* Photo credit to The Closet *
Just who is that corpsey dude in the window, you ask? Why, that’s just Jonathan, the sexy guy who lives alone in his creepy mansion. The back cover asks, “Is Jonathan a dream guy… or a monster?” He’s both, man! I first read this at a preteen/when I was going through my vampire phase, and thus this book was a total turn on.
Yes, vampires. In Sweet Valley High. Specifically falling in love with a Wakefield twin. The series really lost its mind after Margo tried to knife Elizabeth on New Year’s.
Jess shows off her fancy, diamond-stud earrings at the Dairi Burger and everyone acts like they’ve never seen a pair before. Then she promptly loses one in her burger garbage and makes Lila Fowle rifle through the dumpster with her to find it. Now there’s a true friend. The girls find a kitten that’s stuck in the tree, as well as a dead, bloodless body. The perfect end to the perfect night! (Don’t concern yourself with the dead guy—he was just a Big Mesa student.)
On Monday, Chrome Dome presents new student Jonathan Cain to the entire school during an assembly (how dramatic!) and Jess immediately creams herself. But I don’t blame her, because Jonathan totally sounds like someone I would jump. He even drives a motorcycle to school. Everyone at SVH gets Jonathan Fever—the boys wanna be him, the girls wanna do him, you know the score. It’s so weird to hear about all these Sweet Valley kids dressing like goths now; it’s like a parallel universe. So parallel, in fact, that even Enid Rollins starts buying her wardrobe from Hot Topic, dying her hair black and straightening it, and getting gothic acrylic nails; she’s ten different shades of hot for Jonathan, her “soul mate.” Oh dear—Jess vs. Enid when it comes to some guy? I think I know how this one ends.
But Jess is pulling out all her seductress antics and Jonathan blows her off with a note reading, “You don’t want to mess with me; I eat little girls like you for breakfast.” (Ooh! Please do!) But how can he reject her? Didn’t he get the memo that she’s Jessica freaking Wakefield? Then she jumps on the back of his motorcycle before he peels off, clearly forgetting that Liz almost died on one of those contraptions. (Did Sam pave the way for them to be okay again?) Jonathan wants to tell her to take a hike, but she’s just too, too irresistible—he looks into her eyes and feels “as though he were drowning in their blue-green depths.” Then she slips her arms around his waist, and “shaken, Jonathan moaned.” I’m getting so aroused over here.
But then Jonathan dumps Jess off at her house and continues to shun her. He won’t even read the notes she passes him in French class. Jess goes to the Dairi Burger and mopes, where she runs into Enid, who’s also moping, and learns that Enid’s stalked Jonathan to his essentially abandoned mansion. Jess, naturally, heads there tout suite with intent to seduce, and Jonathan pulls her inside and makes out with her like whoa, and is all, “You shouldn’t have come here, Jessica Wakefield… It may have been the biggest mistake of your life.” Hot!
In other news, Liz feels like her life is bland, and the only thing that would make her dull existence better was if her Camp Echo Mountain fling Joey Mason were her boyfriend instead of Todd Wilkins. But Elizabeth is so good and so kind and honesty personified! How could she do this? What’s annoying is that Liz doesn’t even regret fooling around behind Todd’s back—she just worries he’ll find out. And then she’s all, “I guess I’m just not made for deception.” Then why does she persist in being constantly deceptive? An entire book was even NAMED Deceptions because of her deceptions!!!
Liz tries to push Joey out of her mind by indulging in Todd Smooches, but to no avail. When Jess goes to seduce Jonathan, Liz starts freaking out because she just heard on the news that a beautiful blonde was just murdered. Of course it must be Jess—there can only be two of those after all! Liz calls Todd for help and he’s on his way over when Joey appears on her stoop, and they embrace, and of course Todd sees them. What will happen?! I must know!
Other Notes:
- Bruce Patman just laughs when he hears about Jess’s dead-body discovery: “I’d love to see what’s happening at the town dump this morning. I’ll bet it’s crawling with derelicts trying to find the Jessica Wakefield diamond.” I love Bruce. He’s so himself, even though Jess considers him “hopeless.”
- So I take it Liz’s “Eyes and Ears” column is considered defunct now that she’s doing her “Personal Profiles” schtick?
- Jess recovers from her trauma quick enough to start thinking of how she’s going to play herself in a dramatic reenactment on TV, to which Liz replies, “Jessica, a guy was murdered. How can you possibly be thinking of your acting career?” LOLZ.
- Jess’s favorite perfume is called Rendezvous. It so would be.
- Liz’s decisive skills at work: “Joey green eyes, Todd brown eyes, Joey lake, Todd ocean, Joey mountains, Todd beaches…” The hell?
- Even Winston Egbert caves in and wears all black—but with a neon green tie that Maria Santelli bought him. I’ve decided that I love those two as a couple.
- The inside jokes about camp between Liz and Maria Slater get really old, really fast.
- Liz shuns Enid’s obsession; she hates Jonathan because he jostled her in the hallway. But Liz is being a dick to Enid anyway; she acts secretive and best-friendy with Maria Slater, who was a counselor at Camp Echo and thus knows about Liz and Joey. Enid wants to dye her hair black, and Liz is like, “That’s the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard. Why would you want to do something so ridiculous?” Um, wow, relax, please. That seems like a bit much. Liz is such a tool.
- Jonathan Cain drinks squirrel blood, pass it on. (Everyone know it’s the Natty Ice of bloods.)
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