Sweet Valley High
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Sweet Valley High is a young adult book series created by Francine Pascal and written by several ghostwriters, revolving around the lives of Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield, beautiful blonde twins who live in fictitious Sweet Valley, California. The series began with the book Double Love, which was published in 1984. The Sweet Valley High series contained over 150 books and spawned several spin-off series. The last Sweet Valley book, Sweet 18 in the series Sweet Valley Senior Year, was published in January 2003. The books are generally classified as young adult or kids' fiction.
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[edit] Structure of the books
Originally, the books centered solely on the lives of the Wakefield twins. As the series progressed, there was more focus on other characters in the Sweet Valley universe, although every book contained at least a subplot relating to Elizabeth or Jessica.
In addition to the regular books, the series also contained several Mystery and Super Editions. Most of these occurred outside the Sweet Valley High mainframe, with the events contained within bearing little significance to the main books.
After the magna edition A Night to Remember the series was reformatted to contain a succession of story arcs which usually took place over three books, eg the Cheerleading Miniseries contained Jessica Quits the Squad, The Pom Pom Wars and V For Victory.
Four historical "sagas" were published, each chronicling several generations of ancestors of Sweet Valley characters:
- Wakefields of Sweet Valley, covering the lives of five generations of Elizabeth's and Jessica's female ancestors ending with their mother, Alice
- The Wakefield Legacy, covering the lives of five generations of Elizabeth's and Jessica's ancestors on their father Ned's side
- The Patmans of Sweet Valley, covering the lives of four generations of Bruce Patman's ancestors
- The Fowlers of Sweet Valley, covering the lives of four generations of Lila Fowler's ancestors
[edit] Main characters
Elizabeth Wakefield is the eldest twin, having been born four minutes before her "little sister" Jessica. Elizabeth enjoys reading and writing, and hopes to become a journalist someday. She writes the weekly gossip column, "Eyes and Ears," for the Sweet Valley High newspaper, "The Oracle."
Jessica Wakefield, on the other hand, is superficial, self-absorbed and flirty. Her interests change from minute to minute and she loves being up to date on the latest fashions and music. She often gets herself into sticky situations, relying on Elizabeth to bail her out.
[edit] Recurring Characters
- Ned and Alice Wakefield, the twins' parents
- Steven Wakefield, the twins' older brother
- Todd Wilkins, Elizabeth's on/off boyfriend
- Enid Rollins, Elizabeth's best friend
- Lila Fowler, Jessica's best friend
- Winston Egbert, the class clown
- Ken Matthews, the quarterback
- Caroline Pierce, the school gossip
- Olivia Davidson, arts editor for The Oracle
- Penny Ayala, editor in chief of The Oracle
- Roger Barrett Patman, a poor student who turns out to be Bruce Patman's cousin
- Jeannie West, Sandra Bacon and Annie Whitman, members of the cheerleading squad
- Tom McKay, tennis star
- Lois Waller, a shy, overweight student
- Bruce Patman, a rich, handsome senior
- Robin Wilson, cheerleading co-captain
- Aaron Dallas, a soccer player
- Roger Collins, school newspaper staff advisor and popular English teacher
- Nora Dalton, a popular French teacher
- Maria Santelli, a cheerleader and girlfriend of Winston
- The Droids, resident Sweet Valley band, consisting of Dana Larson (vocals), Guy Chesney (keyboards), Emily Mayer (drums), Max Dellon (lead guitar) and Dan Scott (bass guitar.)
- Bill Chase, a surfer
- DeeDee Gordon, Bill's girlfriend
- Rick Andover, the bad boy
[edit] Other Characters
- Cara Walker and Amy Sutton, close friends of Jessica's
- Jeffrey French, Elizabeth's ex-boyfriend who disappeared from the series
- Nicholas and Regina Morrow, wealthy but down to earth siblings
- Suzanne Devlin, bad girl turned good
- Abbie Richardson, cartoonist for The Oracle
- Maria Slater, close friend of Elizabeth
- John Pfeifer, sports editor for The Oracle, Jennifer's boyfriend
- Tricia Martin, Steven's ex-girlfriend who died from cancer
- AJ Morgan, Jessica's first serious boyfriend
- George Warren, Enid's, then Robin's, boyfriend
- Sam Woodruff, Jessica's boyfriend who died in a car crash
- Christian Gorman, Jessica's boyfriend who died in a fight
- Barry Rork, Amy's boyfriend
- Scott Trost, Jean's boyfriend
- Devon Whitelaw, Elizabeth's brief love interest
- Claire Middleton, Female player on football team
- Pamela Robertson, Bruce's girlfriend
[edit] Spin-off Series
The book series began with the Sweet Valley High series, but eventually came to cover their lives from second grade through college with the inclusion of Sweet Valley Kids, Sweet Valley Twins and Friends, Sweet Valley Jr. High, SVSY (Sweet Valley Senior Year), Sweet Valley University, and Elizabeth. Other spin-off series included the Unicorn Club and Team Sweet Valley.
[edit] Sweet Valley Kids
The twins as seven year old second-graders at Sweet Valley Elementary School. The series included several Special Editions and "Super Snooper" mystery books.
[edit] Sweet Valley Twins
(aka Sweet Valley Twins and Friends)
The twins as twelve year old sixth-graders at Sweet Valley Middle School. This was the first spin-off to originate from SVH, and was written entirely by Jamie Suzzane.
[edit] Team Sweet Valley
A two part deviation from the Sweet Valley Twins series, which sees SVMS compete in the California games, Jessica as a gymnast and Elizabeth as part of the beach volley ball team.
[edit] The Unicorn Club
A popular group of girls from SVMS, including Jessica. The series centers around Jessica and her other five Unicorn friends in the series.
[edit] Sweet Valley Junior High
The twins as eighth-graders. This series saw Jessica and Elizabeth attend a new school after the re-zoning of the Sweet Valley school area.
[edit] Sweet Valley Senior Year
The twins as seniors.
[edit] Sweet Valley University
The twins as freshman and sophomore college students.
[edit] Elizabeth
Chronological, the final chapter in the series and the only spin-off that did not feature Jessica directly. Continues from the plot that occurred at the end of Sweet Valley University; Elizabeth flees to London, intending to continue her university studies, but ends up working as a scullery maid. The series contained six books.
[edit] Sweet Valley Heights
This is an as yet unpublished spin-off of the franchise described by Francine Pascal in the April/May 2005 edition of Bust magazine. According to the interview, Sweet Valley Heights will feature characters from the original series living in a gated community and aged in their 20s or 30s. Some sources claim the title has been changed to Sweet Valley Confidential. The Bust interview claimed the initial publication would appear in late 2005, but as of 2006 it has not appeared.
[edit] TV Show
A TV series based on Sweet Valley High ran for 88 episodes between 1994 and 1997. It starred real-life twins Brittany and Cynthia Daniel (formerly Doublemint Twin models) as Jessica and Elizabeth respectively. The twins also modeled for later editions of the book covers.
[edit] Other products
Many tie in products were produced for this series (primarily the Sweet Valley High Run) including a series of puzzles, a board game, audio book versions of selected SVH books, commercially available VHS and DVDs of the SVH TV Series, a CD soundtrack for the TV show, dolls and doll clothing, at least one calendar (for the year 1989/90) and books that were not part of the series (including TV tie-in reprints, a trivia book, a behind-the-scenes book about the TV show, and a "Slam Book").
[edit] Criticisms
The Sweet Valley series has often been criticized for its unrealistic portrayal of teenagers (although this was somewhat rectified in the Senior Year series), and its outlandish plots, especially within the original Sweet Valley High series. Some exotic examples include:
- the twins battling a werewolf in London;
- Margo, a psychotic young woman, and later, her own twin sister Nora, attempting to murder Elizabeth and Jessica in a diabolical scheme to 'replace' them;
- a former classmate of Alice Wakefield's luring them to a beauty spa with the intention of stealing Alice's face via a face transplant; and
- Elizabeth and a Parisian prince falling in love.
[edit] Pop Culture References
- The Simpsons episode, "Homer the Moe,": After Homer tells his friends a bizarre story, Moe replies, "That is the stupidest story I ever heard, and I read the entire 'Sweet Valley High' series."
- Veronica Mars episode 1.14 "Mars vs. Mars": After a student tells Veronica that their teacher seduced her, Veronica replies by saying, "Yeah, I have that same Sweet Valley High Book." (see Suzanne Devlin)
[edit] External links
- Sweet Valley Forum
- The Hidden Bookcase - Brand New Sweet Valley Site for 2006!
- Sweet Valley site
- Sweet Valley LiveJournal
- Sweet Valley Slam Book - a humorous overview of the parent series
- Sweet Valley Unlimited - Your Source to Everything Sweet Valley
- Sweet Valley Diaries - a mock-serious review blog
- Sweet Valley (TV series) (1994)
