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Chargement... Sweet Valley Confidential: Ten Years Laterpar Francine Pascal
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Inscrivez-vous à LibraryThing pour découvrir si vous aimerez ce livre Actuellement, il n'y a pas de discussions au sujet de ce livre. Ahhh, the Sweet Valley High books. I read them religiously as a preteen/teenager. Now we follow the Wakefield twins into adulthood and their distinctly different lives. I think this series started me on my fondness for twins. Sure, the stories and characters were idealized and a little fanciful. But that's what makes good fiction. Best of all, the characters had identifiable flaws. Personality-wise I identified more with Elizabeth (except the flawless beauty of course) than with her twin Jessica. But I was engrossed by their many adventures and day to day lives. The books were a nice escape. ETA: Well, it's strange to see how the truth is masked by nostalgia. I think my fondness for the series was tempered by the fact I was a teenager and teenagers tend to not have the greatest taste in literature (the Twilight series being a prime example). Basically, what I'm saying is the SVH series was the literary equivalent of Beverly Hills 90210. Your basic cheesy High School drama series. In any case, in this particular book, we revisit the pretty, perfect California Wakefield twins ten years after they graduate High School. Elizabeth has moved away from Sweet valley, California and is a struggling writer in New York (is there any other kind?) writing for a small Off-Broadway review blog and living in a tiny apartment. Her once close relationship with her identical twin Jessica has been seemingly irreparably damaged after it was revealed that Jessica had been involved in a secret relationship with Elizabeth's fiance, the staid, stalwart Todd Wilkins. This is the very same Todd Wilkins that Elizabeth has had a relationship with throughout almost the entire series and also with-whom she's had the warm fuzzies for since KINDERGARTEN. We find out later in a flashback (and there are a LOT of flashbacks in this book), that Jessica and Todd had sex once during their senior year of college five years prior. Granted they had secret meetings with one another over a period of one month in an out of the way diner. So Liz leaves the two in a fury and flees to New York, stewing in her hate and disgust. Meanwhile, Jessica and Todd have moved in together and are planning to wed. Jessica is feeling tremendous amounts of guilt, not only for her betrayal eight months before the start of the story (which led to Liz moving to New York), but also for the initial affair five years previous. The story is told mostly in the third person, but when we get to a particular plot point, the perspective shifts to the first person narrative and it can be a little confusing as to who's talking at first since it's used for several different characters throughout the book. Also, we find out that the twins' older brother Steven is gay (which came out of the blue. I think because in order to be relevant to the times, there needed to be at least one gay character). I don't know if Ms. Pascal wrote this book herself or had one of her ghostwriters do it. But the style seems uneven from the previous series. Jessica's vocabulary is very off in that she uses 'teenage' slang frequently when she never did in the book. It seems especially odd since she's now in her late twenties. Also, is no one physically flawed in this book. Everyone has perfect hair, perfect breasts (well, the women do) and perfect teeth. They all have interesting jobs and impeccable fashion sense. There's also swearing in this book when there never was in the original series. It seems very out of place. I guess it's to show this is a more 'mature' story. That and the sex (which is always fabulous, btw). In the end, after a major fiasco at the twins' grandmother's 80th birthday party, they eventually make up when Liz realizes she fell out of love with Todd a long time ago but due to her committed personality, she never thought of leaving. Then, Liz hooks up with Bruce Patman (rich, gorgeous and a former jerkass), and they have awesome sex and they go to the wedding and things are fine. I know this series is far from realistic, but I may be a little cynical anymore. I just hoped to have a little more depth to it is all.
How excited was I when I first learned of this book coming out? OVERJOYED!! The original Sweet Valley series (Sweet Valley Twins) was the very first series that I ever read. I truly believe that this series started my love of reading... the desire to get more information, read further. These two were my friends while I was moving all over the place through my tweens. After reading a number of reviews from like-minded individuals; others who were excited to read the 'where are they now' novel, I was so worried about it. Let's just say, they weren't overly kind. However, I was pleasantly surprised and actually found myself enjoying the book. Now, it wasn't perfect. Seeing Elizabeth, the perfect, do-no-wrong sister, in a completely different setting/light - in the fight of her life with her sister, Jessica; having moved across the country; and dealing with a break-up with her long-time boyfriend, Todd - I felt a little violated. Elizabeth doesn't swear; Elizabeth doesn't hate; Elizabeth doesn't drink, sleep around or even think of it. That's just not the 'down-home' girl that I grew up admiring. It was so strange. Jessica, yes; Elizabeth, NO WAY! But, that's who she was now and as I got into the heart of the matter, it made sense. The back and forth between current and past (high school/college) was great. Having not read all of the Sweet Valley High books, it was nice to have the reminder of what was going on 'back in the day'. In fact, my favourite part of the book was the recap at the end... finding out where all the characters, that I knew and loved, were and how they were fairing in the current world. One change that I would make, the pictures on the inside front & back of the book. Really, these two use Twitter and Facebook... nope, can't see it. Some updated pics would have gone a loooooong way for me. But, then again, these are the girls as we remember them. Overall, the book was worth the read. Would I recommend it to anyone... no, but if you were a Sweet Valley fan, you'll want to read it. Appartient à la sérieDistinctions
After she betrays her identical twin, Jessica Wakefield longs for forgiveness, but Elizabeth moves from Sweet Valley, California, to New York City and searches for the perfect revenge. Aucune description trouvée dans une bibliothèque |
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Google Books — Chargement... GenresClassification décimale de Melvil (CDD)813.6Literature English (North America) American fiction 21st CenturyClassification de la Bibliothèque du CongrèsÉvaluationMoyenne:
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I can honestly say that I was very disappointed overall. Elizabeth was no longer the nice, nurturing, forgiving person that I remembered her to be. Jessica was still the "bad" twin, for lack of a better term. And omg, her use of 'so' and 'like' was so like, really freaking annoying. I can understand the use of those terms in high school or even college flashbacks, but at 27 she was still using them in like, every sentence.
I don't remember their brother or Todd or Bruce, so I can't say anything about any kind of character development or if they seemed the same as they were as kids.
I knew what the ultimate betrayal was even before opening the book, so that wasn't technically a surprise. But the fact that it happened was a surprise because Todd had loved Elizabeth since grade school, it had always been her (it literally says this in the book). Then one night of being forced to spend time with Jessica made him completely forget about his love for Liz and fall madly for Jess? I'm not buying that. And wtf is with everyone sleeping with everyone else? So many people are cheating on each other or divorced or Something and just, why can't any of their friends be happily married?
It all comes together in the end, but getting there was hard. There were SO MANY flashbacks and changes in point of view that it got tiring and hard to read.
All in all, I would say skip this book entirely and just go back and re-read the original series. Don't let this book ruin your great memories of SVH. ( )