Sweet Valley High Obsession

When I was in grade six at Mount Nelson Primary School in 1986 (see the pattern? It was always so easy to remember what year it was/what grade I was in. Lucky me. I really feel for all those people who wander around school in a daze not knowing cause the numbers are different) I had what one might call a minor SVH obsession. My friend Lisa Donahoe (shout out if you're googling yourself) who lived across the road from the school owned all of them. Zoe and I would borrow three each at a time, take them home, read them with the energy of the fanatic IN ONE NIGHT and then swap the next day. I still sneakily read them right up until my early twenties, I think I've even read them since Martin and I got together (cough *research* cough), because the first SVH Senior year wasn't published till 1999 and I know I've read a few of those (Jessica Wakefield gets called a slut. I KNOW!)

Anyway, I stumbled across the Best. Site. Ever. last night and I had to come and share it with my lovely Cake readers because I KNOW some of you are closet Jessizabeth fans. Warning this site contains totally addictive and hilarious recaps of the SVH series. I never knew there were so many of them - Junior High, Middle School, Sweet Valley Kids (is that primary school??), as well as of course Sweet Valley High (which was the first), Sweet Valley Seniors, Sweet Valley University and then some series called Elizabeth which is apparently about her going to England and being a servant or something to some rich Duke dude - oh you funny Americans with your weird arse anglophilia. Then there are the specials and the thrillers...what a franchise. The community has a few different contributors, all of them funny, all of them sharing the same passion for the pure, unadulterated, beautiful crappiness of the series.

But wait, there's more. Apparently Francine Pascal, creator of the series (who lives in France, hated high school and never went to her own prom), is creating a new series - oh yes oh yes - called Sweet Valley Heights Confidential about the SVH clan living in a gated community in their late 20s/early 30s - omigod. How do I sign on to be a ghostwriter for that? Who do I send my resume to? I'd do it just for art's sake, you don't even have to pay me. She's been waving this tantalising idea around for a few years (since about 2005, when it was called Sweet Valley Heights) and the most recent mention I found online was from April '08, which sported the name change to Confidential. No sign of it on Amazon yet. Which is weird because the idea is so HOT I would have thought the books would practically write themselves.