I have written previously about the importance of Sweet Dreams romances and the Sweet Valley High series in my reading history (here, here, here). I make no secret of my devotion to these books, and somewhere along the way, Grab the Lapels recommended Paperback Crush by Gabrielle Moss to me.

This book is a place of understanding. A place where you can sit down, get comfortable, and talk about…that time Jessica Wakefield accidentally joined a cult while she was at the mall. Here you’re among friends.

I didn’t doubt I was among friends, but Moss confirmed it with this –

I could lose myself in the neon-tinted pop culture of my youth, with all its pointless catfights and ice-blue prom dresses*. I may have learned to read from educator-approved picture books about poky puppies and purple crayons, but I learned to become a reader from Sweet Valley High. In 1989, I begged my parents to buy me #32, The New Jessica, because I thought the girls on the cover had pretty hair. Little did I know that I’d be injecting the adventures of those pretty-haired Wakefield twins directly into my veins for the next four years.

And I was the same (but in 1985). I knew when the next installment was due, and would tear down to Angus & Robertson in Camberwell as soon as school finished to buy it. My obsession lasted at least two years.

In Paperback Crush, Moss examines the emergence of YA fiction, with particular focus on the ‘golden years’- the eighties and nineties, when series such as Sweet Valley High and The Baby-Sitters Club really took off (fun fact – Sweet Valley High was the first YA series to land on the New York Times best-seller list).

She covers various genres – although YA fiction at the time predominantly focused on friendships, romance, school and sleepovers, these typical teen experiences could be given a twist, such as some mystery-solving or a touch of horror. Moss also does a deep-dive into the obvious lack of diversity, noting that the stories were centered on ‘…white rich thin heterosexual women with naturally straight hair…‘. She discusses examples of books that did include diversity (mainly cultural and sexual) but those examples, while significant for the time, were few and far between.

Paperback Crush is thoroughly researched and informative but I read it for its nostalgic power, and it did not disappoint. Apart from a detailed examination of Sweet Dreams and Sweet Valley High, Moss also referred to some of my other favourites – the Couples series and the Caitlin trilogy.

Where there are teens, there are love stories. teenagers and romantic love go together like a drunk person and a six-day-old slice of pizza: it’s a pairing destined to lead only to pain, but you try to keep them apart.

So what did these stories, with their predictable plots and formulaic covers, provide me as a 13yo? Firstly, they examined the pitfalls of relationships as much as the highlights – like dating the cutest boy in the school and then discovering that he’s actually as dull as ditch water. Or hammering home the message that your ‘first love’ generally comes with your first heartbreak.

Sure, first love has its moments, and those pics of you and your prom date standing in your driveway remain totally adorable. But overall, first love tends to yield ten dramatic personal ultimatums delivered in a Wendy’s parking lot for every one unforgettable evening spent looking at the stars. It’s a bad deal.

There was also a really strong chicks-before-dicks theme, and the fact that the stories reflected the political and social climate of the time. Moss gets into the nitty-gritty of second-wave feminism but there’s one bit that was really important to most Gen Xers like me – AIDS. Just as we were all thinking about sex, the grim reaper ads appeared. Sure was a buzz-kill. Moss noted that for Gen Xers,  ‘…experimenting with sex wasn’t just a rite of passage; it was a risky situation in which not knowing enough could get you killed….’.  Sweet Dreams dialed back the expectation and the climax (sorry) was a kiss. So while I knew ‘it’ didn’t end there, it was also enough.

I had a think about what I progressed to after Sweet Dreams and SVH. Go Ask Alice did the rounds (Moss describes the 1971 hit as ‘…a book about a wholesome, nerdy teen who tries drugs by accident at a party and becomes so debauched so quickly that she’s basically selling heroin to members of Led Zeppelin by the next weekend’) but we basically moved on to Judith Krantz, Jackie Collins and Jilly Cooper. So much for the story ending with a kiss!

A couple of criticisms – Paperback Crush ended abruptly. Strangely abruptly. No conclusion, no summary. I wanted more of Moss’s pithy observations. Secondly, large sections were devoted to books that I never read, and whilst the social and historical relevance of these books was interesting, the details were not as relevant to me as say, Caitlin’s wardrobe of blazers. But all in all, a completely delightful walk down memory lane.

*note: my Year 12 formal dress in 1990 was ice blue. I’ll try to dig out a pic.

3.5/5

(“And we slept late the next morning. When we finally got up, Stephanie’s parents had blueberry-banana pancakes waiting for us”). For those of us who were roused early on weekend mornings for chores or church, or just didn’t have any friends to sit around eating blueberry-banana pancakes with, Sleepover Friends was the tween equivalent of reading about Gwyneth Paltrow’s Paris apartment in Architectural Digest.

As part of the 20 Books of Summer reading challenge, I’m comparing the Belfast summer and Melburnian winter. The results for the day I finished this book (August 12): Belfast 14°-20° and Melbourne 10°-15°.