SVT Super Edition #12: Goodbye, Middle School!
Sorry that it’s a photo, not a scan, so it's kinda blurry. I haven’t put ink in my printer for over a year, and my scanner has gone on a sympathy strike.
This cover is mostly bad, except for Todd. One arm draped over Elizabeth and the other ending in a closed fist. Has he ever been summarised so succinctly? I bet he punched everybody in the room seconds after this was taken.
So this book is set right at the end of the summer before eighth grade. They know that the schools-shuffle is coming, but they don’t know who’s going where. So it’s after the entire Unicorn Club series, and I think it’s the last book to be considered SVT. It is also right before the Next Stop: Jr High diary thingies. Which means that Amy Sutton moved away a whole year ago, and the Unicorn Club consists of Jess, Lila, Ellen, Kimberly, Mandy and Rachel.
I feel the need to spell this out, because I got confused about where I was in the timeline when I read this. Because it’s technically an SVT, which means they kind of should be in sixth grade. Arrrgh, this transition period is confusing! I bet Frankie Pascal (as I like to call her, as of two seconds ago) just threw her hands up in despair and stopped caring long ago.
So as an introduction to the book, check out this back-of-the-book description:
Now that summer’s over, identical twins Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield can’t wait to get back to school. The only question is: Which school will they be going to?
Sweet Valley Middle School has become so overcrowded, half the seventh and eighth graders will be moved to a new junior high. And nobody knows who will stay and who will go! The twins and their friends plan to spend a final night together, camping out and playing truth or dare.
But these friends who thought they knew each other so well are about to discover a truth more shocking than any dare...
With that in mind, I’ll give you a minute to think about what you expect from this book.
...
Okay, here we go! We begin with Elizabeth getting a letter saying she’s accepted into the building-houses-in-Costa-Rica program that takes place in her Next Stop: Junior High diary. Jessica and Elizabeth are oddly upset over the fact that they won’t see each other for a month. It’s all very dramatic and emotional, lots of ellipses.
Next we have some exposition explaining the SV Junior High premise. The story is that SVMS and Secca Lake Middle School are both overcrowded, and half of each school’s seventh and eighth graders will go to a brand spanking new school called Sweet Valley Junior High. Number one, Secca Lake has a middle school? Number two, in the SVJH series the school is clearly well-established. The kids there have lots of history with each other and with the school. Epic continuity fail. Way to screw up the premise of an entire series.
By the way, I like to think that there’s a Secca Like High. The kids that fell through the cracks between SVT, The Unicorn Club and SVJH go there, and they’re happy.
Jessica hangs out at Lila’s with the Unicorns, all despondent and sad and distracted because she won’t see Elizabeth for a month. Suddenly, the face of a Native American woman "with smooth dark skin and black hair that floated around her face like a halo" appears at the bottom of Lila’s pool and looks at her. Jess blinks, and it vanishes. No-one else has seen it.
After that bizarre and out-of-place occurrence, the Unicorns discuss the uncertainty of who’ll be at which school next year. After talking about how they might be split up they decide to have an end of summer campout party at Secca Lake. While biking home, Jess starts to worry about all those thousands of kids who have good reason to hate her and the Unicorns. They might be at her school next year, with no Unicorn posse to protect her! They could gang up on her!! So to make up for the years of exclusivity and bitchiness, she decides to make the Unicorn Campout a party for their whole class. I love that a party = magical healing balm on wounded interpersonal relationships.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth is lugging textbooks about Costa Rica out of the library (of course) with Maria. They talk about the school switch, and how much they’d miss each other if they were at different schools (except they totally forget about each other after about four SVJH books). They swing by Casey’s for a "friendship sundae" (do they each spit in it before they eat it, like a friendship handshake?). Winston joins them, and then Jess appears, bearing good news about the par-tay. Winston has a mild freak out about having a campout near the haunted burial ground, and Elizabeth gets uneasy at the memory of that night. To calm herself down, she looks around the familiar room, complete with life size mask of Native American woman’s face with a scar and with "two deep eyes that seemed to bore in on Elizabeth’s own". Wait, what? Liz blinks and the mask is gone. At this point in my first read, I was all "what kind of supernatural crap is this?? I thought this was a NORMAL svt!!"
(Now is a good time to point out that, despite the major continuity blunder at the beginning, this book is weirdly accurate with the minutiae of previous SVT books, particularly the late ones. For instance, Joe Carrey is their waiter. There are references to past storylines all over the place. Also, these later books have a bizarre habit of thinly disguising real-life actors. Like, Winston mentions a lifeguard show called Shark Attack starring an actress called Patricia Sanderson. This book doesn't mention the movie star Arnold Weissenhammer, but I can think of at least two that do. Way to be subtle, SV!)
Back at Casa Wakefield, Jess and Liz argue a bit about how to organise the party. Alice wanders in and mentions that there’s an unconfirmed rumour going around Sweet Valley that SVJH will have an accelerated curriculum. Elizabeth nearly explodes with glee. "I bet there are a bunch of kids like me at Secca Lake Middle School. I never thought about that before. If they put us together in the same school, that could be a lot of fun."
I can feel the fun from here!
Anyway, Jessica takes this enthusiasm as a personal insult and they fight some more. Then they both take it for granted that Liz will get into the rumoured smart class at SVJH and Jess will be at a different school altogether and that their twin couldn’t care less that they’ll be separated. This is the cause of some epic melodramatic misery all the way through this book. And hey, I’ve read SVJH. I know this rumour isn't even true. Way to cause needless drama, Alice!
Jess breaks it to the unicorns that she invited the whole class to their campout party. They’re annoyed at first, but eventually come around. The weirdness of having Kimberly at what is now essentially a class-party is acknowledged, but no-one seems to really care.
Jess, Liz, Mandy and Maria head to Secca Lake to do some planning, and the twins argue some more. Jessica hears a disembodied voice say "Listen!" into her ear, while Elizabeth sees a human figure dart behind a tree and vanish. I honestly don’t know if this is meant to be eerie or what, but it just comes across as weird. Disembodied faces and voices? Seriously, ghosts? I feel so wrong footed! Shouldn’t the back or the cover or the title or something hint at the supernatural themes of this book? Like my favourite SV book, The Curse of the Ruby Necklace. If it was called, say, "The Twins on Set!" or "Jessica's Bad Dreams" I probably wouldn't like it as much. Because those titles fail to capture the main point of the book! Dead girl uses her old necklace to possess the twins in their dreams and catch her murderer! (If you haven't read it, you must!!)
Jess and Liz hang out with their respective friends, who all gush about how jealous they are of the twins’ close bond. Ooh, a game! Try and guess who said each of these quotes. Highlight the space after it for the answer!
1) “You’re so lucky to have a twin. You guys are so close, so in tune with each other’s feelings, you know?” - Todd
2) “Twins are like that. Especially the two of you. You and Elizabeth are like two halves of the same person.” - Mandy
3) “You’re lucky to be so close - lots of people don’t get along with their brothers and sisters as well as you two do. I wish there was someone who understood me the way Jessica understands you.” - Cammi
4) “You two are always on the same wavelength, no matter how different you seem. You’re role models. If everyone understood each other the way you two do, there would be peace on earth.” - Randy
5) “[Sending J & E to different schools] has got to be, you know, against the Declaration of Independence or something.” - Ellen
6) “When I moved here, it was ‘the twins this’ and ‘the twins that’ and ‘the twins are so cool’ and ‘let’s check with the twins.’ You guys are like a tourist attraction. They can’t send you to different schools.” - Rachel
7) “It’s like having an automatic best friend. A soul mate.” - Rachel
Yeah, some of them were kind of random and hard. Especially if you haven’t read late SVT or the Unicorn Club.
Anyway, both twins feel miserable about losing this bond. They’re drifting apart, and their twin no longer loves them. Guys! You a couple of spats about a trivial thing that's not even true! It’s not as though, say, one of you accused the other one’s boyfriend of rape.
The planning for this party is done is a weirdly mature way. Minutes are taken and and motions are carried. They organise for Liz, Randy and Cammi to pick up food from this place called the Bread Basket Bakery, which has been relentlessly name-dropped the entire book. It’s owned by a Native American woman with a scar on her face who looks strangely familiar to Elizabeth (hmmmm!) and asks to be called the Bakery Lady. The Bakery Lady casually mentions her sister, who made the fantabulous bread baskets around the place. Also, she casually warns them to take care around Secca Lake... there are stories about that place. Stories and histories and secrets. We’re reminded of Randy’s nerdiness because responds with things like "that’s not rational. I don’t believe those stories for a moment, and neither would any competent folklorist" and "that’s not scientific. It’s crazy to say that places can hold secrets. Not unless she’s talking about stuff like fossils."
Jess swings by the bakery to see if Liz is still there, and meets another native American woman who is apparently the Bakery Lady’s sister. She becomes very solemn as she tells Jessica they both have a twin, and then advises her to Listen.
Party tiiiiiiiiime! Everyone’s breaking down the usual cliquey barriers and is having a grand old time (Lila goes canoeing with Maria and Sophia!). Jess and Liz are sulking in individual pools of misery. Todd tries to cheer Liz up, but she runs away to cry under a tree. She returns for truth or dare, the best part of which is that we have another canon reference to Bruce’s phobia of birds!!! Hey, Bruce:
Why is he even there? Kimberley is there because this is technically a hijacked Unicorn party. What’s Bruce’s excuse?
Anyway, Lila’s truth question for Jessica is to give all the details of what’s bothering her tonight. Jess refuses, and so takes the subsequent dare: hike to echo rock, and shout "Listen!" to prove she made it. Oh, because that was what the Bakery Lady’s twin told her to do! This book is so clever. Liz gets the same question and similarly refuses. Her dare is to go to the aforementioned burial ground and bring back a flower to prove she was there.
Jess reaches the rock, psyches herself out in the utter darkness and silence, shouts "LISTEN!" and turns to hurry back to the campfire... but there’s someone behind her! Who could it be??
Liz hears Jess’s shout and thinks she sounds sad. Liz thinks some more about how their relationship is apparently tattered beyond repair, reaches the burial ground... and someone is sitting on the opposite wall! Who could it be??
Liz is greeted by the Bakery Lady. Liz is all "what are you doing here?" and the Bakery Lady says "that is a long and complicated story. And it is yours that we need to hear first." She deduces that Liz and Jess had a fight, and tells Liz to listen (LISTEN!!!!) to a story...
Meanwhile, Jess has a similar conversation with the Bakery Lady’s twin. Her name is the Basket Lady, and she’s gathering reeds to make more baskets like the ones in the bakery. She also begins a story, and Jessica is supernaturally compelled to sit and listen (LISTEN!!!).
Here’s the story: Once upon a time there were twin sisters who owned a bakery. They were the Bakery Lady, who was serious and practical, and the Basket Lady, who liked making pretty baskets and was too flighty to bake well. They became angry at each other one day, and the Bakery Lady told her sister that she was sick of her and to get lost. The Basket Lady went to gather reeds, and said she’d only return if she ever decided that she wanted to. The Bakery Lady never told her sister that she loved her and would miss her.
Intermission! We hop back to the truth or dare game, where Randy reveals that he’s been secretly longing for Lois Waller to teach him the twist.
Act 2. The Basket Lady camped out at Secca Lake to gather reeds and make an awesome basket to make her sister jealous. But she caught a fever and refused to call her sister for help and her sister refused to come looking for her and... let’s leave the story with a loose end, shall we? Jess leaps to her feet! Must find Liz!
Liz, while similarly running through the woods to reunite with Jessica, falls down a hole. Nice work, Liz.
Jess gets back to then camp and discovers Liz hasn’t returned. The psychic sisters incident has been brought up over and over and over in this book as an example of their ~*~special bond~*~ but Jess says she has no idea where Liz is. The others are shocked and appalled that her Twin-ESP has failed them. Kimberley and Jerry McAllister want to go to bed and let Liz sort herself out, since it’s not like Jessica is getting cosmic thought waves from Elizabeth saying "help me! I fell down a hole!". Jess is horrified, and rallies everyone into a search party by going on about all the times Elizabeth has been there for each and every one of them - and now it’s their time to help her!!
Elizabeth time-travels (no, really) and watches the estrangement between the Bakery Lady and the Basket Lady. Which happens in a field in bright daylight, for some reason.
Jess and the others keep searching. Liz drowsily wakes up and hears Jess calling, can’t make herself heard, and they use their psychic bond to reunite. And save Liz’s life, or something.
The next day, they head to the bakery to thank the Bakery Lady and Basket Lady. But some random woman is there who claims to be the only person who works there, and that she never heard anything about the order for the Secca Lake party last night. But she has a smasher of a story about her great grandmother and her great grandmother’s twin sister! Serious and practical grandma Bessie, and her flighty twin Jessie. Bessie and Jessie. Hey..! That sounds kind of like...
Anyway, so when Jessie went to Secca Lake she got a fever and died. Surpriiiiise!
And just in case we haven’t worked out that these are the same twins who came back as ghosts to warn Jessica and Elizabeth to get along (a warning which, I'm sure, was totally heeded), a photo is produced.
And summer is only just beginning! Lead-in to the Next Stop: Junior High diaries. Wait, didn’t the back of the book say that summer is over?
...
So what was the "truth more chocking than any dare"? That there has already been a set of twins in Sweet Valley called Jessica and Elizabeth? Bruce’s bird phobia? (I know we already knew this, but the characters didn’t!) Sweet Valley is still a hotspot for ghostly happenings?
I don’t know if I’m sad that SVT went out on such a whimper, or gratified that it was at least a bizarro whimper.
This cover is mostly bad, except for Todd. One arm draped over Elizabeth and the other ending in a closed fist. Has he ever been summarised so succinctly? I bet he punched everybody in the room seconds after this was taken.
So this book is set right at the end of the summer before eighth grade. They know that the schools-shuffle is coming, but they don’t know who’s going where. So it’s after the entire Unicorn Club series, and I think it’s the last book to be considered SVT. It is also right before the Next Stop: Jr High diary thingies. Which means that Amy Sutton moved away a whole year ago, and the Unicorn Club consists of Jess, Lila, Ellen, Kimberly, Mandy and Rachel.
I feel the need to spell this out, because I got confused about where I was in the timeline when I read this. Because it’s technically an SVT, which means they kind of should be in sixth grade. Arrrgh, this transition period is confusing! I bet Frankie Pascal (as I like to call her, as of two seconds ago) just threw her hands up in despair and stopped caring long ago.
So as an introduction to the book, check out this back-of-the-book description:
Now that summer’s over, identical twins Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield can’t wait to get back to school. The only question is: Which school will they be going to?
Sweet Valley Middle School has become so overcrowded, half the seventh and eighth graders will be moved to a new junior high. And nobody knows who will stay and who will go! The twins and their friends plan to spend a final night together, camping out and playing truth or dare.
But these friends who thought they knew each other so well are about to discover a truth more shocking than any dare...
With that in mind, I’ll give you a minute to think about what you expect from this book.
...
Okay, here we go! We begin with Elizabeth getting a letter saying she’s accepted into the building-houses-in-Costa-Rica program that takes place in her Next Stop: Junior High diary. Jessica and Elizabeth are oddly upset over the fact that they won’t see each other for a month. It’s all very dramatic and emotional, lots of ellipses.
Next we have some exposition explaining the SV Junior High premise. The story is that SVMS and Secca Lake Middle School are both overcrowded, and half of each school’s seventh and eighth graders will go to a brand spanking new school called Sweet Valley Junior High. Number one, Secca Lake has a middle school? Number two, in the SVJH series the school is clearly well-established. The kids there have lots of history with each other and with the school. Epic continuity fail. Way to screw up the premise of an entire series.
By the way, I like to think that there’s a Secca Like High. The kids that fell through the cracks between SVT, The Unicorn Club and SVJH go there, and they’re happy.
Jessica hangs out at Lila’s with the Unicorns, all despondent and sad and distracted because she won’t see Elizabeth for a month. Suddenly, the face of a Native American woman "with smooth dark skin and black hair that floated around her face like a halo" appears at the bottom of Lila’s pool and looks at her. Jess blinks, and it vanishes. No-one else has seen it.
After that bizarre and out-of-place occurrence, the Unicorns discuss the uncertainty of who’ll be at which school next year. After talking about how they might be split up they decide to have an end of summer campout party at Secca Lake. While biking home, Jess starts to worry about all those thousands of kids who have good reason to hate her and the Unicorns. They might be at her school next year, with no Unicorn posse to protect her! They could gang up on her!! So to make up for the years of exclusivity and bitchiness, she decides to make the Unicorn Campout a party for their whole class. I love that a party = magical healing balm on wounded interpersonal relationships.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth is lugging textbooks about Costa Rica out of the library (of course) with Maria. They talk about the school switch, and how much they’d miss each other if they were at different schools (except they totally forget about each other after about four SVJH books). They swing by Casey’s for a "friendship sundae" (do they each spit in it before they eat it, like a friendship handshake?). Winston joins them, and then Jess appears, bearing good news about the par-tay. Winston has a mild freak out about having a campout near the haunted burial ground, and Elizabeth gets uneasy at the memory of that night. To calm herself down, she looks around the familiar room, complete with life size mask of Native American woman’s face with a scar and with "two deep eyes that seemed to bore in on Elizabeth’s own". Wait, what? Liz blinks and the mask is gone. At this point in my first read, I was all "what kind of supernatural crap is this?? I thought this was a NORMAL svt!!"
(Now is a good time to point out that, despite the major continuity blunder at the beginning, this book is weirdly accurate with the minutiae of previous SVT books, particularly the late ones. For instance, Joe Carrey is their waiter. There are references to past storylines all over the place. Also, these later books have a bizarre habit of thinly disguising real-life actors. Like, Winston mentions a lifeguard show called Shark Attack starring an actress called Patricia Sanderson. This book doesn't mention the movie star Arnold Weissenhammer, but I can think of at least two that do. Way to be subtle, SV!)
Back at Casa Wakefield, Jess and Liz argue a bit about how to organise the party. Alice wanders in and mentions that there’s an unconfirmed rumour going around Sweet Valley that SVJH will have an accelerated curriculum. Elizabeth nearly explodes with glee. "I bet there are a bunch of kids like me at Secca Lake Middle School. I never thought about that before. If they put us together in the same school, that could be a lot of fun."
I can feel the fun from here!
Anyway, Jessica takes this enthusiasm as a personal insult and they fight some more. Then they both take it for granted that Liz will get into the rumoured smart class at SVJH and Jess will be at a different school altogether and that their twin couldn’t care less that they’ll be separated. This is the cause of some epic melodramatic misery all the way through this book. And hey, I’ve read SVJH. I know this rumour isn't even true. Way to cause needless drama, Alice!
Jess breaks it to the unicorns that she invited the whole class to their campout party. They’re annoyed at first, but eventually come around. The weirdness of having Kimberly at what is now essentially a class-party is acknowledged, but no-one seems to really care.
Jess, Liz, Mandy and Maria head to Secca Lake to do some planning, and the twins argue some more. Jessica hears a disembodied voice say "Listen!" into her ear, while Elizabeth sees a human figure dart behind a tree and vanish. I honestly don’t know if this is meant to be eerie or what, but it just comes across as weird. Disembodied faces and voices? Seriously, ghosts? I feel so wrong footed! Shouldn’t the back or the cover or the title or something hint at the supernatural themes of this book? Like my favourite SV book, The Curse of the Ruby Necklace. If it was called, say, "The Twins on Set!" or "Jessica's Bad Dreams" I probably wouldn't like it as much. Because those titles fail to capture the main point of the book! Dead girl uses her old necklace to possess the twins in their dreams and catch her murderer! (If you haven't read it, you must!!)
Jess and Liz hang out with their respective friends, who all gush about how jealous they are of the twins’ close bond. Ooh, a game! Try and guess who said each of these quotes. Highlight the space after it for the answer!
1) “You’re so lucky to have a twin. You guys are so close, so in tune with each other’s feelings, you know?” - Todd
2) “Twins are like that. Especially the two of you. You and Elizabeth are like two halves of the same person.” - Mandy
3) “You’re lucky to be so close - lots of people don’t get along with their brothers and sisters as well as you two do. I wish there was someone who understood me the way Jessica understands you.” - Cammi
4) “You two are always on the same wavelength, no matter how different you seem. You’re role models. If everyone understood each other the way you two do, there would be peace on earth.” - Randy
5) “[Sending J & E to different schools] has got to be, you know, against the Declaration of Independence or something.” - Ellen
6) “When I moved here, it was ‘the twins this’ and ‘the twins that’ and ‘the twins are so cool’ and ‘let’s check with the twins.’ You guys are like a tourist attraction. They can’t send you to different schools.” - Rachel
7) “It’s like having an automatic best friend. A soul mate.” - Rachel
Yeah, some of them were kind of random and hard. Especially if you haven’t read late SVT or the Unicorn Club.
Anyway, both twins feel miserable about losing this bond. They’re drifting apart, and their twin no longer loves them. Guys! You a couple of spats about a trivial thing that's not even true! It’s not as though, say, one of you accused the other one’s boyfriend of rape.
The planning for this party is done is a weirdly mature way. Minutes are taken and and motions are carried. They organise for Liz, Randy and Cammi to pick up food from this place called the Bread Basket Bakery, which has been relentlessly name-dropped the entire book. It’s owned by a Native American woman with a scar on her face who looks strangely familiar to Elizabeth (hmmmm!) and asks to be called the Bakery Lady. The Bakery Lady casually mentions her sister, who made the fantabulous bread baskets around the place. Also, she casually warns them to take care around Secca Lake... there are stories about that place. Stories and histories and secrets. We’re reminded of Randy’s nerdiness because responds with things like "that’s not rational. I don’t believe those stories for a moment, and neither would any competent folklorist" and "that’s not scientific. It’s crazy to say that places can hold secrets. Not unless she’s talking about stuff like fossils."
Jess swings by the bakery to see if Liz is still there, and meets another native American woman who is apparently the Bakery Lady’s sister. She becomes very solemn as she tells Jessica they both have a twin, and then advises her to Listen.
Party tiiiiiiiiime! Everyone’s breaking down the usual cliquey barriers and is having a grand old time (Lila goes canoeing with Maria and Sophia!). Jess and Liz are sulking in individual pools of misery. Todd tries to cheer Liz up, but she runs away to cry under a tree. She returns for truth or dare, the best part of which is that we have another canon reference to Bruce’s phobia of birds!!! Hey, Bruce:
Why is he even there? Kimberley is there because this is technically a hijacked Unicorn party. What’s Bruce’s excuse?
Anyway, Lila’s truth question for Jessica is to give all the details of what’s bothering her tonight. Jess refuses, and so takes the subsequent dare: hike to echo rock, and shout "Listen!" to prove she made it. Oh, because that was what the Bakery Lady’s twin told her to do! This book is so clever. Liz gets the same question and similarly refuses. Her dare is to go to the aforementioned burial ground and bring back a flower to prove she was there.
Jess reaches the rock, psyches herself out in the utter darkness and silence, shouts "LISTEN!" and turns to hurry back to the campfire... but there’s someone behind her! Who could it be??
Liz hears Jess’s shout and thinks she sounds sad. Liz thinks some more about how their relationship is apparently tattered beyond repair, reaches the burial ground... and someone is sitting on the opposite wall! Who could it be??
Liz is greeted by the Bakery Lady. Liz is all "what are you doing here?" and the Bakery Lady says "that is a long and complicated story. And it is yours that we need to hear first." She deduces that Liz and Jess had a fight, and tells Liz to listen (LISTEN!!!!) to a story...
Meanwhile, Jess has a similar conversation with the Bakery Lady’s twin. Her name is the Basket Lady, and she’s gathering reeds to make more baskets like the ones in the bakery. She also begins a story, and Jessica is supernaturally compelled to sit and listen (LISTEN!!!).
Here’s the story: Once upon a time there were twin sisters who owned a bakery. They were the Bakery Lady, who was serious and practical, and the Basket Lady, who liked making pretty baskets and was too flighty to bake well. They became angry at each other one day, and the Bakery Lady told her sister that she was sick of her and to get lost. The Basket Lady went to gather reeds, and said she’d only return if she ever decided that she wanted to. The Bakery Lady never told her sister that she loved her and would miss her.
Intermission! We hop back to the truth or dare game, where Randy reveals that he’s been secretly longing for Lois Waller to teach him the twist.
Act 2. The Basket Lady camped out at Secca Lake to gather reeds and make an awesome basket to make her sister jealous. But she caught a fever and refused to call her sister for help and her sister refused to come looking for her and... let’s leave the story with a loose end, shall we? Jess leaps to her feet! Must find Liz!
Liz, while similarly running through the woods to reunite with Jessica, falls down a hole. Nice work, Liz.
Jess gets back to then camp and discovers Liz hasn’t returned. The psychic sisters incident has been brought up over and over and over in this book as an example of their ~*~special bond~*~ but Jess says she has no idea where Liz is. The others are shocked and appalled that her Twin-ESP has failed them. Kimberley and Jerry McAllister want to go to bed and let Liz sort herself out, since it’s not like Jessica is getting cosmic thought waves from Elizabeth saying "help me! I fell down a hole!". Jess is horrified, and rallies everyone into a search party by going on about all the times Elizabeth has been there for each and every one of them - and now it’s their time to help her!!
Elizabeth time-travels (no, really) and watches the estrangement between the Bakery Lady and the Basket Lady. Which happens in a field in bright daylight, for some reason.
Jess and the others keep searching. Liz drowsily wakes up and hears Jess calling, can’t make herself heard, and they use their psychic bond to reunite. And save Liz’s life, or something.
The next day, they head to the bakery to thank the Bakery Lady and Basket Lady. But some random woman is there who claims to be the only person who works there, and that she never heard anything about the order for the Secca Lake party last night. But she has a smasher of a story about her great grandmother and her great grandmother’s twin sister! Serious and practical grandma Bessie, and her flighty twin Jessie. Bessie and Jessie. Hey..! That sounds kind of like...
Anyway, so when Jessie went to Secca Lake she got a fever and died. Surpriiiiise!
And just in case we haven’t worked out that these are the same twins who came back as ghosts to warn Jessica and Elizabeth to get along (a warning which, I'm sure, was totally heeded), a photo is produced.
And summer is only just beginning! Lead-in to the Next Stop: Junior High diaries. Wait, didn’t the back of the book say that summer is over?
...
So what was the "truth more chocking than any dare"? That there has already been a set of twins in Sweet Valley called Jessica and Elizabeth? Bruce’s bird phobia? (I know we already knew this, but the characters didn’t!) Sweet Valley is still a hotspot for ghostly happenings?
I don’t know if I’m sad that SVT went out on such a whimper, or gratified that it was at least a bizarro whimper.