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Sweet Valley High Super Thrillers #9
"R" for Revenge
The new faculty advisor for the cheerleading squad seems harmless, until the cheerleaders begin disappearing.
Library Binding
First published January 1, 1997
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213 people want to read
About the author
Max Lucado
1,201 books5,424 followersWith more than 150 million products in print and several NYT bestsellers, Max Lucado is America's bestselling inspirational author. He serves the Oak Hills Church in San Antonio, Texas, where he lives with his wife, Denalyn, and their mischievous mutt, Andy. His most recent book published in August 2024 and is titled What Happens Next.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
April 27, 2022
When a new rule goes into place, the Sweet Valley High cheerleading squad is forced to choose a faculty advisor, and co-captains Jessica Wakefield and Heather Mallone are determined to find one who won’t interfere too much. When Elizabeth suggests Nancy Swanson, the timid library assistant, they decide she’s the perfect choice. Nancy is quiet and awkward, but she attends every game and knows a lot about cheerleading and, best of all, she won’t try to be in charge. Meanwhile, Elizabeth is helping out on some research for a magazine article on the past cheerleaders of Sweet Valley High. What she finds is far more tragic and deadly than she could have imagined, and history has a way of repeating itself. Trigger warnings: death, car accidents, drowning, abduction, captivity, guns, illness, bullying, ableism, infidelity.
I always loved Sweet Valley as a kid, and I should have realized that a special fondness for the horror/thriller editions was eventually going to turn into a love for both genres. I have a high bar for both though, so I wouldn’t call this terribly thrilling. A good portion of it is given over to Jessica’s pursuit of Brad, an especially sleazy love interest who flirts with everyone, including her twin sister. (There are so many reasons Elizabeth was always my favorite Wakefield twin.) He killed a lot of the book for me.
Aside from that, it’s a fun plot with plenty of twists. It’s creepy when the cheerleaders start disappearing one by one, although there’s not much mystery involved. It’s clear early on that Nancy is behind it and also that she needs a therapist, not a basement full of dead cheerleaders, but the 90s were a different time for mental health representation (and it’s still always not top notch, let’s be real). Almost thirty years later, I’m not sure this book would be published, since making the villain of the story a traumatized and disabled victim of bullying is pretty gross. The ending gets a little silly, but it’s entertaining overall, if not one of my favorites in the series.
I review regularly at brightbeautifulthings.tumblr.com.
I always loved Sweet Valley as a kid, and I should have realized that a special fondness for the horror/thriller editions was eventually going to turn into a love for both genres. I have a high bar for both though, so I wouldn’t call this terribly thrilling. A good portion of it is given over to Jessica’s pursuit of Brad, an especially sleazy love interest who flirts with everyone, including her twin sister. (There are so many reasons Elizabeth was always my favorite Wakefield twin.) He killed a lot of the book for me.
Aside from that, it’s a fun plot with plenty of twists. It’s creepy when the cheerleaders start disappearing one by one, although there’s not much mystery involved. It’s clear early on that Nancy is behind it and also that she needs a therapist, not a basement full of dead cheerleaders, but the 90s were a different time for mental health representation (and it’s still always not top notch, let’s be real). Almost thirty years later, I’m not sure this book would be published, since making the villain of the story a traumatized and disabled victim of bullying is pretty gross. The ending gets a little silly, but it’s entertaining overall, if not one of my favorites in the series.
I review regularly at brightbeautifulthings.tumblr.com.
October 23, 2016
This was my first Sweet Valley book ♡
I found it lying on the floor of my classroom on the last day of school & I picked up the unappreciated treasure & claimed it.
Best thing I had done that whole year.
I found it lying on the floor of my classroom on the last day of school & I picked up the unappreciated treasure & claimed it.
Best thing I had done that whole year.
February 27, 2022
This is terrible to admit: I never read any Sweet Valley books as a growing lass! I was all about teen terror, not teen drama. I had no idea that the Sweet Valley series had thriller editions. I started out collecting all the Sweet Valley University thrillers, then started collecting the normal Sweet Valley University books. I had to limit myself to what I was buying/collecting, and drew the line at Sweet Valley High (too many of them). But then I saw they had a superthriller involving cheerleaders!
There's no way I'm not getting my hands on a YA thriller featuring cheerleaders!
"Bad" twin Jessica Wakefield is constantly at loggerheads with co-captain Heather Mallone, and the situation isn't helped when they both land eyes on hunky photographer Brad Cotton, who is with his boss, Diane, to do a story on "the girls of 76", the Sweet Valley cheerleading squad who won the national championships. Meanwhile, "good" twin Elizabeth is selected to help Brad and Diane in their research and finding out where they are and what they're up to for the where-are-they-now story.
Jessica and Heather throw themselves at Brad. He also hits on Elizabeth, but she can see him for what he really is. Elizabeth then convinces Jessica to take on mousy library assistant Nancy Swanson as the cheerleading squad's faculty adviser, something all school clubs have recently been mandated to do. Jessica thinks this is perfect, because Nancy's shy personality means she won't get in their way or tell them what to do.
I'm probably not spoiling anything to say that Nancy is a couple of pom-poms short of a rally, but the book does quite a long time to reveal her dark side, as well as getting to the "cheerleaders start disappearing one by one" part mentioned on the book's back blurb. However, I was never bored. There's some silly teen soap to enjoy along the way, and some of the dialogue even borders on snappy and clever.
My familiarity with Sweet Valley, despite not having read any of the books (except for "Don't Answer the Phone" from the university thrillers), means that I know Jessica is the "bad" twin, obsessed with boys and screwing over those around her to get what she wants. But I liked her here. I liked the fact she was unabashed in her pursuit of Brad, solely for a no-strings-attached fling. I liked how she was never shamed for this, just told to be careful.
The thriller aspect is pretty mild. Don't go into this expecting any sort of mayhem. But the whole thing reminded me very strongly of all the cheerleading-based made-for-Lifetime-TV movies that have come out recently. And that's not a bad thing! This wasn't great writing. It wasn't meant to be. But it certainly was fun, something that has unfortunately been missing from too much of what I've read this year.
There's no way I'm not getting my hands on a YA thriller featuring cheerleaders!
"Bad" twin Jessica Wakefield is constantly at loggerheads with co-captain Heather Mallone, and the situation isn't helped when they both land eyes on hunky photographer Brad Cotton, who is with his boss, Diane, to do a story on "the girls of 76", the Sweet Valley cheerleading squad who won the national championships. Meanwhile, "good" twin Elizabeth is selected to help Brad and Diane in their research and finding out where they are and what they're up to for the where-are-they-now story.
Jessica and Heather throw themselves at Brad. He also hits on Elizabeth, but she can see him for what he really is. Elizabeth then convinces Jessica to take on mousy library assistant Nancy Swanson as the cheerleading squad's faculty adviser, something all school clubs have recently been mandated to do. Jessica thinks this is perfect, because Nancy's shy personality means she won't get in their way or tell them what to do.
I'm probably not spoiling anything to say that Nancy is a couple of pom-poms short of a rally, but the book does quite a long time to reveal her dark side, as well as getting to the "cheerleaders start disappearing one by one" part mentioned on the book's back blurb. However, I was never bored. There's some silly teen soap to enjoy along the way, and some of the dialogue even borders on snappy and clever.
My familiarity with Sweet Valley, despite not having read any of the books (except for "Don't Answer the Phone" from the university thrillers), means that I know Jessica is the "bad" twin, obsessed with boys and screwing over those around her to get what she wants. But I liked her here. I liked the fact she was unabashed in her pursuit of Brad, solely for a no-strings-attached fling. I liked how she was never shamed for this, just told to be careful.
The thriller aspect is pretty mild. Don't go into this expecting any sort of mayhem. But the whole thing reminded me very strongly of all the cheerleading-based made-for-Lifetime-TV movies that have come out recently. And that's not a bad thing! This wasn't great writing. It wasn't meant to be. But it certainly was fun, something that has unfortunately been missing from too much of what I've read this year.
May 29, 2016
Jessica and the other cheerleaders get temporarily kidnapped by a crazy teaching assistant. JUST what I needed to start my SV reading career.
May 6, 2025
I read this back in grade school when I inhaled any book with writing in it and the story has stuck with me for going on 25 years so I figured I’d reread it.
As an adult and not a child the writing was obviously very juvenile but it’s meant for a younger audience so it didn’t bother me much. My biggest problem was the 20 year old photographer hitting on and making out with multiple different highschoolers throughout the entire book.
Overall the story would make a KILLER episode of Criminal Minds or SVU and it was dark enough that I probably shouldn’t have been reading it in the 3rd grade.
As an adult and not a child the writing was obviously very juvenile but it’s meant for a younger audience so it didn’t bother me much. My biggest problem was the 20 year old photographer hitting on and making out with multiple different highschoolers throughout the entire book.
Overall the story would make a KILLER episode of Criminal Minds or SVU and it was dark enough that I probably shouldn’t have been reading it in the 3rd grade.
August 13, 2019
Liked it
May 17, 2015
Who doesn't love the Sweet Valley series. I love re reading these books and going back to my childhood. Even though I am in my early 30's now I do not believe I'll ever be too old for them. Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield are two unbelievable characters that will withstand all of time. In this book Jessica manages to land herself in quite a bit of hot water again (big shocker) and Elizabeth saves the day. You expect that to happen with these books so it does not disappoint in that area. Hopefully I'll be able to read every book about this series at some point.
April 29, 2012
One of my most favorite SVH story!
Read
May 5, 2010F PAS svh
July 9, 2013
I have read so many of these books I can't remember all of them.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews