I Cried When I Found Out the Creator of Sweet Valley High, Francine Pascal, Died

Sweet Valley was my escape during a difficult childhood—and its inhabitants will be part of me forever.

I remember sitting in the front seat of the car on the way to first grade, legs sticking out, too short to bend, let alone touch the floor, holding my backpack in my lap. Inside was the first Sweet Valley Kids book I had ever read, ready to return since it was library day. “I wish I had an identical twin,” I said to my mom, thinking wistfully about Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield, the stars of Sweet Valley. “She’d be my best friend.”

My mom half-smiled, concentrating on the turn she needed to make to get into the drop-off lane. “Honey, you were an identical twin.” That’s how I found out I’d been a twin (later, I learned about Vanishing Twin Syndrome), just as I’d been introduced to what would become a nearly two-decade obsession: Francine Pascal’s Sweet Valley books.

I grew up in North Dakota, before the internet. Sure, we had electricity and running water, but we were isolated. The latest national trends made their way to us about a year later. We didn’t have a 5-7-9, Gap, or The Limited: a late-80s, early-90s kid’s version of hell. 

A lot was going on at home, too. One of my parents had recently been diagnosed with a chronic autoimmune disease that was only beginning to be studied, while the other was dealing with struggles of their own. I had a severe stutter right up until I started elementary school, and I’d been bullied so much that my sense of self-esteem, even at that young age, was shot. When you try to interact with other kids and get made fun of, you stop trying, and retreat into yourself. 

Sweet Valley was my escape. The world Pascal created was always there for me, a refuge I turned to when things weren’t so great at home (and even when they were). It’s what led me to continue to be a voracious reader through the years. Some of my core memories revolve around reading: picking out Surprise! Surprise! that day in the school library; my dad yelling, “I’m going to the bookstore, anyone want to come?” The first question I’d always ask was “Can I get a book, too?” One of the many things I appreciate about my parents is that when it came to books, they never said no.

There was always a new Sweet Valley book to read, and let me tell you—I read them all. Sweet Valley Kids, Sweet Valley Twins, The Unicorn Club, Sweet Valley High, and as the years went by, Sweet Valley University. I consumed as much Sweet Valley as I could, and it didn’t stop at the books. The board game? Wore it out. The TV show? Obsessed. The TV show theme song and soundtrack? Couldn’t get enough of that CD. The dolls? They were some of my most prized possessions. I kept many marketers employed in my youth. (Now that I’m writing this, I need to see if I can stream the TV show somewhere. I may need to rewatch it for nostalgia’s sake.) 

During the few short days it took me to burn through the latest set of books from each series, I was a part of Sweet Valley. I saw pieces of myself in each of the characters, deeply identifying with them and desperately wishing I could be them.

I wanted to be a journalist like buttoned-up Elizabeth, with the magnetic appeal of Jessica’s carefree personality. I wanted the brains of nerdy class clown Winston Egbert, a boyfriend who displayed Todd Wilkins-level devotion, and Lila’s Fowler’s trust fund at my disposal (let’s be real, we knew that witch would never have to work). And oh, how I longed to be part of anything resembling the Unicorn Club. I also vowed never to date anyone like that stuck-up playboy Bruce Patman. (Like most of us, I did anyway, but let’s just pretend that never happened.)

My Sweet Valley obsession continued through college. I kept the books hidden away in a purple trunk at the end of my dorm room bed, especially the Sweet Valley Kids and Sweet Valley Twins series—I couldn’t be caught dead reading those. Eventually, though, my fun reads were replaced with lengthy textbook chapters, study guides, homework, and marathon library sessions spent memorizing notes for quizzes and tests. Every so often, I’d see one of the new books in the bookstore and pick it up, but life came at me fast. Bit by bit, my love for Sweet Valley faded into the background.

I read my last Sweet Valley book, Sweet Valley Confidential, on an airplane in 2011, when I moved to New York City. (I still have strong feelings about Jessica marrying Todd; my jaw dropped when that whole situation played out.) The books stuck with me, though. When I got into watching “Gossip Girl,” I remember thinking, “Caroline Pearce came first.” And though it makes me laugh to think about it now, I definitely threw out both Jessica and Elizabeth as options when my husband and I were coming up with potential names for our daughter.

Much like Maria Slater’s childhood movie-star career, my youth is long gone. I’m an elder millennial (don’t get me started on the term “geriatric millennial”) mom to a 3-year-old now—but when I heard about Pascal’s passing this week, it hit me hard. I sat there for a moment, somewhat shocked, even though I shouldn’t have been. She was 92. I feel silly even sharing this, but I cried. I cried over a woman I never met, but who created a fantasy world that I knew so well, and loved for so much of my life.

A few years ago, when I saw some Sweet Valley nostalgia merchandise at an 80s-90s pop-up shop in NYC, it got me thinking: What would I say to Pascal if I ran into her on the street?

I never did get to meet her and have my fangirl moment, but I know what I would have said if I had. I would have thanked her. I would have thanked her for inspiring so many of us to read, and for creating an entire universe of diverse characters and storylines we could lose ourselves in. I would tell her what a profound impact she had on my childhood, on the formative years of my life, and how I still carry aspects of her books along with me. I always will. I would tell her that a generation of women still look back on the world of Sweet Valley with such happiness. Thank you for everything, Francine.

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