In a word, sophisticated.

Just a note to say I'm not dead yet, just tired. Work + sick = no time to smoosh various covers together as the final step for world domination. That said, I might as well post this and add the images tomorrow. Yes. Maybe. Well, it's an idea.

Too Good To Be True
August 1984

  Is Suzanne as perfect as she seems?

  A devil in disguise...

The Wakefield twins are wild with excitement. Glamorous, sophisticated Suzanne Devlin is coming to Sweet Valley from New York City. For two weeks, Elizabeth will show her around town while Jessica has the time of her life in New York.
  At first, Suzanne seems to be the most perfect girl in the world. She's beautiful and friendly and not the least bit stuck-up. All the boys of Sweet Valley are absolutely crazy about her. But when Suzanne accuses Mr. Collins of trying to seduce her, Elizabeth knows there's more to Suzanne than meets the eye.


  Suzy Devlin is so obviously the original incarnation of Caitlin that it's no wonder I love/loathe them both so much. That aside, she's a bitch. You can tell it by looking at her, and it just goes to prove that the residents of Sweet Valley are a bunch of idiots. You'd expect it from the guys, but the girls have been proven to be extremely judgmental, harsh, bitter little harpies [teenage girls] and yet this hotter than hot, "sophisticated" overly sweet to the point of inflicting diabetic comas on unsuspecting residents just blows into town and not a single person other than Roger Collins has the balls to say, "Wait, what?" I cry foul.

  With that said, let's rewind. Ned Wakefield is exchanging his daughter for one of his college buddy's daughters, namely Suzanne Devlin. As anyone who has ever even watched a nanosecond of Designing Women knows, Suzanne is the name of the bitch. However, this is prior to that, so the Wakefields simply think they'll be welcoming an old friend's kid into their home, and obviously their friend wouldn't raise a self absorbed, boy crazy, lazy, sneaky, crafty, bitch goddess.... like they did with Jessica. Nope, they expect sunshine and rainbows. However, they can't afford to send both twins to New York City, for what is actually a logical reason. Namely, with Steve in college and the girls a year away, the Wakefields can't just be blowing cash on a two week vacay to NYC for the girls. Now, this will be blown away by all the numerous trips they'll take later on, but I actually smiled at their reasoning.
  Anyway, they finally flip a coin to decide which twin will take NYC by storm. Being contrary by nature, Jessica takes tails. Naturally, this means heads, Liz, wins. Jessica does not deal well with losing, so she sulks and cries and bemoans her fate. Liz, in her infinite wisdom, gives Jessica an in when she worries aloud about missing the class picnic and spending two weeks away from Todd. Jessica "casually" mentions that Lila Fowler has had her eye on Todd for awhile, but it's okay because Todd would never, ever stray, and even if he did, well, it would just be a fling and they don't matter, right? Liz frets, not so much because she believes Jessica's obvious lie, but because she had wanted to spend time with Todd and the rest of her friends, and while NYC is awesome, going alone might not be so much with the awesome. Jessica declares herself the winner and runs off to tell her parents how generous Liz is being, even without Liz having fully caved. Which is okay, as Liz doesn't actually mind giving up the trip to NYC, something she confesses to Jessica as they're at the airport. Had Liz wanted to go, nothing could have stopped her, and this much we'll learn later is true. This is one of those books where you want to smack Liz for falling for Jessica's scheming ways, but you also respect that this was actually Elizabeth's choice, she just let Jessica think she'd done the convincing. Or maybe you just accept that she thinks it was her choice and disillusioning Elizabeth too many times in one book is just painful. I don't know.
  So off Jessica goes to NYC, primed and ready for adventure. Back at home, Liz and the rest of the Wakefields are blown away by how pretty and fantastic Suzanne-call-me-Suzy is. She sounds too good to be true, people comment. Well, duh. She's gorgeous, pretty, fantastic, sophisticated, nice, chore doing, Liz complimenting, golly gee wilikers, makes Liz look bad/lazy in comparison. Of course she's ebil! Sigh. To be fair, we don't find out for sure until page 56, or until she's been there a few days. In that time she acts so happy to be around a real family, so overjoyed at spending time with perfect strangers, although I'd probably love being surrounded by people who were ready to worship me, too, and is exceptionally polite, going so far as to do the dishes and cook for the Wakefields. She's a dream, an absolute dream. Our first inkling that maybe she's not what she seems is when she nearly drowns at the class picnic, despite having proven herself previously to be a fantastic swimmer. She manages to scare Roger Collins away after he saves her, but it's not made clear at that moment whether he just didn't want to be around a soaking wet hot teenage girl, or whether she'd been a little obvious in her "ohgosh, I'm drowning, please save me, young Robert Redford!" theatrics.
  Fear not, she'll make it really obvious in a second. One day Liz cannot find her lavaliere, despite turning her room upside down in her search for it. Suzy reassures her that they'll find it, and pretends to sympathize, but all the while the necklace is in her pocket, and she's petting it, cooing, "Soon, my precious, sooooooooooon."
  Immediately following this little act, she flirts/comes on to Mr. C in his own yard. Delivering a little something from Liz, Suzy requests a drink from the hose and then, gosh oh golly, drenches her t-shirt. Subtle thy name ain't Devlin. Granted, it wasn't meant to be subtle. Mr. C likes his job and his women a little less porntastic, so he sends Suzy on her way. This just makes her more determined. She will bed young Robert, she will.
  Now, we switch to Jessica's exploits in NYC. She does the traditional tourist thing and comes to realize that maybe Suzy's life isn't as charmed as she might have thought. Mrs. Devlin is a stone cold bitch, NYC ain't a cheap place to live, and Mr. D is never around, although he is a charmer. More to the point, Suzy's boyfriend Pete is a god and knows it, too. Thus he's a jerk. If you love watching Jess try and fail, you'll love the various ways she tries to get his attention only to have him know full well what she's up to, but he honestly doesn't seem all that interested. It's an interesting mirror to what Suzy's up to. Jess becomes more desperate and flails about, making a fool of herself at a party thrown for her, where Suzy's best friend Evelyn wishes she were as nifty as Lila back home. Instead Ev and company are so painfully dull that the only thing Jessica can do to keep from nodding off is to drink her wine very, very quickly and get very, very drunk. This does not endear her to the NYC crowd and she's sent home, passed out in the back of a cab.
  That leads to Jess calling Liz, painfully missing her twin and seriously wishing she'd stayed home where she belonged. But being Jessica, she can't tell Liz this, so she tells Liz she's having a fantastic time, taking the city by storm, and gosh, isn't Liz jealous of all the fun times Jess must be having?
  Well, no, no Liz isn't. She's having fun, missing necklace aside. Which means it must be time for something bad to happen! Todd gets last minute tickets to a Laker's game [zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz] and Liz wants to go with, but can't because she's babysitting for Teddy Collins that night. It's too late to find some other teenager [remember, the BSC is all the way in Connecticut, so no worries about Kristy slashing the Fiat's tires in retaliation for encroaching on their territory] and Liz couldn't possibly leave Mr. C in the lurch. Enter Suzy who offers to babysit, because what else was she going to do all night while Liz was away? And this, this is where Lizzie drops the ball. She lets Suzy talk her out of calling Mr. C and checking to see if this is okay. Now, we know that this would so not be okay, but Liz doesn't, but still, she's responsible enough to know how things are done. Still, she runs off with Todd and Suzy hits Mr. C's place. Mr. C is all, "what the fu..er, hell are you doing here, Devilwoman?" and Suzy says she thought Liz called to see if it was okay and gosh, she's sorry, but she's sure she and Teddy will have a good ol' time. Cue Teddy being charmed and Mr. C figures what's the worst that'll happen and leaves. FOOL.
  The second Mr. C is gone, Teddy gets told to shut up and watch TV, Suzy's got better things to do than entertain a brat. Teddy cries and Suzy wanders upstairs to go through Roger's stuff. Nothing smutty to be found at all. Suzy isn't thrilled with the lack of personality this shows, but decides she'll take a long, nice bubble bath and maybe, tee hee, if she's lucky, Mr. C will come back early and find her in the tub and well, join her. He doesn't and when she makes her way back downstairs, she notices Teddy has passed out on the couch and it looks like he's been crying. Well, suck it up, kiddo, because life sucks and then you die, and anyone who says otherwise is not living in the real world.
  Which is to say, Suzy has issues. Her parents have shipped her off to various boarding schools her whole life and it's obvious they don't want her, wah wah wah. She subscribes to the theory that if Suzy ain't happy, then nobody is happy.
  Mr. C comes home to find Suzanne "asleep" on the couch next to Teddy [seriously, Suze, putting the kid to bed would have been a good idea if YOU could tell he was upset. His own father would obviously be able to tell and it wouldn't help your skanking around cause either. Sigh.] but with her shirt buttons undone enough to make it really obvious that Suzy's got a nice rack, y'know, if you were into that sort of thing. After she forces him to grope her [feel how fast my heart is beating!] she tries to get him to drink a little with her, but he reminds her that she's underage. She dismisses this and moves in for the kill. He shoots her down, despite being physically interested, heart racing and all that. Or maybe he's not and it's totally fear that she's going to ruin his life. Either way, he essentially kicks her out of the house and she plots her revenge. It's simple.
  She's going to make the entire town think good old Roger Collins tried to rape her. She tears her own shirt, thinks unhappy thoughts, cries and ruins her makeup, and then slinks up to Elizabeth's room to tell, but only when prodded and promised that Liz will believe her. And Elizabeth does, because why would anyone lie about such a thing? The entire store revolves around that little thought. Why would anyone lie about nearly being raped?
  And anyone who had read the first book in the series prior to this damn near choked. But we'll get to that in a minute.
  Liz and Suzy go to Ned who calls Chrome Dome and Roger Collins probably wakes up the next morning to find his entire life has gone to shit because he DIDN'T take advantage of the strange girl half dressed on his couch. FUN.
  The entire thing makes Liz sick because she cannot reconcile the man she thinks she knows so well with the man Suzy's painted as this horrible, drunken sleaze. Todd shares the same disbelief, but it doesn't tear him up as much because Mr. Collins is just a cool teacher to him, not his mentor/friend/kindly uncle figure. The town is similarly torn. Some of the residents, like quite a few of the parents, believe Suzy, and are thrilled to finally have an actual reason to get rid of Collins. Damn his liberal, artistic, outside the box teaching ways! Damn them! On the other hand, anyone who has actually spent any time with Collins probably thinks this is a horrible rumour blown up to epic proportions.
  While at Cara Walkers, the usual SVH cast is plotting what to buy Lila for her birthday. Lila's gift falls to the wayside as they discuss and take sides on the whole Collins debate. Some people, like Olivia Davidson, don't believe that someone they know that well, someone who has been their morality compass for the entire year [and probably prior to that] is capable of such a thing. They don't come right out and call Suzy a liar, but they do wonder if somehow things got mixed up. Some, like Cara, are quick to say that of course Mr. C tried to get lucky. He's a guy and Suzy's hot. End of story.
  Liz and Todd aren't so sure. On the one hand, Mr. C is awesome. They know he couldn't, wouldn't... could he? On the other hand, what possible reason could Suzy have for lying about this? There's no way she could be confused, so what, did she dream it? She's a sweetheart, how could she possibly be lying?
  The one thing everyone agrees on is that Lila doesn't really need a huge gift, so some of the money they've set aside for her gift will be put into a gift for Suzy. A sort of, "Sorry our favorite teacher assaulted you, no hard feelings, kay?" gift. Uh...huh.
  On this moment of disbelief, we head back to Jessica. She's finally managed to finagle another date with Pete, only he's not falling under her spell. Turns out he didn't even want to ask her out, Suzy's parents asked him to show her a good time. Jess is heartbroken. She gets what she wants and she wants Pete but he ain't biting. What gives? They go back to the Devlins and he goes up to the apartment with her, she assumes it's to say hey to Suzy's parents but they aren't there... and then, we have another moment where Jess and Suzy mirror one another. You see, as Suzy is faking her attack, Jessica's playing with fire. She wants Pete's attention, but he wants a little more than that. He gets more than a little aggressive and Jess freaks out. She wanted an evening of mild making out, and he's pushing for rough sex, right there in the living room. Jess ain't that girl and she tells him no. He points out that no one in their right mind would believe that Jessica didn't want what she was about to get, and Jess flips out. Not because this is so painful to hear over and over [essentially anytime Jess goes after an older boy], but because dude, fuck that, no means no, and somehow there's a bit of a chase that ends when Pete lands on top of Jessica. Before we find out whether Pete is really just teaching her that maybe she should be a little more discriminating when it comes to who she hits on and the sort of signals she sends out, the Devlins come home. This can't be good.
  While Jessica is dealing with the fall out from that little disaster, Liz decides to be a sneaky saint and put Suzy's gift in her suitcase, so that when she's packing, or maybe when she's home, she'll find her little package of sunshine. However, while she's riffling through Suzy's stuff, she finds a familiar gold necklace. How odd, how did her lavaliere end up in Suzy's suitcase unless.... Suzy stole it? Hmm. This blows Elizabeth's mind and she can't think about it for too long before her head begins to hurt almost as much as her heart.
  Of course, she also can't stop thinking about it. On their way to Lila's party out at the Country Club, Todd asks why Liz is so quiet. She tells him about her unexpected find and again tries to reason it out. Todd points out the obvious, that some people are just broken inside. There isn't always a why, and while that's frightening, and painfully annoying to all of us who thrive on the WHY more so than anything else, it is life, and it will happen. He likens it to East of Eden, and just as I think we might get out of this alive, he makes a crack or two about Jessica, to which Elizabeth replies that Jessica would never do anything really bad, like what they're supposing Suzy has done.
  NOW you may do your spit take and say, what the fuck? Jessica did exactly what you're thinking about accusing Suzy of, only she didn't spread it all around town. She couldn't get Todd, so she decided to get back at him by telling the one girl he liked that he'd tried to get a little too friendly with her. Jessica accused Todd of, if not rape, than at least not respecting her boundaries. She LIED to her twin about this and had Elizabeth thought to spread it around like she did with Mr. Collins, well, it would have sucked and Jessica would have been in the same boat as Suzy, except at least Todd and Jessica had kissed before. So yeah, the argument that Jess would never do anything that bad, and gosh, what sort of wicked soul would do such a thing? Hello, your own twin sister, dumb ass!
  So Liz decides that Todd is right. Some people are just rotten and if Suzy could steal and lie about a necklace [of which there are a million explanations] then she could obviously lie about sexual assault. Uh, way to rationalize that. Stealing a necklace =/= lying about being assaulted. Just sayin'...
  Liz confronts Suzy at Lila's party in the coat room. Um, yeah. Suzy tries to play it off, badly, but Liz doesn't fall for it and then mentions Mr. Collins. Suzy freaks out, confesses and acts a royal bitch while she's at it. She threatens Liz, who threatens her right back and then Suzy points out that when she's done with Elizabeth, what she did to Mr. Collins will look like a cake walk. Interesting. I wonder how telling everyone that Liz cracked her head and has been acting crazy compares to getting a man fired, possibly causing him to lose his child [if his crazy, only mentioned in one offs wife got a hold of that info, he could lose Teddy], and ruining his life. We never find out because just as Suzy has managed to convince almost everyone at Lila's party that Liz is back to her own post-coma Jessica-like Liz behavior, Winston crashes into Suzy and spills punch all over her beautiful Halston outfit. Suzy freaks the fuck out and bites Winston's head off. She tries to do damage control, but that much crazy spewing forth makes most people realize that odds are good, Liz isn't so crazy as to be wrong about Suzy lying about Mr. Collins, or at least being seriously mistaken. Suzy is left to cry about her defeat and Liz finds out that Winston intentionally ruined Suzy's dress, in hopes that the bitch would crack and everyone else would realize Elizabeth wasn't crazy, that Mr. Collins wasn't a sleaze, and that the world would return to it's perfect order. If Winston didn't find fat people super freaky, I'd love him. Ah, well.
  The thing I don't get is what happened after this? How did Ned and Alice treat Suzanne after this? Did they kick her ass, report her to her parents, what? I'm so confused.
  Liz opts out of taking Suzy to the airport and picking up Jessica, so Jess comes home, finds Suzy's gift, thinks it's her own and happily swipes it. Turns out that when the Devlins came home, Jessica did the only sensible thing she could think of. She broke down. Pete has since been banned from Casa de Devlin, and alls well that ends well. Again, did the Devlins tell Ned and Alice about their daughter's little problem at the end of her visit, or what? Cuz I know for damn sure my parents would have wanted to know/would have told. But that would mean that Jessica couldn't play it off, thus leading to Elizabeth giggling like a fiend when it seemed that Jessica had stolen Suzanne's boyfriend. Ah, sisters. Fear not, Jess eventually learns of the bitchery that was Suzy Devlin. Just not now.

Trivia, dahling:

• Steven had his birthday, apparently. He's 19 as of now. Funny, I think he goes right back to being 18 next book.


• Liz suggests the coin flip, and Jess likens it to the time Ned won a doll at the Fair and gave it to Jessica [who won the coin toss] and he felt so guilty that he ran out and bought Liz a better one.


• Jessica's dream Manhattan involves an "impossibly chic Manhattan disco" where Mick Jagger wants to dance. Dude, by the 80's he was a little on the rough side, so whoa. Just... whoa, Jessie. WHOA. Anyway, there'd also be the owner of Tiffany's who would gift her with an emerald necklace, content to just bask in the glow of her beauty. Or possibly she'd settle for being discovered as the next Cheryl Tiegs, immediately placed on the cover of Cosmo.


• Steve is likened to Elizabeth in terms of temperament, but dude has anger management issues that rival Jessica's.


• Jess can have NYC, Liz would rather be "mountain climbing in the Sierras" or "rafting down the Colorado River." Screw that, I'll take NYC, and I'm no fan of the city.


• Jess sets off the metal detector at the airport with a massive silver bracelet. Talented.


• Sophomore year, Jessica played the lead in My Fair Lady, and for weeks walked around with a snooty faux British accent.


• Suzy's accent isn't like snooty Jessica's, but instead is just cultured and, our favorite word for Suzy, sophisticated.


• In case you missed it, Tricia Martin is a senior at SVH. She's also starting to blow off plans with Steve. GASP!


• The Wakefields have a lemon tree in their backyard.


• Jessica loots around in Suzy's makeup for her date with Pete. I cry foul. Lookit that cover. What looks good on Suzanne would look ghastly on the twins aside from the basics, kay? Also, if Suzy makes Liz worry about her own perfectly lovely size six figure, would Jess easily slide into a slinky little number from Suzy's closet?


• Jessica's NYC itinerary: Saks, Russian Tea Room, Windows on the World, the Empire State Building, and a horse drawn carriage through Central Park.


• Pete McCafferty has green eyes, chestnut hair, perma-tan, and drives a Ferrari. Needless to say, he's hot in a preppy sort of way.


• The Devlins live on Park Avenue.


• Apparently Jessica, the shopaholic, draws the line at $75 for a scarf. Wonder if she would these days... Inflation and all.


• The Devlins: Mr. D is short, roundish, thinning blond hair, bushy mustache, twinkling gray-blue eyes. Mrs. D is tall, impossibly thin, with cheekbones that could cut glass, and is a total Ice Queen.


• Jessica's first date with Pete is to a Horowitz concert.


• Suzy's while you were out call list: Tom McKay called twice, Aaron Dallas called three times, Bruce Patman only called once, but Winston called twelve times, and had time for a late night serenade.


• Page 56 is when we learn that Suzy is so not what she seems. Or is, if you're judging the book by it's cover.


• Todd's got his second hand Datsun, baby.


• Mr. Collins lives in a sunny yellow frame house. Um, okay.


• Winston wrote "I love you, Suzy" in toilet paper.


• If you're wondering at Winston's love affair with Suzy, Mandy Farmer moved sometime and everyone thinks it's about time the poor guy got over the fact that his girlfriend is gone. Um, okay, sure.


• Evelyn Meeker, despite the horrible last name, is Suzy's best friend, and is dating a 25 year old. She's a tall brunette and fairly bitchy, but in a boring way.


• When babysitting for Teddy Collins, make sure he's in bed by 8:30pm.


• Suzy likes to go through people's personal stuff. One time she found pot in her cousin Ruthie's jewelry box and blackmailed her for ages. Lovely.


• After Suzy's accusations, this is how the group at Cara's divided themselves: Pro Mr. C- Olivia, John Pfeifer, Enid, Ken. Against: Cara, Caroline, Winston. Undecided: Todd and Liz.


• The last time Liz and Jessica dressed up for a night out, Ned wanted a picture of them, so they took one out by the pool. Jessica hammed it up so bad that she ended up falling into the pool.


• Todd always runs 15 minutes late.


• Liz once called the cops, thinking she heard someone breaking into their house, but it was just Jessica coming in through the window after curfew. Oops!


• Lila's birthday party was held at the country club.

Quotes:
  "Somehow a pair of culottes doesn't exactly compare with a trip to New York." -Jessica has a point, Liz. p7
  "Do you always imagine yourself to be the star of a movie?" - Pete to Jessica. Yes. Yes she does.
  She was even mad at her sister. Elizabeth had been so quick to want to switch places with her. She probably knew how it was going to turn out and had only pretended to want to go in the first place in order to make it sound like fun. Jessica has lost her damn mind. Like Liz knew Pete was going to go all date-rape on Jessica. As if. p95

137:
  "Never!" Jessica sobbed. "I'll probably never set foot out of this dumb town for the next hundred and thirty-seven years!" p6
  "Honestly, Liz, I've never been so deliriously happy in my entire life. The Devlins-well, it would take me a hundred and thirty-seven years to describe them." p69




  I waffle on Too Good... I like parts of it, I find other parts insane. The dorky, but lovable, little kid in me loved so much of this book that I can't hate it overall, or even look at it objectively. On the other hand, the knowledge of what they'll do to Suzy in the future just kills me. With a few exceptions, noticeably the serial killers [heyo, Margo/Nora] we're forced to endure the humanization of just about every "villain" in the series. Why? Todd explained that some people are just born bad. Or you've got your Lila Fowlers of the world, those with issues that explain their narcissistic behavior and this somehow endears them to the readers [moi] but no one would ever say she's a nice person. She has her reasons, and you might not agree with them, but they do exist. Similar reasons exist for Suzy to be the way she is, so why change it? Meh.
  I do wonder what would have happened if Jess and Suzy had gone head to head this go round. Would she have been so easily fooled? [Yes.] Would she have bristled at how much everybody just looooooved Suzy? [Yes, again.] Would she have taken her down much harder than Liz and Winston managed to? [Oh for heaven's sake, yes!] It would have been glorious.

In a word, sophisticated.

Just a note to say I'm not dead yet, just tired. Work + sick = no time to smoosh various covers together as the final step for world domination. That said, I might as well post this and add the images tomorrow. Yes. Maybe. Well, it's an idea.

Too Good To Be True
August 1984

  Is Suzanne as perfect as she seems?

  A devil in disguise...

The Wakefield twins are wild with excitement. Glamorous, sophisticated Suzanne Devlin is coming to Sweet Valley from New York City. For two weeks, Elizabeth will show her around town while Jessica has the time of her life in New York.
  At first, Suzanne seems to be the most perfect girl in the world. She's beautiful and friendly and not the least bit stuck-up. All the boys of Sweet Valley are absolutely crazy about her. But when Suzanne accuses Mr. Collins of trying to seduce her, Elizabeth knows there's more to Suzanne than meets the eye.


  Suzy Devlin is so obviously the original incarnation of Caitlin that it's no wonder I love/loathe them both so much. That aside, she's a bitch. You can tell it by looking at her, and it just goes to prove that the residents of Sweet Valley are a bunch of idiots. You'd expect it from the guys, but the girls have been proven to be extremely judgmental, harsh, bitter little harpies [teenage girls] and yet this hotter than hot, "sophisticated" overly sweet to the point of inflicting diabetic comas on unsuspecting residents just blows into town and not a single person other than Roger Collins has the balls to say, "Wait, what?" I cry foul.

  With that said, let's rewind. Ned Wakefield is exchanging his daughter for one of his college buddy's daughters, namely Suzanne Devlin. As anyone who has ever even watched a nanosecond of Designing Women knows, Suzanne is the name of the bitch. However, this is prior to that, so the Wakefields simply think they'll be welcoming an old friend's kid into their home, and obviously their friend wouldn't raise a self absorbed, boy crazy, lazy, sneaky, crafty, bitch goddess.... like they did with Jessica. Nope, they expect sunshine and rainbows. However, they can't afford to send both twins to New York City, for what is actually a logical reason. Namely, with Steve in college and the girls a year away, the Wakefields can't just be blowing cash on a two week vacay to NYC for the girls. Now, this will be blown away by all the numerous trips they'll take later on, but I actually smiled at their reasoning.
  Anyway, they finally flip a coin to decide which twin will take NYC by storm. Being contrary by nature, Jessica takes tails. Naturally, this means heads, Liz, wins. Jessica does not deal well with losing, so she sulks and cries and bemoans her fate. Liz, in her infinite wisdom, gives Jessica an in when she worries aloud about missing the class picnic and spending two weeks away from Todd. Jessica "casually" mentions that Lila Fowler has had her eye on Todd for awhile, but it's okay because Todd would never, ever stray, and even if he did, well, it would just be a fling and they don't matter, right? Liz frets, not so much because she believes Jessica's obvious lie, but because she had wanted to spend time with Todd and the rest of her friends, and while NYC is awesome, going alone might not be so much with the awesome. Jessica declares herself the winner and runs off to tell her parents how generous Liz is being, even without Liz having fully caved. Which is okay, as Liz doesn't actually mind giving up the trip to NYC, something she confesses to Jessica as they're at the airport. Had Liz wanted to go, nothing could have stopped her, and this much we'll learn later is true. This is one of those books where you want to smack Liz for falling for Jessica's scheming ways, but you also respect that this was actually Elizabeth's choice, she just let Jessica think she'd done the convincing. Or maybe you just accept that she thinks it was her choice and disillusioning Elizabeth too many times in one book is just painful. I don't know.
  So off Jessica goes to NYC, primed and ready for adventure. Back at home, Liz and the rest of the Wakefields are blown away by how pretty and fantastic Suzanne-call-me-Suzy is. She sounds too good to be true, people comment. Well, duh. She's gorgeous, pretty, fantastic, sophisticated, nice, chore doing, Liz complimenting, golly gee wilikers, makes Liz look bad/lazy in comparison. Of course she's ebil! Sigh. To be fair, we don't find out for sure until page 56, or until she's been there a few days. In that time she acts so happy to be around a real family, so overjoyed at spending time with perfect strangers, although I'd probably love being surrounded by people who were ready to worship me, too, and is exceptionally polite, going so far as to do the dishes and cook for the Wakefields. She's a dream, an absolute dream. Our first inkling that maybe she's not what she seems is when she nearly drowns at the class picnic, despite having proven herself previously to be a fantastic swimmer. She manages to scare Roger Collins away after he saves her, but it's not made clear at that moment whether he just didn't want to be around a soaking wet hot teenage girl, or whether she'd been a little obvious in her "ohgosh, I'm drowning, please save me, young Robert Redford!" theatrics.
  Fear not, she'll make it really obvious in a second. One day Liz cannot find her lavaliere, despite turning her room upside down in her search for it. Suzy reassures her that they'll find it, and pretends to sympathize, but all the while the necklace is in her pocket, and she's petting it, cooing, "Soon, my precious, sooooooooooon."
  Immediately following this little act, she flirts/comes on to Mr. C in his own yard. Delivering a little something from Liz, Suzy requests a drink from the hose and then, gosh oh golly, drenches her t-shirt. Subtle thy name ain't Devlin. Granted, it wasn't meant to be subtle. Mr. C likes his job and his women a little less porntastic, so he sends Suzy on her way. This just makes her more determined. She will bed young Robert, she will.
  Now, we switch to Jessica's exploits in NYC. She does the traditional tourist thing and comes to realize that maybe Suzy's life isn't as charmed as she might have thought. Mrs. Devlin is a stone cold bitch, NYC ain't a cheap place to live, and Mr. D is never around, although he is a charmer. More to the point, Suzy's boyfriend Pete is a god and knows it, too. Thus he's a jerk. If you love watching Jess try and fail, you'll love the various ways she tries to get his attention only to have him know full well what she's up to, but he honestly doesn't seem all that interested. It's an interesting mirror to what Suzy's up to. Jess becomes more desperate and flails about, making a fool of herself at a party thrown for her, where Suzy's best friend Evelyn wishes she were as nifty as Lila back home. Instead Ev and company are so painfully dull that the only thing Jessica can do to keep from nodding off is to drink her wine very, very quickly and get very, very drunk. This does not endear her to the NYC crowd and she's sent home, passed out in the back of a cab.
  That leads to Jess calling Liz, painfully missing her twin and seriously wishing she'd stayed home where she belonged. But being Jessica, she can't tell Liz this, so she tells Liz she's having a fantastic time, taking the city by storm, and gosh, isn't Liz jealous of all the fun times Jess must be having?
  Well, no, no Liz isn't. She's having fun, missing necklace aside. Which means it must be time for something bad to happen! Todd gets last minute tickets to a Laker's game [zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz] and Liz wants to go with, but can't because she's babysitting for Teddy Collins that night. It's too late to find some other teenager [remember, the BSC is all the way in Connecticut, so no worries about Kristy slashing the Fiat's tires in retaliation for encroaching on their territory] and Liz couldn't possibly leave Mr. C in the lurch. Enter Suzy who offers to babysit, because what else was she going to do all night while Liz was away? And this, this is where Lizzie drops the ball. She lets Suzy talk her out of calling Mr. C and checking to see if this is okay. Now, we know that this would so not be okay, but Liz doesn't, but still, she's responsible enough to know how things are done. Still, she runs off with Todd and Suzy hits Mr. C's place. Mr. C is all, "what the fu..er, hell are you doing here, Devilwoman?" and Suzy says she thought Liz called to see if it was okay and gosh, she's sorry, but she's sure she and Teddy will have a good ol' time. Cue Teddy being charmed and Mr. C figures what's the worst that'll happen and leaves. FOOL.
  The second Mr. C is gone, Teddy gets told to shut up and watch TV, Suzy's got better things to do than entertain a brat. Teddy cries and Suzy wanders upstairs to go through Roger's stuff. Nothing smutty to be found at all. Suzy isn't thrilled with the lack of personality this shows, but decides she'll take a long, nice bubble bath and maybe, tee hee, if she's lucky, Mr. C will come back early and find her in the tub and well, join her. He doesn't and when she makes her way back downstairs, she notices Teddy has passed out on the couch and it looks like he's been crying. Well, suck it up, kiddo, because life sucks and then you die, and anyone who says otherwise is not living in the real world.
  Which is to say, Suzy has issues. Her parents have shipped her off to various boarding schools her whole life and it's obvious they don't want her, wah wah wah. She subscribes to the theory that if Suzy ain't happy, then nobody is happy.
  Mr. C comes home to find Suzanne "asleep" on the couch next to Teddy [seriously, Suze, putting the kid to bed would have been a good idea if YOU could tell he was upset. His own father would obviously be able to tell and it wouldn't help your skanking around cause either. Sigh.] but with her shirt buttons undone enough to make it really obvious that Suzy's got a nice rack, y'know, if you were into that sort of thing. After she forces him to grope her [feel how fast my heart is beating!] she tries to get him to drink a little with her, but he reminds her that she's underage. She dismisses this and moves in for the kill. He shoots her down, despite being physically interested, heart racing and all that. Or maybe he's not and it's totally fear that she's going to ruin his life. Either way, he essentially kicks her out of the house and she plots her revenge. It's simple.
  She's going to make the entire town think good old Roger Collins tried to rape her. She tears her own shirt, thinks unhappy thoughts, cries and ruins her makeup, and then slinks up to Elizabeth's room to tell, but only when prodded and promised that Liz will believe her. And Elizabeth does, because why would anyone lie about such a thing? The entire store revolves around that little thought. Why would anyone lie about nearly being raped?
  And anyone who had read the first book in the series prior to this damn near choked. But we'll get to that in a minute.
  Liz and Suzy go to Ned who calls Chrome Dome and Roger Collins probably wakes up the next morning to find his entire life has gone to shit because he DIDN'T take advantage of the strange girl half dressed on his couch. FUN.
  The entire thing makes Liz sick because she cannot reconcile the man she thinks she knows so well with the man Suzy's painted as this horrible, drunken sleaze. Todd shares the same disbelief, but it doesn't tear him up as much because Mr. Collins is just a cool teacher to him, not his mentor/friend/kindly uncle figure. The town is similarly torn. Some of the residents, like quite a few of the parents, believe Suzy, and are thrilled to finally have an actual reason to get rid of Collins. Damn his liberal, artistic, outside the box teaching ways! Damn them! On the other hand, anyone who has actually spent any time with Collins probably thinks this is a horrible rumour blown up to epic proportions.
  While at Cara Walkers, the usual SVH cast is plotting what to buy Lila for her birthday. Lila's gift falls to the wayside as they discuss and take sides on the whole Collins debate. Some people, like Olivia Davidson, don't believe that someone they know that well, someone who has been their morality compass for the entire year [and probably prior to that] is capable of such a thing. They don't come right out and call Suzy a liar, but they do wonder if somehow things got mixed up. Some, like Cara, are quick to say that of course Mr. C tried to get lucky. He's a guy and Suzy's hot. End of story.
  Liz and Todd aren't so sure. On the one hand, Mr. C is awesome. They know he couldn't, wouldn't... could he? On the other hand, what possible reason could Suzy have for lying about this? There's no way she could be confused, so what, did she dream it? She's a sweetheart, how could she possibly be lying?
  The one thing everyone agrees on is that Lila doesn't really need a huge gift, so some of the money they've set aside for her gift will be put into a gift for Suzy. A sort of, "Sorry our favorite teacher assaulted you, no hard feelings, kay?" gift. Uh...huh.
  On this moment of disbelief, we head back to Jessica. She's finally managed to finagle another date with Pete, only he's not falling under her spell. Turns out he didn't even want to ask her out, Suzy's parents asked him to show her a good time. Jess is heartbroken. She gets what she wants and she wants Pete but he ain't biting. What gives? They go back to the Devlins and he goes up to the apartment with her, she assumes it's to say hey to Suzy's parents but they aren't there... and then, we have another moment where Jess and Suzy mirror one another. You see, as Suzy is faking her attack, Jessica's playing with fire. She wants Pete's attention, but he wants a little more than that. He gets more than a little aggressive and Jess freaks out. She wanted an evening of mild making out, and he's pushing for rough sex, right there in the living room. Jess ain't that girl and she tells him no. He points out that no one in their right mind would believe that Jessica didn't want what she was about to get, and Jess flips out. Not because this is so painful to hear over and over [essentially anytime Jess goes after an older boy], but because dude, fuck that, no means no, and somehow there's a bit of a chase that ends when Pete lands on top of Jessica. Before we find out whether Pete is really just teaching her that maybe she should be a little more discriminating when it comes to who she hits on and the sort of signals she sends out, the Devlins come home. This can't be good.
  While Jessica is dealing with the fall out from that little disaster, Liz decides to be a sneaky saint and put Suzy's gift in her suitcase, so that when she's packing, or maybe when she's home, she'll find her little package of sunshine. However, while she's riffling through Suzy's stuff, she finds a familiar gold necklace. How odd, how did her lavaliere end up in Suzy's suitcase unless.... Suzy stole it? Hmm. This blows Elizabeth's mind and she can't think about it for too long before her head begins to hurt almost as much as her heart.
  Of course, she also can't stop thinking about it. On their way to Lila's party out at the Country Club, Todd asks why Liz is so quiet. She tells him about her unexpected find and again tries to reason it out. Todd points out the obvious, that some people are just broken inside. There isn't always a why, and while that's frightening, and painfully annoying to all of us who thrive on the WHY more so than anything else, it is life, and it will happen. He likens it to East of Eden, and just as I think we might get out of this alive, he makes a crack or two about Jessica, to which Elizabeth replies that Jessica would never do anything really bad, like what they're supposing Suzy has done.
  NOW you may do your spit take and say, what the fuck? Jessica did exactly what you're thinking about accusing Suzy of, only she didn't spread it all around town. She couldn't get Todd, so she decided to get back at him by telling the one girl he liked that he'd tried to get a little too friendly with her. Jessica accused Todd of, if not rape, than at least not respecting her boundaries. She LIED to her twin about this and had Elizabeth thought to spread it around like she did with Mr. Collins, well, it would have sucked and Jessica would have been in the same boat as Suzy, except at least Todd and Jessica had kissed before. So yeah, the argument that Jess would never do anything that bad, and gosh, what sort of wicked soul would do such a thing? Hello, your own twin sister, dumb ass!
  So Liz decides that Todd is right. Some people are just rotten and if Suzy could steal and lie about a necklace [of which there are a million explanations] then she could obviously lie about sexual assault. Uh, way to rationalize that. Stealing a necklace =/= lying about being assaulted. Just sayin'...
  Liz confronts Suzy at Lila's party in the coat room. Um, yeah. Suzy tries to play it off, badly, but Liz doesn't fall for it and then mentions Mr. Collins. Suzy freaks out, confesses and acts a royal bitch while she's at it. She threatens Liz, who threatens her right back and then Suzy points out that when she's done with Elizabeth, what she did to Mr. Collins will look like a cake walk. Interesting. I wonder how telling everyone that Liz cracked her head and has been acting crazy compares to getting a man fired, possibly causing him to lose his child [if his crazy, only mentioned in one offs wife got a hold of that info, he could lose Teddy], and ruining his life. We never find out because just as Suzy has managed to convince almost everyone at Lila's party that Liz is back to her own post-coma Jessica-like Liz behavior, Winston crashes into Suzy and spills punch all over her beautiful Halston outfit. Suzy freaks the fuck out and bites Winston's head off. She tries to do damage control, but that much crazy spewing forth makes most people realize that odds are good, Liz isn't so crazy as to be wrong about Suzy lying about Mr. Collins, or at least being seriously mistaken. Suzy is left to cry about her defeat and Liz finds out that Winston intentionally ruined Suzy's dress, in hopes that the bitch would crack and everyone else would realize Elizabeth wasn't crazy, that Mr. Collins wasn't a sleaze, and that the world would return to it's perfect order. If Winston didn't find fat people super freaky, I'd love him. Ah, well.
  The thing I don't get is what happened after this? How did Ned and Alice treat Suzanne after this? Did they kick her ass, report her to her parents, what? I'm so confused.
  Liz opts out of taking Suzy to the airport and picking up Jessica, so Jess comes home, finds Suzy's gift, thinks it's her own and happily swipes it. Turns out that when the Devlins came home, Jessica did the only sensible thing she could think of. She broke down. Pete has since been banned from Casa de Devlin, and alls well that ends well. Again, did the Devlins tell Ned and Alice about their daughter's little problem at the end of her visit, or what? Cuz I know for damn sure my parents would have wanted to know/would have told. But that would mean that Jessica couldn't play it off, thus leading to Elizabeth giggling like a fiend when it seemed that Jessica had stolen Suzanne's boyfriend. Ah, sisters. Fear not, Jess eventually learns of the bitchery that was Suzy Devlin. Just not now.

Trivia, dahling:

• Steven had his birthday, apparently. He's 19 as of now. Funny, I think he goes right back to being 18 next book.


• Liz suggests the coin flip, and Jess likens it to the time Ned won a doll at the Fair and gave it to Jessica [who won the coin toss] and he felt so guilty that he ran out and bought Liz a better one.


• Jessica's dream Manhattan involves an "impossibly chic Manhattan disco" where Mick Jagger wants to dance. Dude, by the 80's he was a little on the rough side, so whoa. Just... whoa, Jessie. WHOA. Anyway, there'd also be the owner of Tiffany's who would gift her with an emerald necklace, content to just bask in the glow of her beauty. Or possibly she'd settle for being discovered as the next Cheryl Tiegs, immediately placed on the cover of Cosmo.


• Steve is likened to Elizabeth in terms of temperament, but dude has anger management issues that rival Jessica's.


• Jess can have NYC, Liz would rather be "mountain climbing in the Sierras" or "rafting down the Colorado River." Screw that, I'll take NYC, and I'm no fan of the city.


• Jess sets off the metal detector at the airport with a massive silver bracelet. Talented.


• Sophomore year, Jessica played the lead in My Fair Lady, and for weeks walked around with a snooty faux British accent.


• Suzy's accent isn't like snooty Jessica's, but instead is just cultured and, our favorite word for Suzy, sophisticated.


• In case you missed it, Tricia Martin is a senior at SVH. She's also starting to blow off plans with Steve. GASP!


• The Wakefields have a lemon tree in their backyard.


• Jessica loots around in Suzy's makeup for her date with Pete. I cry foul. Lookit that cover. What looks good on Suzanne would look ghastly on the twins aside from the basics, kay? Also, if Suzy makes Liz worry about her own perfectly lovely size six figure, would Jess easily slide into a slinky little number from Suzy's closet?


• Jessica's NYC itinerary: Saks, Russian Tea Room, Windows on the World, the Empire State Building, and a horse drawn carriage through Central Park.


• Pete McCafferty has green eyes, chestnut hair, perma-tan, and drives a Ferrari. Needless to say, he's hot in a preppy sort of way.


• The Devlins live on Park Avenue.


• Apparently Jessica, the shopaholic, draws the line at $75 for a scarf. Wonder if she would these days... Inflation and all.


• The Devlins: Mr. D is short, roundish, thinning blond hair, bushy mustache, twinkling gray-blue eyes. Mrs. D is tall, impossibly thin, with cheekbones that could cut glass, and is a total Ice Queen.


• Jessica's first date with Pete is to a Horowitz concert.


• Suzy's while you were out call list: Tom McKay called twice, Aaron Dallas called three times, Bruce Patman only called once, but Winston called twelve times, and had time for a late night serenade.


• Page 56 is when we learn that Suzy is so not what she seems. Or is, if you're judging the book by it's cover.


• Todd's got his second hand Datsun, baby.


• Mr. Collins lives in a sunny yellow frame house. Um, okay.


• Winston wrote "I love you, Suzy" in toilet paper.


• If you're wondering at Winston's love affair with Suzy, Mandy Farmer moved sometime and everyone thinks it's about time the poor guy got over the fact that his girlfriend is gone. Um, okay, sure.


• Evelyn Meeker, despite the horrible last name, is Suzy's best friend, and is dating a 25 year old. She's a tall brunette and fairly bitchy, but in a boring way.


• When babysitting for Teddy Collins, make sure he's in bed by 8:30pm.


• Suzy likes to go through people's personal stuff. One time she found pot in her cousin Ruthie's jewelry box and blackmailed her for ages. Lovely.


• After Suzy's accusations, this is how the group at Cara's divided themselves: Pro Mr. C- Olivia, John Pfeifer, Enid, Ken. Against: Cara, Caroline, Winston. Undecided: Todd and Liz.


• The last time Liz and Jessica dressed up for a night out, Ned wanted a picture of them, so they took one out by the pool. Jessica hammed it up so bad that she ended up falling into the pool.


• Todd always runs 15 minutes late.


• Liz once called the cops, thinking she heard someone breaking into their house, but it was just Jessica coming in through the window after curfew. Oops!


• Lila's birthday party was held at the country club.

Quotes:
  "Somehow a pair of culottes doesn't exactly compare with a trip to New York." -Jessica has a point, Liz. p7
  "Do you always imagine yourself to be the star of a movie?" - Pete to Jessica. Yes. Yes she does.
  She was even mad at her sister. Elizabeth had been so quick to want to switch places with her. She probably knew how it was going to turn out and had only pretended to want to go in the first place in order to make it sound like fun. Jessica has lost her damn mind. Like Liz knew Pete was going to go all date-rape on Jessica. As if. p95

137:
  "Never!" Jessica sobbed. "I'll probably never set foot out of this dumb town for the next hundred and thirty-seven years!" p6
  "Honestly, Liz, I've never been so deliriously happy in my entire life. The Devlins-well, it would take me a hundred and thirty-seven years to describe them." p69




  I waffle on Too Good... I like parts of it, I find other parts insane. The dorky, but lovable, little kid in me loved so much of this book that I can't hate it overall, or even look at it objectively. On the other hand, the knowledge of what they'll do to Suzy in the future just kills me. With a few exceptions, noticeably the serial killers [heyo, Margo/Nora] we're forced to endure the humanization of just about every "villain" in the series. Why? Todd explained that some people are just born bad. Or you've got your Lila Fowlers of the world, those with issues that explain their narcissistic behavior and this somehow endears them to the readers [moi] but no one would ever say she's a nice person. She has her reasons, and you might not agree with them, but they do exist. Similar reasons exist for Suzy to be the way she is, so why change it? Meh.
  I do wonder what would have happened if Jess and Suzy had gone head to head this go round. Would she have been so easily fooled? [Yes.] Would she have bristled at how much everybody just looooooved Suzy? [Yes, again.] Would she have taken her down much harder than Liz and Winston managed to? [Oh for heaven's sake, yes!] It would have been glorious.