NOT reading it. that sounds horrendous. you NEVER split up todd and liz. NEVERRR. Nora (the second evil doppleganger) should have hit with a stick whoever came up with that plot. now i just want to go read the fairly scary books about the evil twins.
PS: ken matthews, maria slater, and aaron dallas (loooove him)
I don't remember Nora, only the first evil twin Margo! Do we still have those books at home? That sounds like ideal poolside reading this summer!
Aaron Dallas becomes Stephen's husband. And Ken Matthews and Lila have, like, an open marriage. Which: LILA IS MARRIED TO BRUCE HELLO. (I feel very strongly about that.) I don't think Maria Slater made it into SVC. I…actually don't remember her. Wait, was she Winston's gf?
Ken Matthews is not cool enough to be married to Lila if he's how I remember him. No wonder it's an open marriage.
I know right? Lila + Bruce 4EVER. 😉
Jessie, most of the book was not where I would have imagined them being, and your summary is much closer to what I had in mind. You know what the saddest part is? These characters actually started reminding me of the cool kids I knew in high school that still hang out with each other and still think they're the cool kids and I started not liking any of them anymore! ha ha!
Whatever happened to Enid's boyfriend Hugh? I can't believe there was a time in my life when I thought Enid and Hugh were the most awesome names ever.
Yeah, there was definitely a sense of faded glory about that scene at Lila and Ken's, right? I prefer to imagine them as being sort of awesome and scandalous.
Maybe that's why I kinda liked that Elizabeth was out and about in NY. I thought more of those guys would have moved away to be fabulous someplace else, not stayed behind and found a new pizza place to hang out at. And definitely. Lila was meant to be with Bruce. Ha ha! Bruce's rapey Chuck Bass moment!
Remember when Elizabeth was held prisoner in the hospital she worked at? I loved that one!
Yes! She was a candy striper & she got kidnapped by a creepy old orderly, right? She got kidnapped a lot. Did you ever read the SVU books? She had a whole stalker crazy boyfriend then.
I also always liked Elizabeth with Jeffrey French much more than Todd. It's like Sam vs. Finn from Glee!