**This blog contains adult language.**
Warning: Spoilers Ahead!!! This is a recap blog which means I read the book and tell you everything that happens so you don't have to read it yourself. Do NOT continue to read unless you want to know what cold-hearted-bitch move the twins made this book.
From the Back of the Book: Too much mystery... Cara Walker feels that her boyfriend Steven Wakefield isn't paying enough attention to her. Suddenly he's acting aloof and withdrawn. Cara's good friend Jessica, Steven's sister, suggests Cara add some mystery to the relationship. When Cara takes Jessica's advice, it backfires. Steven starts to act even more distant, and Cara is sure he's hiding something. He used to confide in her, but now it seems he's turning to his sister Elizabeth's friend Abbie Richardson. Will Cara discover Steven's secret before she's replaced by someone new?
Meet the Cast
*Elizabeth Wakefield – identical twin of Jessica and massive fucking martyr.
*Jessica Wakefield – identical twin of Elizabeth with narcissistic and histrionic tendencies
*EvilNed Wakefield – neglectful patriarch of the clan and successful lawyer
*VileAlice Wakefield – neglectful matriarch of the clan and an interior designer
*Steven Wakefield – older brother, university student and general asshole
*Enid Rollins – Liz's best friend and generic good-girl type
*Todd Wilkins – Liz's douchebag former boyfriend currently exiled to Vermont
*Lila Fowler – Jessica's self-absorbed best friend and representative of SV new money
*Bruce Patman – school dick and representative of SV old money
*Winston Egbert – stereotypical school nerd
*Jeffrey French – Liz's new victim....I mean love interest
There are more but these are the main characters that plague us book after book.
This book was published in 1988 and this is my first time reading it. The cover is weird. Why is Steven wearing a suit? Why does Cara look like a 30-year-old housewife? Do you think Pascal knows what an actual teenager looks like?
In the last book, Enid's grandmother came to town and made her life miserable. Liz worked on a documentary about life in Sweet Valley. That was pretty much it. It was boring.
Missing, Presumed Dead: Johanna, Patty and Eddie are still buried so deep underground that I fear they will never find their way back to the surface. They are still being kept company by Roger who hasn't been seen in a disturbingly long time. Do you think Pascal remembers he exists?
Released from the Wakefield Dungeon: Amy finally clawed her way back out of the Compound to put in an appearance at the Dairi Burger. I'd congratulate her but I don't think life in Sweet Valley is that much of a prize.
We begin with Jess and Cara taking the bus to school because Liz had a doctor's appointment so she took the car. Cara has just received a letter from Steven and she gushes to Jess about how romantic he is. Jess really doesn't want to hear about her brother's love life. She's still on her “serious relationships in high school are stupid” and “long distance relationships are doomed” shtick. She really hates how much Cara has changed since she started dating Steven. Cara used to be a party girl and now she's all boring and serious.
Since Jess isn't interested in her love letters, Cara changes the subject to her upcoming birthday party. Cara's actual birthday was months ago but she didn't have a party back then because she and Steven were fighting. I'm pretty sure that was the book where Jess tried to break them up. Anyway, her parents are letting her have a luncheon at some fancy French-style café. She can only invite fourteen people and her guest list is full but she accidentally mentioned the party to Abbie and now Abbie thinks she's going to be invited too. Cara isn't sure what to do about it. Jess tells her not to mention the party again and Abbie will probably forget all about it.
Who is Abbie you ask? You know Abbie. She's totally been around for 44 books and didn't just poof into existence full-grown-Athena-style in the last book. Abbie was part of the popular crowd in 9th grade but then she ghosted them all when she got a boyfriend from another school. She's recently broken up with said boy (Doug) and now she's trying to slide back into her old friend group.
We skip ahead to lunch. Liz is upset because The Oracle isn't as popular as it used to be. Winston suggests a “funny feature” and Penny and Liz think that's a great idea. Penny asks Winston to write it and when he says he doesn't have time because his grades suck, Liz shrieks at him that he has to because it was his idea. Why did all the characters in books shriek so damn much in the 80's and 90's? I swear this was Stine's favorite word too. Winston doesn't let them bully him into anything. He says they should hold a competition to find the new humor columnist. Penny decides to put Olivia in charge of running it because she has a lot of free time on her hands since Roger is locked away in the Compound. {{{Are those two even still dating? I've lost track of the lore.}}}
Abbie joins them and they tell her about the competition. She volunteers to help and Penny asks her to make posters. Winston says Abbie should try out for the columnist spot because apparently she's a talented cartoonist. Sure. We knew that. We know everything about her. Abbie's totally been around forever and is an integral part of Sweet Valley life.
We skip ahead to that afternoon. Cara facilitates the twin descriptions for us. They call the girls “shapely” which make me deeply uncomfortable considering they are teenagers. Jess is assigned the words “irrational” and “thriving on excitement and change”. Liz is assigned “calm”, “even-tempered”, “fair” and “judicious”.
Seriously? Irrational?
Sigh.
Steven calls. He needs to come home for some “intense” allergy tests because he's been hella congested lately. He's gathered up assignments from his professors to work on at home while he's being scanned, x-rayed, poked and prodded. Cara is super excited he's going to be home for awhile but he warns her that this isn't a vacation. For one thing he feels lousy and for another, he's going to be super busy making up assignments and going to various appointments.
Jess thinks Steven being around so much is a bad thing for his and Cara's relationship. She warns Cara that they might start getting on each other's nerves if they spend more time together. She says that Cara should be more aloof with Steven so he doesn't take her for granted.
Holy fuck, Pascal. We've already done this.
We land in Abbie's head now. I didn't expect this. I thought we'd bounce back and forth between Cara and the twinsies. Anyway, Abbie tells her mom about the competition and her mom encourages her to submit a cartoon. Abbie says she's considering it. If she ends up working for the paper, she'll get to spend more time with Liz and she really wants to be Liz' friend.
Abbie's mom is glad to see her daughter pursuing her own interests because she gave up everything to be with Doug. They only did the things he wanted to do and only spent time with his friends, etc.
Clearly Pascal has run out of new ideas and she's just going to recycle the same story line over and over. I wonder if she'll bring Regina back to life so she can kill her again.
Abbie is finding post-breakup life hard because she doesn't know who she is anymore and she's incredibly lonely. She decides to create a cartoon about a girl in a similar situation. It's not remotely funny. I'm just going to let you guys read it.
~~~Cartoon~~~
Jenny: When I was going out with John, I felt terrible about myself. All I could do was sit around and worry about him. We stopped having fun and I felt like it was all my fault.
Mom: So how do you feel now?
Jenny: Well, everything's different now. John and I have split up and I don't have anyone to blame but myself for anything that happens.
Mom: Well, it's Friday night, Sweetheart. What are you going to do? Are you going to see some friends? Go to a movie?
Jenny: Nah. I think I'll just sit around and worry for awhile about what I did to make things fall apart.
~~End Cartoon~~
Abbie loves it and decides to submit it. She hopes Liz likes it because “Elizabeth Wakefield could do no wrong.”
Now that's hilarious.
Back with the twinsies. Liz tells Jess that Amy submitted a proposal to the competition. It was a mock Miss Manners column that I really wish they'd let us read. I bet it was better than the cartoon.
Wait. What am I saying? Pascal would have written it too which means it would have been just as dumb.
Anyway.....apparently Abbie offered to help Amy refine it or something which Liz tells Jess she finds really weird. You know, because Liz sees helping others as a transactional thing and never really does it unless she's getting something in return? Remember when poor Justin needed help on that English paper and Liz refused to help him unless he talked to Molly because Liz didn't want to take the damage hit to her reputation by talking to Molly herself? Liz is very self-serving and only volunteers help when it benefits her in some way so I'm sure Abbie selflessly offering to help Amy confused the absolute fuck out of her. When Jess agrees that it was weird of Abbie to offer to help her competition, Liz does the fastest U-turn in history and scolds Jess for not being sympathetic and for calling Abbie's behavior weird.
BITCH YOU JUST SAID IT! YOU'RE THE ONE WHO CALLED IT WEIRD IN THE FIRST PLACE!
Then, despite the fact she's the one who brought her up, Liz says she's uncomfortable talking about Abbie behind her back. Girl........you are on my very last nerve right now.
Steven arrives home to much fanfare. I like to imagine he's wearing the stupid suit from the cover. The twins make him hamburgers or something and they invite Cara to celebrate his homecoming.
Dude lives like twenty minutes away or something and is home literally all the time. They just saw him for that documentary party two weeks ago.
As the evening goes on, Cara notices that Steven isn't being as affectionate with her as he usually is. They go outside to talk but Steven starts uncontrollably sneezing and asks to go back inside. Cara hints that she'd rather stay outside because his whole family is in there and they won't have any privacy. She doesn't care if he's sneezing his head off and literally crying from the allergens because it's more “romantic” outside. Seriously, Cara? Do you have a sneeze fetish or something?
Yes, those exist.
No, I won't elaborate.
Cara worries that Steven might already be tired of her. She asks him to go for a walk and then is hurt because he seems so reluctant to prolong his time outdoors. Clearly Cara also has very little empathy. There must be something in the water in Sweet Valley that makes everyone so self-absorbed and selfish. Steven agrees to the walk and Cara asks him if anything is wrong. Yeah, bitch, he's allergic to something outside and you keep insisting he stay out there. Steven says he isn't feeling well, his new allergy medication makes him feel like shit and he's super worried about a history term paper he has to write. Cara blows ALL of that off and cuddles up to him, saying she's really glad he's home and they get to spend some unexpected time together. He reminds her that he's going to be busy with the medical tests and all the school work he still needs to do because he's not on vacation. She's hurt and thinks Jess is right about their relationship declining.
Seriously, maybe these people need to start drinking bottled water or something. Not only is Cara displaying a shocking lack of empathy, she doesn't even seem to have any sympathy for her boyfriend's distress. She only cares about her own feelings.
Can I tell you how much I hate it that I'm being forced to be on Steven's side here?
Also, I just realized we hopped into Cara's head with no page break or anything. Do better, Pascal.
We skip ahead a few days and land at a SVH lunch table. Cara is moping around because her busy, sick boyfriend isn't paying enough attention to her. Everyone is excitedly talking about her party but she just doesn't care anymore because her relationship is doomed. When Abbie approaches, Cara shushes them all because she's still hoping that Abbie will forget about her party.
Abbie is excited because she's one of the finalists for The Oracle competition. Naturally Amy is the other one because Pascal didn't bother to tell us about anyone else entering. Liz tells Abbie that she'll have to submit another entry and then questionable Mr Collins will decide who gets the spot on the paper. Abbie confides in Liz that she's struggling with self-confidence because her ex-boyfriend Doug belittled her cartoons. Apparently his mother was a serious artist and he saw cartoons as a lesser thing. Liz barely acknowledges this and flits away.
Abbie hasn't forgotten Cara's party, by the way. She still thinks she's going to get an invitation so she goes to the mall after school to buy a silver ring to give to Cara as a birthday present.
We just kind of skip ahead to Sunday (the day of the party). Abbie hasn't heard from Cara and realizes she hasn't been invited after all. She feels completely humiliated.
I feel bad for her. I kind of like her so far. I hope she doesn't drink the water.
We're back with Cara and the twinsies. Pascal just hops from one head to another. The venue for Cara's party is beautiful and everyone is suitably impressed. It's pretty much the popular crowd (including Bruce and Amy who aren't together anymore) plus Steven. Just in case you've forgotten, Pascal reviews the book where Regina died. I know you remember so I'm not going to bother. Jess lets us know that Bruce is back to being a fuck boy and she no longer trusts him.
Girl, he tried to SA your sister. You shouldn't even be sharing the same air as him.
Steven is super grumpy and not really paying any attention to Cara. He gets up at one point to go to the bathroom and Cara asks Jess if he's been that way at home. Jess says he hasn't and there isn't anything to indicate that this is deceptive so maybe he's just being a bitch to his girlfriend. Who knows? Cara decides to get up and check on him when he doesn't come back right away and she finds him sitting in a chair near the restrooms reading a letter that's been typed on pink, floral stationery. Cara asks him what he's reading and he shoves it in his pocket and then yells at her for being nosy.
I just got why he's wearing a suit on the cover. It's a scene from the party. I still think he looks like 30-year-old man in middle management and not a college student but whatever.
Cara yells at him for not paying enough attention to her. He yells at her for not being sympathetic enough about his sniffles. She accuses him of ruining her party. It's a fun time. These people should not be together.
It's Monday and we're back with Abbie. She considers giving the silver ring to Liz as a gesture of friendship but ends up giving it to Cara since it was supposed to be her birthday present in the first place.
That was fast. We're back in Cara's head now. She feels like a dick for not inviting Abbie to the party. She kind of wishes she'd invited Abbie instead of Steven.
What the hell, Pascal? Give us a fucking minute to settle would you? We're back with Abbie now. She goes home with Liz after school to get advice on her contest entry. She ends up meeting Steven and they commiserate over allergy tests (Abbie is allergic to cats). He fawns all over her cartoons and then ends up telling her all about his issues with Cara. He says he needs space to get his work done and take care of his health and she's being super clingy. Abbie says Cara is probably just really worried about him and trying to show her concern. Steven dismisses this outright but tells Abbie that she's really easy to talk to.
Sigh.
She's sixteen, Steven. Stop being creepy.
Also, who just starts dumping their relationship problems on a teenager they met six seconds ago?
Now we're in Steven's head. He takes out the letter and tells us that it's a love letter but it isn't signed. Liz comes in and sees him holding it and he yells at her for being nosy. Seriously, didn't we just do this with Cara? Anyway, Liz acts like she recognizes the stationery.
This is a ridiculous amount of head hopping. Now we're with the twinsies. A few days have passed (how the fuck long is it taking Steven to do these tests? I feel like a couple weeks have gone by. Couldn't he have driven back and forth if they're this spaced out?). Abbie has been coming over to the Compound every day and Jess is taking full advantage of the fact that Abbie's love language is doing things for others. Abbie thinks that doing things for other people will make them like her and it's sure working on Jess who has her doing all kinds of chores.
Liz gives Abbie a lecture about doing too much for other people. Abbie says she enjoys helping others but Liz says she's being exploited. She tells Abbie that she's great company and that people will want her around even if she isn't doing things for them.
I mean, you didn't want her around until she started doing things for you. You ignored her completely until she became free poster-making labor for The Oracle.
Since Abbie is spending all her free time at the Compound, she ends up seeing a lot of Steven. He thinks she's a better listener and more understanding that Cara. He tells her all about the mystery letters and confides in her that they were typed on the same stationery that Tricia used to use. Abbie urges him to tell Cara about the letters but he says he can't discuss anything that relates to Tricia with her. She gets all weird about it. He tells Abbie that he wishes Cara was more like her.
Ouch.
Steven's such a douche.
We start hopping between Jess, Liz and Cara again which is highly annoying. Cara is worried that Steven is cheating on her. He isn't being affectionate with her at all and she can tell he's hiding something. Jess tells her to talk to him about it but Cara refuses. Listen, if Steven can't talk to you and you can't talk to Steven, you're not really in a relationship at all, Cara. She says she's just going to act disinterested in Steven so he'll try to win her back. Jess calls her crazy even though I'm pretty sure Jess gave her this exact advice earlier in the book. Lila agrees with Cara though. She says Steven needs to know he can't take her for granted.
Jess and Cara had this exact conversation in another book. What are we doing here, Pascal? This is ridiculous.
Back to Abbie. It's another day I guess. She arrives at the Compound but Liz has been held up at school. Steven invites her in to wait. They talk about Cara again. He says he just can't talk to Cara anymore. Then he makes a move on underage Abbie who has never given him the slightest encouragement to do so. Thankfully Liz comes home and interrupts because none of that felt very consensual to me.
I seriously hope y'all haven't been taking a drink every time we head hop because I don't want to be responsible for any alcohol poisoning.
We're back with the twinsies. Liz tells Jess about the letter she saw Steven with. Jess asks Liz if Abbie could have written it. Jess thinks Abbie is hanging around the Compound so much because she has a crush on Steven but Liz thinks she's just there because she's lonely.
VileAlice makes an appearance to set up what is clearly a plot device because Pascal couldn't figure out a more logical way to accomplish it. She asks the twins to go to the mall to exchange some invitations she picked up for an event. While they are there, Liz notices some stationery that is very similar to the stationery Steven's mystery letter was typed on. She points it out to Jess who goes up to the saleslady and asks if anyone has bought the pink version lately. Somehow the saleslady remembers that a young girl with a sweet voice bought some a couple weeks before. Business must be super slow at this store for her to remember that. Jess asks if the girl had long, dark hair (like Abbie) and the saleslady says maybe but she really doesn't remember. Jess is still convinced that Abbie bought the stationery.
While they're still at the mall, Liz bumps into Betsy who has been gone so long that I forgot she existed. Clearly Pascal did too, but she trotted her out to say one very stupid line. Apparently Steven contacted her and asked her if she knew where Tricia's stationery was. Like........why would she know that? Why would she be keeping track of where her dead sister's stationery ended up? This ridiculous moment is just there so Liz can make the connection between the stationery and Tricia. Liz tells Jess about it and they both agree it's very cruel for someone to use Tricia's stationery to write to Steven.
How would they know, Liz? How would they know it resembled the stationery Tricia used to use? No one is being cruel on purpose (except Pascal). No one could have known.
EvilNed shows up at dinner with six tickets to a Knicks game completely out of the fucking blue. Since Steven is having a hard time with his sniffles, EvilNed says he can give the extra ticket to Cara. Steven balks because he and Cara are going through a rough patch. He asks if he can invite Abbie instead because he's already got his sights on another underage girl. Everyone is a little shocked.
Later Jess tells Lila about Steven offering the ticket to Abbie and Lila naturally tells Cara who is PISSED. Not only is Cara pissed at Steven, but she's pissed at the entire Wakefield family for letting this happen. She's particularly mad at Liz because Liz has been inviting Abbie over so often. To be fair, I'm pretty sure Abbie is just showing up but I'm down with blaming Liz for anything and everything.
We're back with Abbie now. She's at the Compound again and Steven has managed to get her in a room alone. Abbie is super uncomfortable with the way he's acting toward her. She doesn't want to be the other woman and she doesn't want to be used as a rebound. She again encourages Steven to talk to his actual girlfriend. He's a big baby about it. He doesn't want to do any work with the current underage girlfriend because he'd rather just start something new with the next underage girlfriend. It's easier that way.
Steven is so fucking gross.
The mail arrives and there's another mystery letter in it. In another lazy plot contrivance that makes zero sense, Steven hands the letter to Abbie and asks her to hold it for him while he goes upstairs for a minute. Zero reason given. Pascal isn't even trying anymore. Naturally Jess comes home and sees Abbie holding the letter.
We hop into Jess' head just long enough for her to tell Liz about seeing Abbie with the letter. They are both furious. Jess wants to confront Abbie about it in front of Steven so she can't lie. Liz agrees this is the best course of action because she's never thought something through in her entire life.
Strangely we land in Lila's head. She goes to Cara's house to console her. She does this by listing all of his bad qualities.
Can we start with how he exclusively dates Sophomores when he's like twenty?
Lila focuses on how poor and unromantic he is. Cara says she doesn't care about those things.
In a stunning (I mean stupid) revelation, Cara admits that she's the one sending the mystery letters. She says she wanted to inject some mystery into their relationship but.....why would she think that was the way to do it? It makes no sense. Lila doesn't get it either so she just kind of dismisses it and tells Cara that Abbie is a terrible person for stealing Steven away. Cara says that Steven isn't an inanimate object that someone can steal. If he cheated it was because he wanted to cheat.
For those two sentences alone, I will bestow upon Cara my highest blog honor.
But just for those two sentences because I'm still trying to figure out her reasoning for the anonymous letters.
Lila's done with this entire conversation and says either Cara goes to the Compound to talk to Steven of her own volition or Lila will drag her there.
Back to the Compound. Liz stomps into the house and accuses poor Abbie of only befriending her to get into Steven's pants. Jess chimes in and accuses Abbie of writing the letters. Abbie denies both charges but the twins just empty a full magazine of contempt right into her chest. It's brutal. When they stop for a breath, Steven starts yelling at her for writing the letters. Abbie feels so attacked that she gets light-headed. I would too with three irrational people screaming at me for something I didn't do.
Oh. Maybe Jess is irrational. I stand corrected.
Abbie takes a breath and again denies writing the letters and denies being into Steven in any way. She points out that she has repeatedly tried to get Steven to talk to his girlfriend and work things out. Jess doesn't listen. She says the salesperson at the stationery store identified Abbie (she definitely did NOT) and that's all Steven needs to hear to convict Abbie of these crimes. Abbie says she clearly tried to befriend the wrong people.
Abbie leaves. I know it won't last because the entirety of Sweet Valley is contractually obligated to worship the Wakefields, but I'm going to enjoy this fleeting moment.
::::Deep breath::::
And now we're back to the bullshit.
We land with Cara who arrives at the Compound just after Abbie leaves. She sees the offending letter on the table and picks it up, asking if Steven ever figured out she was the one who wrote them. {{{Surprised Pikachu faces all around.}}} Steven tells her about the Tricia connection and she's horrified. She didn't know and never intended to use his dead girlfriend's stationery.
Steven immediately takes this underage girl in his arms and stares deeply into her underage eyes like he wasn't just hitting on another underage girl a few minutes ago. I think we're supposed to find this romantic. Pascal probably expects us to swoon.
Cara admits that she got all clingly because GrossSteven was acting distant. GrossSteven says he was acting distant because she was being demanding and possessive. Those are big words, Cara. Heavy words. Your boyfriend has issues and I really wish you'd acknowledge them. It's not demanding to ask him to pay attention to you at your birthday dinner. It's not possessive to expect him not to talk to other underage girls.
They agree to communicate more. GrossSteven pretends he was never really attracted to Abbie and he just valued her friendship. He so masterfully rewrites history here that I'm surprised he's worried about that history term paper at all. Clearly he's set.
They all gather to discuss what they did to poor Abbie. Jess and Liz worry that she might have been so devastated by their accusations that she'd do something drastic. GrossSteven immediately absolves them of that responsibility by saying that Abbie stood up for herself and she's clearly fine. They stop worrying about being awful people and think they might have even helped her find her confidence again.
These people are pathological.
We land into Abbie's head again. Cara calls to ask if they can talk to her and she agrees. They come to her house. Cara apologizes for the party thing which is probably the last on Abbie's list right now. Liz gives her a hug and asks for forgiveness. Abbie blows that off and says she owes them all a “thank you”.
Oh, fuck off, Pascal.
Abbie says they taught her how important it is to stick up for herself because #theWakefieldscandonowrong. Abbie forgives them even though they don't deserve it. She thinks she's made real friends finally. She hasn't. These people are awful. All of them.
Abby wins the competition and becomes a columnist for the paper. Yippee I guess.
The C-plot gets thrown in on the very last page. Wait. Is it technically the C-plot when there was really no B-plot? I don't think that stupid competition was the B-plot. It barely got any page time. Whatever. The twins' cousin from Arizona is coming to stay with the Wakefields because her mom is getting remarried and she's upset about it. The girls are excited to have cousin Kelly around and hope they can help her accept her new stepfather and stepbrothers.
The end.
Coming Up Next: Cousin Kelly gets a book. I'm sure she'll cease to exist after that.
Man, this one was dumb. I know I say that a lot but what the hell was that whole mystery letter thing? It made zero fucking sense. I really hope this is the last we'll see of GrossSteven for awhile. He really give me the creeps.
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