Francine Pascal obituary: Sweet Valley High author who built a fantasy world of idealised Americana for teenage girls (2024)

Born May 13th, 1932

Died July 28th, 2024

Blonde cheerleaders with aquamarine eyes, cherry lips and California tans. White sand beaches and rolling hills. Varsity letters and teenage drama.

Francine Pascal, who has died at age 92, built this world of idealised Americana into a juggernaut literary empire that defined the childhoods of a generation of girls in the 1980s and 1990s.

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A former journalist and soap opera scriptwriter, Pascal did not publish her first novel until well into her forties. At 51 she struck gold with Sweet Valley High. Writing young adult fiction was an “accident”, she said, after she struggled to sell a soap opera about teenagers to television networks. Instead she wrote it up in book form, honing soap opera devices into addictive novels about the interior worlds of teenage girls. Each one would end on a cliffhanger to bring the reader back for the sequel.

“She had this steadfast vision,” says Amy Berkower, Pascal’s long-time agent who bought into her idea in the early 1980s, quickly selling the first 12 books to publisher Bantam.

Pascal was born and raised in New York city, where she spent most of her life. She wrote for the high school newspaper and then studied journalism at New York University, afterwards writing for women’s magazines such as Cosmopolitan.

[Sweet Valley High author Francine Pascal dies aged 92Opens in new window]

She had three daughters with her first husband, Jerome Offenberg, whom she married in 1958 and divorced in 1963. The following year, she married John Pascal, also a journalist. The couple found jobs as writers on an ABC soap opera, The Young Marrieds. In 1977 Pascal published her first novel, Hangin’ Out With Cici.

A few years later Pascal’s husband died of cancer. In 1983, now the single mother of three teenage girls, she published the first of the Sweet Valley High books. They took off up the charts and, in 1985, Sweet Valley’s Perfect Summer became the first young adult book to make the New York Times paperback bestseller list.

Sweet Valley centred on two identical twins, Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield, in a fictional Los Angeles suburb. The twins share “spectacular, all-American good looks” but while Jessica is sneaky and flirtatious, Elizabeth is the studious good girl. The pair represented Jekyll and Hyde, the good and bad sides of an emerging individual.

Each Sweet Valley High cover featured dreamy pastel illustrations of the blonde teens, stamped with tabloid-worthy headlines. “What Jessica wants, Jessica gets – even if someone gets hurt!” reads the cover of Secrets, the second book in the series.

“There was nothing like this at the time. There were romance books, but this was different ... These books were girl-driven,” Pascal told The New York Times in 2011. “I felt that I was putting life in the hands of girls ... These girls ran the ship. They ran the action.”

Pascal’s Sweet Valley universe is rooted in fantasy – including her own. She had not been to Los Angeles before writing about it. She created, by her estimate, 35 books focused on the high school prom, but never attended one herself. The focus on California teenagers was a formula that would be repeated in pop culture in the ensuing decades with hits such as the TV series Gossip Girl and the film Clueless.

For years when I was selling 100 million and more, the New York Times pretended I didn’t exist

Pascal churned out books on nearly a monthly basis, relying on a team of ghostwriters who were commanded to adhere to her “bible”, a detailed guide to the characters and world of Sweet Valley. Friends describe her as disciplined, tough and fun. Each day, she sat down at her typewriter at 10am, and wrote exactly four pages.

There are hundreds of books, including spin-offs, spin-offs of spin-offs – more than 200 million copies have been sold – a TV show, dolls and board games. And while the books are now relics of another era, the brand lives on – perhaps through nostalgia among women of a certain age. As recently as 2020, a film was in the works with Paramount.

Sweet Valley High has at times been derided as the equivalent of literary junk food. “For years when I was selling 100 million and more, the New York Times pretended I didn’t exist,” Pascal told The Guardian in 2012.

It wasn’t until later in life that she began to appreciate the significance of the franchise, which she told the Chicago Tribune in 1991 brought a love of reading to a generation of girls who “hadn’t even picked up a book [before] ... Everybody likes to think they are making a difference in this world. When I get a letter from a child saying that Sweet Valley has made her enjoy reading, I know I’ve done something important. And that is truly a wonderful feeling.”

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2024

Francine Pascal obituary: Sweet Valley High author who built a fantasy world of idealised Americana for teenage girls (2024)

FAQs

How many books are in the Sweet Valley High series? ›

The books chronicle the lives of identical twins Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield, who live in the fictional Sweet Valley, California, a suburb near Los Angeles. The twins and their friends attend Sweet Valley High. The series began in 1983, and concluded twenty years later after the publication of 181 books.

Did Francine Pascal write all the Sweet Valley books? ›

Pascal wrote the first 12 books herself and then worked with other writers for the others, creating outlines and a go-to bible. “People who weren't able to stay within the lines weren't right for it,” she said.

What age is appropriate for Sweet Valley High books? ›

Very 80s LoL Not a lot of cursing, there is some iffy stuff though…. Boy girl relationships meant for kids ages 11 & up…. Overall I give it 3 or 4 stars.

Will there be a Sweet Valley High movie? ›

Diablo Cody has revealed that a movie adaptation of Sweet Valley High is still in the works.

What happens at the end of Sweet Valley High? ›

After they work things out, Elizabeth and Todd get back together and are a couple again. At the end of the series she was torn between old flame Todd and sexy bad-boy Devon Whitelaw, who turned out to be a liar and a coward. She broke up again with Todd in the last book of the Sweet Valley High series, Aftershock.

What is the plot of Sweet Valley High? ›

Storyline. The series revolves around the lives of Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield, beautiful blonde twins who live in the fictitious Sweet Valley, California, and their gang of friends. Elizabeth is warm, friendly and sincere, while her twin sister Jessica is flirty, mischievous, and irresponsible.

Are Sweet Valley High books still being made? ›

It has been written by Francine Pascal, along with several ghostwriters. Sweet Valley High books began in 1983 and ended 20 years later. There are over 152 books in the Sweet Valley High series.

How many books are in the Sweet Evil series? ›

There are 4 books in this series.

How many books are in the Creek Canyon series? ›

There are 3 books in this series.

How many Sweet Valley University books are there? ›

Sweet Valley University Series in Order (63 Books)

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