Francine Paula Pascal was an American author best known for her Sweet Valley series of young adult novels. Sweet Valley High, the backbone of the collection, was made into a television series, which led to several spin-offs, including The Unicorn Club and Sweet Valley University. Although most of these books were published in the 1980s and 1990s, they remained so popular that several titles were re-released decades later.
The rumours are true - Mrs Otis is retiring! Very suddenly too. Mr Crane - ‘the animal guy’ / the roving science teacher, helps them to put together a party for her. He also leaves a ready to hatch chicken egg in an incubator with the twins for the weekend. Lots of random things happen that don’t really contribute to the plot - the kids start a mean petition about a teacher they don’t want to take their class and she finds it, the egg hatches, the kids make banners and paint their names on a vase for a gift (then Lila buys a crystal vase as well), then the class bunny goes missing, Winston brings in his car dressed as a bunny for the party, the mean teacher finds the bunny, the cat destroys the vases and the kids make a photo frame with personal trinkets for the class photo. Oh and Mr Crane will be their new teacher. My rating - 2/10 - I can see why the series only lasted 6 more books after this. I much prefer the other two formats.