Time elapsed in this book: 2 weeks
Length of their junior year: 2 years, 6 months, 3 weeks
Jessica’s love interest: Seth Miller
Entertainment rating: 8/10
At this point in the Sweet Valley High series, they’d apparently decided that having Super Editions wasn’t enough. It was time to bring out Super Thrillers! I never loved the Super Thrillers as a kid. I think I always associated them with being scary, even though they’re not. They’re like Nancy Drew-lite, and I loved Nancy Drew as a kid. I should have loved these too! I read them, of course, but I didn’t reread them the way I reread the regular books in the series. Rereading it as an adult, I’m wondering if perhaps I didn’t love these as much because they don’t really feature a lot of the main characters from the regular series and weren’t as soapy in their drama.
The cover: how 80’s is this cover design?!? I love the magnifying glass. I do not love Liz’s shirt. Seriously, what is that bow?! That high-necked jacket?! I don’t think Liz got the memo she’s supposed to look like a teenagers in the 80’s. She looks like a kid playing dress-up as what she thinks an adult looks like.
The title: there is no actual instance of double jeopardy in this book. Did Ned Wakefield, in all his lawyerly wisdom, pick the title?
It’s summer in Sweet Valley again. Not the summer in which the twins went on a bike trip and Liz was dating Todd, not the summer in which the twins worked as “mothers helpers” in Malibu and a single Liz fell in love with a rock star in disguise, but a completely different summer in which Liz is dating Jeffrey and the twins have internships at the Sweet Valley News. It makes sense that Liz got an internship there, since she works at the Oracle and wants to be a writer. It makes NO sense that Jess landed an internship there. This decision is explained as their parents wanting Jess to follow Liz’s example for the summer, but it doesn’t explain why the Sweet Valley News accepted her as an intern.
Jess was unsure about the internship at first but is now excited about it because of a young journalist there named Seth Miller. He’s “only” 22 (still way too old for a 16 year old to date…), a total hottie, and writes mystery novels that are published under the pen name Lester Ames. Jess knows all this because she found his resume in their boss’s file drawer.
Steven comes home for the summer and brings one of his college friends, Adam Maitland, to stay with them. Steven has a summer job in Mr. Wakefield’s law office, which seems about right for Sweet Valley (all quality law firms hire 18 year olds, right?), and Adam has an internship at a criminal law firm that’s in the same building as the Sweet Valley News office. Jess decides that since Jeffrey is in San Francisco as a camp counselor for the summer, she should set Liz up with Adam so 1) Liz doesn’t keep wasting her time with a long-distance boyfriend, and 2) Liz doesn’t accidentally fall in love with Seth. I love this kind of logic!
Adam tells the Wakefields he’s from South Dakota and that he has a girlfriend, Laurie, who lives about an hour away. She’s an orphan who was raised by servants of her billionaire grandfather, who has threatened to cut her off if she keeps dating Adam! Her grandfather wants Laurie to marry the unstable son of one of his business partners. Adam and Laurie are trying to keep their relationship secret because of this. This feels like the start of a 50’s soap opera, not a realistic situation in 1987 (when this book was published), but I somehow did not clock this as weird when I was a kid. Anyway, Jess is disappointed to hear Adam has a girlfriend but decides she’ll have to nip that in the bud so she can set him up with Liz.
At work, Jess tries to cozy up to Seth by telling him that the restaurant fire he just wrote an article about might have been arson. Seth gets excited by this tip and hurries over to the restaurant with Jess in tow. The restaurant manager tells Seth that some towels near the stove caught fire and that it was definitely not arson. Seth is annoyed with Jess for giving him bad information. He should be annoyed at himself for believing it without evidence.
At home, Liz talks to Jeffrey on the phone and then retreats to her room, where she finds a typed letter from Adam professing his love for her. Liz feels uncomfortable and vows to not say anything to Adam because she doesn’t want to encourage him.
The next day, Jess apologizes to Seth again about the bad info she passed along about the restaurant fire. She offers to make it up to him by telling him everything she knows about a bank robbery that happened a few weeks ago. What she actually knows: nothing. What she tells him: her neighbor, Mr. Bennett, is the guilty party and the police have suspected him of embezzlement for years. We’re told that Jess “was so entranced by her own story that she almost forgot it was completely untrue.” Jess is absolutely unhinged in this book and I LOVE it.
Seth is impressed by Jessica’s story and writes it up as news despite having zero evidence to back up any of these claims. Clearly Seth is both a moron and a terrible journalist. He turns the story in. The editor, Lawrence Robb, reads it, then calls them both into his office. He says not a single fact stood up when he tried to check it out. What a surprise! Seth can’t believe he took Jessica’s word for any of this (I can’t believe it either!) and says he should have checked his own facts like he learned in journalism school. I have a hard time believing this guy went to journalism school, but okay. Mr. Robb says he’ll give Seth another chance as a reporter but sends Jess to do data entry for a woman named Sondra.
Jess ends up working until 10pm that night, trying to get everything entered in the database. I hope she’s getting overtime pay at this internship, although it’s never actually clarified whether it’s a paid internship or not. She heads to the parking lot to leave. Adam’s car is there too, so she knows he’s working late as well. Across the parking lot, she sees someone taking something out of the trunk of a white Trans Am with an S-shaped scratch on it. It looks like a pile of blankets…. but then a limp arm falls out of it! There’s a body in there! The guy carrying the body looks up and meets Jessica’s eyes. She jumps into her Fiat and zooms home!
The rest of the Wakefield family went to a late movie, so no one’s home. Jess is understandably freaked out and can’t get in touch with any of her friends, so she calls Seth. He doesn’t believe her at first, still salty about the bad article he wrote, but he can tell she’s really upset so he eventually comes over. Jess says they should go to the police, but Seth suggests they go back to the parking lot first to see if the guy is still there. At the parking lot, they talk to the guard, who says he’s been there all night and didn’t see anything. Jess says there was no one at the guard’s booth when she left, and the guard admits he briefly left to make a phone call. Jess tells Seth that they need to call the police. Instead, he drives her home and then takes off since her family is back.
Jess tells her family about what she saw. Liz doesn’t believe her at first and says that Jess has been a bit “excitable” recently, trying to find mysteries everywhere to impress Seth. Steven says he’s tired and that they should call the police in the morning. The phone rings. It’s Adam, calling from jail. He’s been arrested! He found Laurie’s body in the trunk of his car that night and called police immediately. The police then found a rope in his glove compartment, which they assume was the murder weapon, and immediately arrested Adam.
Jessica and Mr. Wakefield go to the police station and she gives a statement about what she saw. Sergeant Wilson says a grand jury will indict Adam in the morning and that they’ll keep him in custody until a trial is scheduled. Sergeant Wilson informs them that Adam and Laurie were secretly engaged! They had been dating for six months and got engaged a month ago. Talk about quick! What is it with teenagers in this series getting engaged? Laurie was supposed to inherit a bunch of money on her 18th birthday, which was in two weeks. Apparently Adam knew all about this trust fund and had been pushing for a secret marriage. The police suspect that Laurie wanted to delay the wedding and that’s why Adam killed her, since he’d recently run up some debts of his own (he bought a used car, clothing, and textbooks thanks to a loan from his aunt… all of which sounds reasonable to me). How nice of the police to share all this info with the Wakefields. Also, Laurie was only 17?!? And both Adam and her own grandfather thought this was a good age for her to get married?!? WTF is wrong with these people?!?? Sergeant Wilson says in his 25 years working in Sweet Valley, they’ve never had a murder. Considering this is the first of multiple Super Thrillers, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say they’re about to make up for lost time….
The next day, Liz thinks about the typed letter she got from Adam saying that he might need to do something drastic if he couldn’t be with Liz. She decides to give it to the police, who don’t bother verifying its authenticity and take it as more proof that Adam is guilty.
Meanwhile, Jess and Steven go visit Adam. He is upset and says he doesn’t care about anything now that Laurie’s dead. Jess and Steven want to help him and ask if there’s anyone who might have hated Adam enough to set him up for this. Adam says maybe Tom Winslow, the guy Laurie’s grandfather wanted her to marry.
Mr. Wakefield tells the twins not to drive the Fiat again until the real killer has been caught, since the killer saw Jess in it and might recognize her again if she’s in the car.
An article comes out in the Sweet Valley News that mentions that Adam wrote a love letter to someone other than Laurie. The article also says that a trial is scheduled to start in two weeks. TWO WEEKS?!? What kind of fast-paced, half-assed legal system is this?!? When does a murder trial ever happen this fast?? I assume that as a kid, I read this and just nodded along because it seemed legit. I guess this is the kind of legal system in which lawyers like Mr. Wakefield thrive, one in which there is no space for reality.
Jess can’t believe the article and decides to go to the police to confess that she wrote the letter from “Adam.” Sergeant Wilson says Jessica’s confession isn’t going to convince the District Attorney, who’s under a lot of pressure from Laurie’s grandfather and will likely just claim that Jess is lying to protect Adam.
Jess tells Seth that she wrote the letter and that she could use his help to find that white Trans Am and the real killer. Seth agrees, thinking he’ll get a good story out of this. They go to the jail to talk to Adam, who tells them about Tom Winslow, the guy Laurie’s grandfather wanted her to marry. Jess is convinced that’s who they’re looking for.
That evening, Jess takes the Fiat out to meet up with friends at the Dairi Burger, but on her way there… she spots the white Trans Am is behind her! Jess is terrified and drives to the police station, hoping he’ll follow. Instead, he drives off, and Jess doesn’t know if he noticed her or not. When she gets home, however, her parents are pissed that she took the Fiat and ground her for a week, although they agree that she can attend a party at the Sweet Valley News the next night so long as she stays with Liz the entire time.
On Saturday, before they leave for the party, Jess gets a call from Sergeant Wilson, who wants her to come down to the station for a few more questions. Jess worries that he’s going to mention the letter that she wrote to Liz, so she doesn’t want Liz to accompany her there. Jess tells Liz that a squad car’s going to pick her up and will give her a ride to the party after she’s done at the station, so Liz should take Steven’s car and that Jess will meet her there.
At the station, Sergeant Wilson shows Jess a composite sketch done from her description of the blond guy she saw in the parking lot. Then he pulls out a photo of Tom Winslow from an envelope and asks Jess to take a look. She confirms that the man in the photo is the killer! I don’t know why they bothered with the composite sketch if they had a photo of Tom. Then again, this is the Sweet Valley police.
At home, Liz can’t get Steven’s car to start. She calls for a taxi, but the company says it’ll be a forty-five minute wait. Liz can’t wait that long to go to the party and doesn’t want to walk to the bus stop alone, so she decides to take the Fiat.
Jess gets dropped off to the party and she spots the white Trans Am in the parking lot. She goes into the party and finds Seth, who’s talking to a blond guy. It’s Tom Winslow! Tom’s father apparently went to college with the sports editor, which is why he’s at this party. Honestly, I’m still not sure why he’s at this party, as this explanation leaves a lot to be desired… I certainly never went to a company party just because my dad’s college roommate worked there…
Jess tells Seth that Tom is the killer. Seth doesn’t believe it at first, but Jess finally convinces him. Seth the genius tells Jess to keep talking to Tom and make sure he stays at the party while Seth calls the police. Why doesn’t Jessica call the police while Seth talks to Tom?!? I’m way smarter than Seth is, but I think that’s probably obvious. Tom comes over and starts talking to Jess, saying she looks familiar and trying to figure out where he’s seen her before. Jess is terrified he’ll figure it out!
Liz pulls into the parking lot as Tom is leaving, having given up on figuring out why Jess looks familiar. Liz realizes that the car he’s driving is a white Trans Am with an S-shaped scratch. She can’t believe she’s driving the Fiat since she knows he’ll recognize her! Sure enough, Tom blocks her car and tells her to get out. When she doesn’t, he picks up a lead pipe from the garage floor (apparently the garage is part of Clue: The Sweet Valley Edition game) and starts banging the Fiat with it. A guard notices the racket and comes over to stop Tom, but he tackles the security guard and knocks him out! Liz gets out of the car, scared, and Tom violently pushes her into the car, hitting her head and knocking Liz out!
Jess comes into the garage just in time to see Tom knock out Liz. She picks up a rusted tire iron from the garage floor (again, we need Clue: The Sweet Valley Edition. Also, this garage could use a serious cleaning if they have all these weapons lying around!) and runs over to hit Tom with it. Tom is knocked down but still conscious. Jess turns her attention to Liz, who’s regaining consciousness. She tells Liz they need to run, but they only make it to the guard booth when they hear Tom’s voice behind them. He’s picked up the lead pipe again and threatens to bash their heads in if they take another step. Jess tells Liz to continue to the door, which is only ten feet away. Jess pushes Liz toward it and then lunges at Tom, trying to wrestle the lead pipe away from him! She pins one of his arms but he manages to free it and tells her he thinks it’s time he shuts her up for good.
Liz stumbles into the stairwell and pulls the fire alarm, which immediately starts ringing. Seth leads a group of security guards toward the alarm. They find the unconscious guard on the ground and find Tom lifting the lead pipe over Jessica’s head. They’ve caught him! They’ve caught Laurie’s real killer!
Sergeant Wilson takes everyone’s statements and tells the twins that Adam will be a free man again, thanks to them. Lawrence Robb tells Jess that she can collaborate with Seth on an article about the murder. Jess tells Seth that she’s going to let the editor know he didn’t believe Jessica’s eyewitness account about the murderer unless he writes his next mystery novel about her. He agrees, and Jess is thrilled. She gets to star in a novel and she gets to work closely with Seth on an article! When the article comes out, however, only Seth’s name is listed in the byline. Jess is a bit salty, and Liz says she understands why Mr. Robb didn’t want to include Jessica’s name, since she’s just an intern. Sounds to me like Liz is jealous!