“These will create a wonderland effect”………BSC # 121: Abby in Wonderland

Memory Reaction

I’m sure I wouldn’t have a memory even if I did read it as a kid.  I started reading it last night, but had to start over this morning because I couldn’t even remember what I read.  I should add that I was completely exhausted and had just taken melatonin when I read it. But the book’s also ridiculously boring.

Revisited Reaction

Abby and her mother/sister are going to stay with her grandparents (Gram and Grandpa) at their house in the Hamptons.  Apparently it’s an annual thing.  While there, they help the grandparents plan their big anniversary party, which is also an annual thing.  The parties always have themes and this year it’s Alice in Wonderland.    I didn’t really catch why.  Maybe because “Abby in Wonderland” sounded like a cute title?

Anyway, Abby notices that her grandmother’s upset that some people in the family aren’t going to be able to make it to the party.  Abby also notices that Gram seems to be acting a little different than usual (mostly just resting more), and she overhears a conversation where Gram sounded upset.  Then while looking for the menu for the party, Abby accidently sees a brochure about dealing with breast cancer.  So, Abby assumes Gram is sick and worries about what will happen, but doesn’t want to say anything.  She wants to help, so she calls all the people who couldn’t come to the party to say how much it would mean to Gram if they came (and so they all do).  At the party Abby ends up crying during her grandmother’s speech thanking everyone and runs inside.  Gram follows her and when Abby admits what she found, Gram tells her they found a lump but she’s waiting for tests to find out if it’s cancerous.   And that’s the freaking end, we never find out if she actually has cancer.  I think they were going for the message of our family will handle whatever comes up, but it’s still annoying to leave it up in the air.  And I think this is the last Abby book, so I doubt it gets addressed again.

Meanwhile the Pikes cancel their vacation to Sea City because Mr. Pike’s car broke down and they need to spend the money fixing it.  So, the BSC helps them have a beachy stay-cation type thing, where they set up wading pools in the yard and play in a sandbox, and other similar stuff.  It causes about 3 chapters of hijinx, and everyone’s happy at the end.  

High/Lowlights

• Abby mentions how she likes sleeping in, but I could swear there’s another Abby book where she says she’s an early riser.

• Claudia outfit:  “She had on orange leggings and a long yellow tunic on which she’d sewn wild zigzag patterns of tiny beads.  Her dangle earrings were also handmade, from a combination of clay beads and the same sparkly beads she used on her tunic.  Her shows were a deep aqua.  She looked like a human sunset.”  Anything that starts with “orange leggings” can’t end well. 

• When I read the Europe Super Special, I thought that this book must be before it, because it seemed like that book referenced things in a book I hadn’t read.  But this actually takes place right after the trip to Europe.

• I’m surprised the Pikes could get a full refund for that house they always rent. 

• Abby says her grandfather recently had heart surgery.   I guess that happened in the one Abby book I have left to read, but I could be wrong about that. I’m sure I’ll find out soon though.

• Abby’s grandmother hasn’t spoken to her sister in years.  This family sure has its share of drama, doesn’t it?  Her mother and sister hadn’t spoken in years either.

• Speaking of Abby’s aunt, she and her baby show up at the beach house as well.

• Who has a costume party for their anniversary?  A theme costume party no less.  For Alice in Wonderland.  No wonder some people didn’t want to go.

• One day, a friend of Anna’s from Long Island comes to visit.  I like hearing about Anna having friends and not just being dragged into BSC events.  Her friend’s apparently some super-smart music genius because she could tell the music book Anna was using had a mistake in the score/notes/whatever you call it. It was really random.

•  I feel like this plot would have worked better for another character.  I like Abby well enough, but I certainly don’t care about her family drama or her grandmother who’s barely mentioned before.  If it was Kristy’s grandmother who might have cancer, I’d be more invested.

• Abby’s mom says the grandmother was mad at the sister because she revealed a secret.  But later Abby’s aunt tells Abby, the “secret” was that the aunt told Gram (in front of other people) how Weight Watchers must be going well, when Gram didn’t want people to know she following it.  Yes, totally worth not speaking for years.

• Gram is making a family tree for the party and Abby tells her about computer software for building family trees online.  But the computer isn’t at their beach house so they have to start it by hand. But Gram and Grandpa are very excited about buying “fancy equipment” like a scanner to put the thing together.   Because there’s not much that’s fancier than a scanner.

• We also hear about an outfit of some friend of Gram’s: “She was wearing a red-and-orange tie-dyed outfit with flowing sleeves.” I can’t tell if Abby’s complimenting it or insulting it, but it totally sounds like something that would end with: “But on Claudia it looked great!”

• Most of the BSC members are watching the kids at the Pike’s party, but they say it isn’t a real sitting job because Mr. and Mrs. Pike are home.  But they’re going to be staying in their bedroom the whole time.  Not just staying inside, but actually staying in the bedroom.  Interesting.

• We hear about the stuff going on in Stoneybrook, because Abby says that Mallory called and told her about it.  It seems kind of weird that Mal would call her on vacation about that. It’s not like Abby was gone that long or that she and Mal are BFFs.  Why not just say she heard about the Stoneybrook stuff later on?

• Okay, so Abby says she’s going away for eight days, and she leaves on a Friday.  Then she says Kristy’s coming to stay with them for their second weekend.  But eight days after Friday is a Saturday, so there shouldn’t really be a second weekend.  But they’re all still there Saturday night, so it clearly wasn’t an eight-day trip.

• I’m not even sure the point of Kristy showing up is.  She really didn’t do anything or have any interesting conversations with Abby.

• The Pike kids all invite guests to the beach party thing.  Vanessa invites Charlotte and Becca.  Margo invites the Arnold twins, but weren’t the twins actually friends with Vanessa?  I can’t remember what book it was in, but Marilyn’s all jealous that Carolyn keeps hanging out with the other girls without her?  But they let her join in at the end?

• Claire invites Hunter Bruno, which seems like an excuse to have Logan show up at the party.  Which would be fine if Logan had anything significant to do, but he doesn’t.  And really, has Claire ever interacted with Hunter before?

• When they’re looking at pictures from Gram’s childhood, Abby sees a picture of her grandmother’s brother who died when he was 18 and asks what happened t him.  It turns out he was killed in World War II.  Wouldn’t Abby have heard that story before?

• The triplets start a water balloon fight at the party and accidently splash Mrs. Pike through the window.  She comes out, pretending to look mad, but hits them with a SuperSoaker.  Nice.

• I’m not totally sure how they accidently splash Mrs. Pike through her bedroom window.  They say that Adam was attempting to hit David Michael who was standing under her window. But if the bedroom’s upstairs, he must have been really off.  No way David Michael’s that tall.  Also, why was the window open if they were trying to stay away from the party?

• So, when Abby ‘s calling relatives to get them to come to the party, she calls Gram’s sister, who’s all, I wasn’t invited to the party.  It’s kind of awkward. But then she gets her grandmother to call and actually invite her.  Isn’t it great when a BSC member can resolve a years-long feud with almost no effort?

• The beach party thing includes a night under the stars.  The sitters helping out at this event are Stacey, Claudia, Jessi, Mallory, and Logan.  Ben Hobart’s also present.  But Mallory’s super strict parents have no problem letting this coed sleepover happen.  And Mr. Spier’s either okay with the arrangement or doesn’t know about it.

• Stacey remembers that the Pike’s like going to town in Sea City, so she arranges a trip to downtown Stoneybrook.  Since there isn’t much to do there, she arranges a tour of the fire station and police station.  Which seems…odd.   They should have taken the kids to a place with miniature golf.

• Whoever owned this book originally filled out the questionnaire thing in the back.  One of the questions is what you would change about the book, and she said she’d change the part about Abby thinking her grandmother had cancer.  Which made me laugh, because that’s basically the main plot of the book.

• In the questionnaire she also says that the character she’s most like is Kristy, because she’s always grouchy.  Which isn’t a word I would have used to describe Kristy.  Oh, and if she was throwing a party her theme would be Spice World.  It was 1998.

• I was watching Grimm while I wrote this and it’s opening shot was of a person tearing a page out of an Alice in Wonderland book.  Weird coincidence.

“Dealing with me made you sick, huh?”.....BSC # 119: Stacey’s Ex-Boyfriend

Memory Reaction

Again, after my time.

Revisited Reaction

Stacey notices that her ex, Robert, has been acting kind of down.  She remembers that Andi (the girl he dumped her for) came to talk to her a couple months back to tell her she was worried about Robert.  Stacey sort of reached out to him then, but hadn’t talk to him since.  Then she runs into Robert’s sister at the mall, who tells her Robert’s still miserable and makes Stacey promise to call him.  She does, and the two start talking again (as friends).  Robert says he hasn’t been happy lately, isn’t interested in the activities he used to do, and hasn’t really been interested in talking to his friends.

The basic idea’s that Robert’s depressed and Stacey spends most of the book trying to help him.  She talks to his friends, but they’re mad at him for dropping off the radar in recent months.  She convinces him to rejoin the baseball team after quitting, but then he skips practice.  She even starts tutoring him because he’s stopped trying in school.  Her daily tutoring’s the only thing that convinces Robert’s parents to unground him (which they did because his grades dropped), but he doesn't even seem to care about that.

Stacey has no idea what to do, so she finally calls into some radio call-in show offering advice, and is told she can’t help him herself and should convince him to talk to an adult.  Stacey decides to do this, but Robert gets all defensive and pissed at her for butting in.  Then Stacey tells her mom, who wants to call his parents, but Stacey begs her not to, and she agrees.  Later, Robert comes back to her house crying and says he hurts inside and doesn’t know why.  He agrees he needs help and Stacey convinces him to talk to his baseball coach (Robert’s choice of a “trusted adult”), which is apparently somewhat helpful.  Stacey realizes that she let herself get too caught up in Robert and let things in her own life slide.  But she and Robert decide to be friends and even go to some dance together.

Meanwhile, there’s some new place in Stoneybrook where people can go to pick strawberries.  Of course all the kids in town go crazy picking berries.  Then they end up with way too many, and Kristy decides to have some festival where everyone brings strawberry baked goods and plays related games.  It’s pretty nondramatic.  I started craving strawberries though, so I’m glad I got them at the store yesterday.

High/Lowlights

• Stacey says she doesn’t like to define herself as a diabetic.  Then maybe she shouldn’t always bring it up when she first starts to describe herself.

• In math class, Robert can’t answer a question and is sort of laughed at.  When Stacey’s asked, she considers not answering so Robert doesn’t look as bad, but says she can’t do it because she doesn’t like playing dumb.  I approve of this choice.

• The copy of the book I have is hardcover.  Which is really weird, I don’t remember ever seeing a hardcover BSC book.  It’s the same size/shape as the others, so I’m wondering if the book was falling apart and was rebound it somehow.

• Guess who wore this: “She was dressed entirely in animal prints.  She was wearing a long-sleeved zebra-print leotard under leopard-print overall shorts. A tiger-stripe scarf was tied around her neck and her hair was caught up into a ponytail with a lizard print scrunchie.  Her earrings were two orange spotted giraffes." 

• The strawberry picking place is called Strawberry Fields Forever.  They acknowledge it’s a Beatles reference.

• Stacey’s dating Ethan at this point, who lives in the city, and she goes to visit him on two different day trips.  She sees her father while she’s there too.  I like this.  They’re close enough to NYC that she can do that, so it makes sense that she’d do that instead of always going for a whole weekend.
• I’m not sure why Stacey was so against her mom calling Robert’s parents, since she had already decided to bring an adult in, but didn’t have much success asking Robert to go to anyone himself.  I guess it’s typical of a teenager though.
• There’s this thread throughout the book about how Stacey has to write her “self-portrait” for English class, and she says it’s basically an autobiography.  Claudia even does a sketch of her to go with it.  But didn’t all the girls already write their autobiographies?  Why give them the same assignment twice?

• Stacey keeps saying how she doesn’t want to talk to others about Robert because she doesn’t want to betray his confidence.  So, she only says vague things about how Robert’s unhappy.  But…that’s really all she knows.

• Both Claire Pike and Linny Papadakis get sick and throw up from eating too many strawberries.  They claim they won’t ever eat any again, and everyone tells them they will as soon as they feel better.  But I’m not so sure. It’s a known thing that you can get an aversion to foods when you get really sick from them.  It happened to me with macaroni and cheese – I loved it as a kid, got sick after eating it, and for years after I could barely look at it without getting nauseous.

• Jessi and Mallory take the younger Pikes to the strawberry picking place.  Mr. Pike gives them $20 and says if they pick enough to cost more than that, they’ve picked too many.  Then when he comes to pick them up they have to ask for more money and he just hands it over.  They don’t mention whether they pay for all the ones they eat while picking (which is at least enough to make Claire sick).  They certainly weren't keeping a count of them.

• Stacey describes Ethan as an art student.  She doesn’t mention his age in this one, but I think he’s supposed to be 15 or 16.  How’s someone that young an art student?  Doesn’t art student suggest out of high school and in some kind of art school/program?  Or does she just mean he takes art classes?  Because they never describe Claudia as an art student.

• So, the part where Stacey tells us that Andi talked to her about Robert is really detailed and she even mentions that she sent Robert a Valentine-gram.  I had absolutely no memory of the Andi conversation, but the valentine-gram seemed kind of familiar so I looked it up.  Sure enough, this all went down in another Stacey book. Funny how I couldn't remember that but have such vivid memories of the early ones.

• How many strawberries are these people picking/buying?  I love strawberries, but I always eat them in the first couple days after I buy them, because otherwise they go bad.  This book takes place over a couple of weeks, so if they’re picking cartons of them, the problem shouldn’t be having too many too eat, it should be that the berries are going bad.  I’ve gone apple picking and ended up with too many to eat, but apples last longer than strawberries.

• Stacey talks to Robert’s friend Alex about his issues, but Alex says he doesn’t care if Robert’s not happy, because he totally wasn’t there for him when his parents were getting divorced.  My first thought was that this is awesome continuity from back when Stacey was friends with him, because I specifically remember his parents splitting up.  But my second thought was that no 13-year-old boy would say anything like that.  At least not to another teenager.

• Also, Alex’s parents split up back in book 83, which is way before Robert started feeling depressed.  And it seemed like Robert and Stacey were both being very supportive of Alex at the time. So, maybe it’s not good continuity.

• When Robert shows up at Stacey’s house it’s around 11:00 pm.  Stacey convinces him to call his baseball coach to ask for help then.  He does and leaves a message. Then the coach calls him right back and agrees to meet with him the next day.  But this seems awfully late for phone calls.  Could he really not wait till morning to call?  I mean Robert’s depressed, but he isn’t suicidal.

• Stacey does tell Ethan that she’s been helping Robert and he’s pretty cool about it.  She’s nervous about telling Robert about Ethan, but she finally does after he’s agreed to ask for help.

• Stacey keeps telling us how what she used to feel for Robert is gone and won’t come back, and that she doesn’t want to be more than friends.  I think she protests a little too much, but whatever.

• Of course, when Stacey calls the radio show she gets on the air.  I’m sure no one ever calls in to radio shows and doesn’t get on, or has to wait to get on.

• When planning the festival, they go on the internet and find a “strawberry chat room,” where people from all over send them recipes and ideas.  I love how this was clearly an attempt to be hip/modern, and now it just makes the book seem so dated.

• Everyone brings baked goods with strawberries to the festival to share.  Kristy gets the idea to gather recipes for everything into a book, which she then copies and staples together to sell to everyone.  She does this all while the festival was going on, which I can buy because it was at her house and Watson has a copier in his home office.  But my question is, why do all these people just have the recipes with them? Normally if I bring food to a person’s house I don’t carry the recipe with me. I don’t usually have them memorized either.

• The BSC’s going to use the money they made at the festival to take their charges to some water park.  That’s generous of them.

• I really like the messages in this one – first that a 13-year-old can’t always help someone on their own, and second that while you can help others, you shouldn’t always lose yourself in their problems.

“Why on earth would anyone leave you here”……………BSC Mystery # 28: Abby and the Mystery Baby

Memory Reaction

After my time, so nothing to say here…

Revisited Reaction

Abby gets home from school and finds a baby on her front porch in a car seat.  Like what happens to most girls when they’re 13.  After the initial shock, she basically falls in love with the baby right away.  She IS a BSC member, afterall. They call the police, but Abby’s mom tells them (privately) that she wanted to let the baby stay with them.  And they agree right away. Which is when you know that Mrs. Stevenson knows more about the baby than she’s letting on.  So, the baby stays around, Abby and everyone else coo over him and that’s pretty much the bulk of the book.  Since they don’t know the kids real name, they call him, Eli.

This actually isn’t much of a mystery, but I think that’s why I like it as a mystery book…it’s actually believable for teenage “detectives.”  The BSC wants to see if they can find out who left the baby there.  

Their investigation’s pretty limited.  Mallory and Jessi think it was a woman in some writing group they are in, because she wrote a story about abandoning a baby.  I can see their point, because leaving a baby on someone’s door step’s such a rare and original idea…obviously there’s a connection.  Another suspect’s the nanny that Mrs. Stevenson hires, because Abby thinks she’s weird, and because she once calls him “E.J.”  The nanny says it’s because her nephew’s name is E.J., but the girls don’t totally buy it, because they always let their imaginations run away with them.  The only other clues the girls have are that Maria Kilbourne saw a green car in the area the day the baby was left, and that Abby finds a receipt from a NYC pharmacy on her driveway.  All of this, of course, leads nowhere.

The more interesting action is with Abby’s mother who’s acting a little weird.  First she acts shocked at the blanket that the baby was wrapped in.  Then, she agreed to take in the baby, and insisted on talking to the police and a social worker with no one else in the room.  And one day Abby calls her at work and is told that she was taking off for “family business,” which Mrs. Stevenson denies when she gets home.  Abby ends up searching her Mom’s home office, and sees that she had written the name “Miriam” down on post it note.  This reminds Abby that her mom has a sister named Miriam that the family hasn’t spoken to in years.  Abby and Anna look through old photos to see if they can find out what Miriam looks like, and they can only find one of her baby pictures…where she’s wrapped in the same blanket that Eli was wrapped in when he was dropped off. 

Abby figures out that since her mother ran off without telling them where she was going, that she must have found where Miriam was.  She hits redial on the phone, gets a hospital, and takes off to the city (by herself) to confront her mom.   She shows up at the hospital and finds her mom and aunt talking.  The story is that Eli’s father left her, she was struggling to make ends meet, and she didn’t take care of herself as well as she should (she’s diabetic).  She dropped the baby off at the Stevenson’s and then went to the hospital.  She was out of it/in a comma for a while, which I guess explains why she didn’t make a follow up call about the baby.  But everyone put the past fights behind them and wants to be family again.  Miriam and the baby are going to live with Abby’s grandparents in Florida while she gets back on her feet.  This way if she has to drop the baby off one someone else’s doorstep, she doesn’t have to worry about him freezing to death.

There’s a subplot that’s a bit more prominent than there usually is in mysteries – the BSC decides to say it is “writing month” or something for the kids they sit for.  They encourage all the kids to write poetry/stories, and then host some event at the library where the kids do readings.  It’s a nice idea in theory, but reading little kids’ stories isn’t the most entertaining thing.

High/Lowlights

• So, soon after Abby finds the kid, she goes to change his diaper (the mom had left a bag with some supplies).  And she’s all, “Suddenly, I had the answer to something I was wondering about. It’s a boy!”  The way that was worded just cracked me up for some reason.

• Claudia outfit: “A funky red-flannel minidress layered with a black-and-white-checked thrift-shop man’s vest, black tights, and red high-tops.”  I have two thoughts – first, could they possibly work in more hyphens into that description?  Second, that actually sounds a little like something someone on My So-Called Life would wear.  The only problem is that show was on in 1994, three years before this book was published.  Styles changed a bit.

• When I Googled My So-Called Life to find that link, I saw that the entire series is on Hulu Plus, and I’m now really tempted to spend my weekend watching it.

• Stacey was wearing jeans that “were stonewashed to a perfect degree of faded blue, and torn at the knee in this casual-yet-not-sloppy way. She wore them with a crisp white shirt, a green V-necked sweater, and brown Hush Puppies.”  That doesn’t really sound like a Stacey outfit to me.  Maybe the ripped jeans, but not the sweater.

• Apparently, Miriam left a note in the car seat, which Abby totally missed (but her mom found).  Some detective.

• When talking about the woman in her writing group, Mal’s all, “I know it’s a mistake to confuse fact with fiction,” and it cracked me up because Mal is ALWAYS mixing the two up.

• Miriam’s story makes no sense.  The sister lived in NYC, so she rented a car, drove to CT, and knocked on Abby’s door.  When no one answered, she didn’t know what to do and was feeling faint, so she left the baby on the porch, but then apparently drove back to the city before going to the hospital.  If she was that out of it, why not go to a closer hospital?  I mean, this takes place in February, not the best time for leaving a kid outside.  She really couldn’t sit in the car for an hour to wait to see if anyone came home?

• Also Mrs. Stevenson said that Miriam used her last few dollars to rent a car and drive to Connecticut.  Did she not think of making a freaking phone call?  If she knew where her sister lived, she must have known where she works and that she’s in the city all the time.

• The Stevenson’s borrow a crib from Kristy’s family, one that supposedly belonged to Emily Michelle but was now in the attic.  My question is: Emily hasn’t aged since shewas adopted.  So, how did she outgrow her crib?

• Mrs. Stevenson tells the nanny she hires that the baby is four months old, and Abby notices that she says this as fact.   But this is before she tracks down Miriam, so how did she know about the 4 months part?  Unless maybe it was in the note?  But it sounded like Miriam wrote a somewhat incoherent note, so it seems weird that she would put in that info but forget contact information.

• Abby does attempt to call the pharmacy to find out if the receipt’s really from the baby-abandoner or if it actually came from her mom.  The first thing I noticed was that when she calls the pharmacy she gets an actual person. How retro. Then the rest of the call’s kind of silly – she pretends she’s her mom and asks about her prescription to see if her mom is a customer.  Then there’s a contrived moment where she asks if her maiden name is in the system, which is all so that the pharmacist can say they have an M Goldberg in the system.  Which I guess is a clue, but it’s a stupid one because who’s going to read it and think, “Oh, I bet that means the baby was left by Abby’s aunt that we have never heard about.”

• I don’t know why Abby didn’t think to say…ask her mother if it was her receipt.

• Mrs. Stevenson’s first name is Rachel, and her maiden name was Goldberg.  In case it ever comes up in BSC trivia or something.

• Abby calls Kristy when she finds the baby, because she doesn’t know what to do.  Kristy comes over with her grandmother, and then calls that cop they are always working with.  I don’t know she couldn’t just call the main number at the station.  When they are looking for clues about who’s robbing banks or whatever, it makes sense that they need to talk to him because most cops won’t talk to kids.  But when it’s an actual emergency anyone would listen.

• At a sleepover, the girls are all into watching Eli, and Abby says it’s like the movie “Three Men and a Baby” because they all fought over who got to take care of the baby.  Which doesn’t totally sound like the plot of that movie (at least the majority of it), but whatever.  I remember in that movie the baby was left on the doorstop of where the father lived, so maybe this was supposed to be foreshadowing that Eli was left on their doorstep because they were family.  Cause the girls all think the person just picked the Stevensons at random, because it’s a nice house.

• Eli’s real name is Daniel.  I like Eli better.

• So, Charlotte, Becca, and the Arnold twins are talking about how they are worried about boring people with their writing, so Claudia and Stacey talk them into writing and performing a play.  Because Carolyn’s a science nut, she wants to write about photosynthesis, and that’s what they make the play about.  Good thing they won’t bore anyone.

• I guess Charlotte is over her stage fright/shyness at this point?

• The girls are looking at pictures from Abby and Anna’s Bat Mitzvah, and Mary Anne asks if all their relatives were there.  Abby says, “All the one’s were speaking to.”  Which comes off like a joke, but I guess is a  hint they have a relative their not speaking to.

• Also, when talking about families, Kristy mentions her Aunt Colleen, who was mentioned way back in book 6. 

• Abby totally gets away with going to NYC alone because her mother felt guilty about lying.

• Other stories read at the BSC poetry slam thingy a rap about boogers and puke (the Pike triplets) and a bunch of stories about mystery babies appearing (the kids in Abby’s neighborhood who are obviously influenced by actual happenings).  Oh, and Vanessa gives a bunch of background on poetry.

• Since Eli/Daniel is moving to Florida, Abby thinks that she should figure out a BSC trip there.  I guess no one told her it already happened.

“I mean so little to this club that you don’t even have to replace me?”….BSC # 125: Mary Anne in the Middle

Memory Reaction

So, I didn’t read this as a kid, but I do remember when I read the following book as an adult and was a little annoyed/surprised that we didn’t get the full story on Mal moving in that book.

Revisited Reaction

At the start of this book, Mallory’s waiting to hear back from the boarding school she applied to.  Mary Anne refers to Mal visiting the school, so I guess that happened in yet another previous book. They really let this storyline play out for a while, didn’t they?  Anyway, Mal keeps saying she’s not sure if she’ll go, but Mary Anne can tell she’s pretty much made up her mind.  Mallory keeps talking to Mary Anne about it because Jessi doesn’t have an open mind about Mal leaving, and she gets mad whenever Mal brings it up.  Also, Mary Anne’s narrating the book, so she has to know what’s going on.

Anyway, Mallory obviously gets in, and gets a full scholarship.  When Jessi hears this, she gets mad at Mallory for wanting to leave.  She keeps saying Mal’s running away from her problems. So, when Mallory decides to go, she tells Mary Anne first.  At a BSC meeting, Jessi demands Mallory tell the club her decision.  When Mal does, Jessi gets mad because she can tell Mary Anne already knew.  They bicker back and forth and both keep venting to Mary Anne.  This goes on for a while – Mary Anne tries to send them on a joint sitting job so they’ll have to talk, but that ends up making things worse.  Then, at a slumber party Jessi has, Mary Anne insists Mallory still come, but that doesn’t end well either.  Eventually, Mary Anne invites them both over and forces them to talk things out.  They do, and Mal tries to explain why she feels the need to go.  They basically make up, but we don’t really get to hear the bulk of the conversation, because it’s apparently not important enough to show.

Meanwhile, Mal’s siblings have decided they don’t want her to leave and are mad at her as well.  They act like annoying brats for a while, but Mary Anne convinces them that they should want Mallory to be happy and that she’ll still be part of the family.  And the BSC and Mal’s family put together some “We Love Mallory Day” to show her how much she means to them.  These girls are no where near as bitchy as people I went to middle school with.

The subplot is that Kristy wanted to put together a special holiday project (this takes place in December).  They decide they’re going to make holiday decorations that they’ll donate to the senior citizen home in town.  Apparently, the place has really old crappy decorations.  They end up having a bit of a party for the people there too.  These girls are WAY to goody-goody to be believable.  My high school had a community service club that did less volunteer work.

High/Lowlights

• Mrs. Pike has a temporary job working at Bellair’s for the holidays.  Mary Anne and Mal are sitting for the rest of the Pikes a lot, which is the explanation for Mary Anne ending up in the middle of the whole Jessi/Mal stuff. 

• Mary Anne says you can tell Claudia isn't a “student” by looking at her spelling.  But I have to say, I was always a good student and can’t spell very well either. I’m nowhere near as bad as Claud, but seriously, if not fore spel cheeck I’d bee screwed.

• Mary Anne and Mal are almost late for a BSC meeting, because Mrs. Pike got stuck in traffic on her way home from work.  But isn’t Belliar’s in downtown Stoneybrook?  The girls bike to it sometimes.  How much traffic can there be?

• Claire asks why Mrs. Pike needed to get a job, and she wonders why they need money when Santa’s the one who brings all the presents.  Mal just says they need money for other things.  Mary Anne’s thinking how Mallory must be thinking about the cost of her school, but I think Mallory was probably just saying what you say to kids who still believe in Santa Claus. If they had actually given us a Mallory book when she’s making a life altering decision, I would know for sure.  But whatever.  I’m not upset about that or anything.

• Claudia’s on a kick where she makes clay beads and incorporates them into her clothes.  For instance: “The shirt she was wearing that day was one she had tie-dyed and then cut into fringe around the bottom.  At the end of each fringe was a polymer clay bead she’d made.”  I think I had a shirt with beaded fringe when I was little, but it wasn’t something I made. I want to say it had pictures of Cabbage Patch Kids on it.   But that sounds like a really weird shirt, so maybe I’m mixing up my memories.

• Maybe I missed something, but why are 2 people needed for the Pikes again?  What happened to that whole thing about the Pikes not needing two sitters?  Did they undo that in another book?  Or are they just hoping we forget for plot purposes?

• So, Jessi’s having a party because her friends from Dance NY are visiting.  Kristy’s all worried about sitting jobs that night, and the others are like, “we’ll make sure Logan and Shannon are free that night.”  But isn’t it kind of mean to call them and say, “Hey, can you cover for us while we all have a party without you.”  I know Logan wouldn’t go to a slumber party, but it still seems rude.

• When they first mentioned the sleepover, I was thinking, how it’s so convenient that there are never baby-sitting jobs when big events/celebrations occur.  But then Kristy brought it up, so I guess I can’t really complain about that.

• Nicky gets Ranger Rick magazine in the mail.  I remember my aunt used to give me and all my cousins subscriptions to this for Christmas.  My brother and I got one we were supposed to share, but I didn’t read it that much.   Then she finally asked if people cared about it and stopped giving it out.

• Claire gets something called Ladybug Magazine, does anyone know if that’s a real one too?  I got a couple kid magazines when I was younger, but don’t remember one called Lady Bug.  But the Ranger Rick reference was real, so maybe this one was too.

• There’s an awkward moment when Jessi overhears one of her dance friends telling Mal that Jessi will get over her moving.

• Mallory seems surprised that her siblings are upset with the idea of her leaving home.  Which is kind of sad if you think about it.

• When Jessi and Mal are fighting, I wanted Jessi to tell Mallory how she turned down a chance to leave home with the Dance NY thing.  I’m not saying Mallory should have based her decision on what Jessi did, but it would have been interesting to see it come out.

• Mary Anne and Mallory keep leaving school and walking to the elementary school to pick up the younger Pikes and walk home with them.  But I don’t get this….don’t the kids normally walk home on their own?

• When they make holiday decorations, of course they are all politically correct and make decorations for Christmas, Hanukah, Kwanzaa, and the Winter Solstice.  I was expecting the first three, but the Winter Solstice?  Seriously?

• I get diversity, but it seems kind of weird to show up for a sitting job at someone’s house, and tell the kids they have to make decorations for a holiday they don’t celebrate.  There’s got to be a better way to do it.

• When Mal and Jessi went on their joint job, who did they think they were going to be sitting with? I know Mary Anne could easily just have said it was going to be her, but I wish they had just told us the lie that was used.  Especially since Mary Anne’s such a crappy liar.

• If you care, Mallory’s reasons for wanting to go to school are partially because of the Spaz Girl thing, but also because it’s a chance to be herself and not just “one of the Pike kids.”  She thinks she’ll find out who she is. It’s also a good writing school.

• One part of We Love Mallory Day’s a stop to see Henrietta Hayes, that writer Mal sort of worked for.  Henrietta gives Ma some kind of young author award, but I think it’s something she just made up. But I don’t get why they brought her back.  It’s not like we’ve seen Henrietta’s the past 40+ books.

• Ben Hobart does pop up in this one.  I guess he and Mallory hadn't talked a lot recently, but they do see each other in this one, and he gets to be a supportive friend. Which is nice, because he's a character that was around for a while and deserves some closure.  Unlike the random writer person.

• When talking about who to replace Mallory with, someone suggests Erica Blumberg, but the other girls shoot this down.  Claudia says she acts like she knows everything.  But isn’t Erica the one who called Claudia when she realized something was happening with the child abuse guy?  You think Claud would give her some credit.

• For the record, the BSC decides they just won’t replace Mallory at all, which has to kind of sting for her.

• This is kind of random, but after a BSC meeting, Mary Anne mentions that Mallory leaves Claud’s room, then stops to get her coat out of the front hall closet.  So do these girls really hang their coats up there for every meeting?  I always pictured them piled in a corner of Claudia’s room. 

“I also knew this wasn’t exactly a happy ending”…….BSC # 117: Claudia and the Terrible Truth

Memory Reaction

I didn’t read this one until now.

Revisited Reaction

Okay, so, this is a “very special episode” book.  The BSC has these new clients, the Nicholls, who have two little boys (5 and 7).  Claudia becomes their regular sitter, because apparently, sometime after I stopped reading, the BSC changed their policy about that being an issue or causing fights.

Anyway, the boys, Nate and Joey, are really sweet.  But Claudia notices that they’re nervous all the time, like they think they’re going to get into trouble about the smallest thing.  They’re even scared to go play in their next-door neighbor’s yard because their dad didn’t give specific permission.  At first, Claudia thinks they had a bad experience with a past baby-sitter. Cause baby-sitters have such a huge impact on kids lives, I guess.Then Claudia notices that Mr. Nicholls is super strict.  He yells loudly at the boys because a jar of peanut butter was left on the counter.  Claudia explains she left it there because she was in the middle of making a snack for the boys when he rang the doorbell (he forgot his key).  When he hears that, he puts on a fake smile and apologizes for yelling.  But Claud realizes that he’s the one Nate and Joey are scared of.

At one job, Claudia goes back to get her jacket after Mr. Nicholls pays her, and she overhears a loud slapping sound.  When she moves on to leave, she sees the boys crying, and notices that Joey’s cheek is red.  Mr. Nicholls acts like everything’s normal and offers her a ride home, but Claudia just leaves.  She calls an emergency BSC meeting and tells everyone what happened.  The girls have no idea what to do.  They aren’t even sure if there’s really a problem, because Claudia didn’t see anything.  And they note that some parents do spank their kids.  But Claud’s instincts tell her it’s something serious. So, they make the rare decision to talk to an adult.  They tell Mrs. Kishi, who actually works with Mrs. Nicholls.  Mrs. Kishi decides she will talk to Mrs. Nicholls first, but also calls a social worker she knows for advice.  At first, Mrs. Nicholls denies everything, but Mrs. Kishi decides to call the Department of Children’s Services.  Before we find out what happens with that, Mrs. Nicholls basically fires the BSC. 

Erica Blumberg gets hired as the replacement.  One day, she calls Claudia to say she’s sitting and that Mr. Nicholls told her the boys needed to stay in their rooms all day because they “misbehaved.”  But Erica heard them crying so she went up to see them and noticed they were both bruised, and she didn’t buy their story about a softball accident.  Claudia calls her mom, and I guess the news of actual bruising gets to Mrs. Nicholls because she and Mrs. Kishi head over to get the boys.  Claudia also bikes over there because she can’t stand not knowing what’s happening.  Of course, Mr. Nicholls has gotten home by this point and is pissed off, but Mrs. Kishi and Mrs. Nicholls get the boys in the car.  They temporarily take them and Claudia to Mr. Kishi’s office to regroup (they drop Erica off at home). Mrs. Nicholls agrees to go to the police, and takes the boys up to stay with her sister in New York.  And they obviously don’t live happily ever after, but the BSC and Erica talk with Mrs. Kishi to try and get some closure on the whole thing.

There’s this subplot about how the BSC’s entering a bunch of their clients in the town’s St. Patrick’s Day parade.  The kids all make Irish-themed cardboard cutouts to wear as sandwich boards/costumes and walk behind some of the floats.  The only entertaining part’s that Claudia couldn’t go to the costume making session (because she was dealing with the Nicholls), so all the costumes look horrible, and they end up putting signs on everyone saying what they’re supposed to be.

High/Lowlights

• I know they liked to tackle some real issues in these books, but child abuse seems a bit over-the-top.  Because they obviously were trying not to make the situation to be as terrible as it could be, but still get a message across.  But it just seems weird to insert this story into what’s normally a very happy/fantasy town.

• Claud’s Aunt Peaches and her husband are away, so babyLynn’s staying at the Kishi’s.  We get all sorts of scenes of Claudia cooing over the baby.  It’s actually a bit annoying in print, because we can’t see her.  I could handle it somewhat on TV, if they actually show a cute baby to go along with it.  Here, not so much.

• Also, there aren’t any outfits in this book, and I’m thinking it’s because they gave the page space to baby descriptions.

• Here’s some BSC timeline stuff:  Mary Anne’s dad was remarried “not long ago.”  And Abby moved to Stoneybrook “recently.”  But Lynn’s six months old.  I guess I could see “recently” being used to describe something less than a year ago, but WAY too much has happened since Mr. Spier got married to call it “not long ago.”

• Claudia’s surprised that Mr. Nicholls remembers her name, because they only met once before.  But she says thinks this when she shows up to sit.  Wouldn’t he know the name of the person coming to watch his kids, even if he didn’t remember meeting her?  They always tell the parents who’s going to sit.
• The Nicholls live next to the Stanton-Cha’s who are from that book with the secret society/country club.  Yay, for continuity.

• They also mention Lou McNally, who’s from way back.  She’s apparently just moved back to town.  I’m guessing that’s continuity from this book, which I haven’t read yet.  But I just got a copy, so I will soon.  

• If you’re wondering about Mr. Nicholls job and why he’s the one greeting Claudia all the time, Joey and Nate mention he’s going on interviews when Claudia’s sitting, so the assumption is he’s unemployed.

• Claudia thinks it’s weird that the boys say they got in trouble for touching a briefcase.  Which, I agree with.  But that’s based on the word of a five-year-old.  Wouldn’t she consider that he lied about what happened?  I know he didn’t here, but she doesn’t know them that well.  Kids sometimes lie.

• During the scene where Claud and her mom take Mrs. Nicholls, Nate, and Joey to Mr. Kishi’s office, all I can think about is who’s watching Lynn?  Which then made me wonder who was taking care of her all day when the Kishis were at school/work that week?

• At the costume making session that Claud can’t attend, one of the kids wants to make a leprechaun.  So, Kristy asks who can draw one, and Mallory says she knows how to, but is too busy setting up the paint.  Wouldn’t it make sense for someone who can’t draw to switch jobs with Mal?

• When talking about telling adults, Kristy says her mom’s good in emergencies, and Mary Anne says her dad can give good legal advice.  The way she phrased that seemed weird to me, Claudia doesn’t exactly need legal advice.  But it’s nice to see them going to their parents about stuff they can’t handle.

• So, Mrs. Nicholls actually calls Kristy to cancel the sitting jobs.  Kristy figures she got her name/number off their posters.  But 1) why is Kristy’s number on fliers when they only want people to call Claud’s? And, 2) do these girls put their full names on posters that they just hang out in public?  Their parents are okay with that?

• At the parade, the BSC entry walks behind a float with Miss Teenage Stoneybrook, Little Miss Connecticut, and a bunch of other pageant winners.  I guess Little Miss Connecticut’s the next step after Little Miss Stoneybrook?  Charlotte calls it a boring float, but it would have been nice if she also referenced her own pageant experience.

• They invite Erica to a meeting to a BSC meeting where they talk about the whole Nicholls thing to get closure.  I like that Mrs. Kishi made a point of telling Erica to talk to her mother, and to get all the BSC members to talk about what happened.  Even though no one was as involved as Claudia was.  It’s like…actual parenting.

• Of course, we hear on the last two pages that Mr. Nicholls admits everything he did and agrees to counseling. Which takes away from what I thought was going to be an optimistic, but ambiguous ending.

“I felt so stupid writing in the BSC journal”…..BSC Super Special # 15: Baby-sitters’ European Vacation

Memory Reaction

This was my first time reading this one.

Revisited Reaction

In the latest edition of completely unrealistic class trips, Jessi, Mallory, Stacey, Abby, and Kristy are off to London and Paris. SMS is traveling with a group from another middle school from Toronto.  I didn’t catch how or why this partnership happened, but I don’t think it really matters.  Anyway, the girls each have their own little adventure.

Jessi finds out that the group she danced with in NYis performing in London.  She gets tickets for herself and the BSC members.  While backstage saying hello, a dancer – who just happened to be dancing a part Jessi knows – injures herself.  Since her understudy’s also sick, they ask Jessi to fill in and perform.

Mallory has dinner with some second cousins that live in London.  They show her a family tree stating that William Shakespeare is a distant relative (great x17 grandfather).  I guess they thought this book wasn’t unrealistic enough.  Or maybe it’s not unrealistic, since great x17 works out to less than a hundredth of a percent.  Lots of people must be related to him that much. Anyway, Mal’s inspired and spends the rest of the trip working hard on some story, and doesn’t pay attention to what she’s actually seeing until Jessi points it out to her.

Stacey’s got a couple of things going on.  First, her mother’s a chaperone, which she finds super embarrassing.  Understandable for a 13-year-old. Then she picks up the wrong suitcase at the airport, which I feel like has been done before, but can’t think of when.  I may be thinking of Sleepover Friends.  This lets her whine about clothes a bit and go shopping.  But, then we get to the real point: The bag she grabs includes an urn with the ashes/remains of someone.  When they reach the owner of the bag, they find out he’s a WWII vet, and was traveling to Europe to spread his army friend’s ashes on the beach in Normandy.  Mrs. McGill tells the guy that she and Stacey will bring the ashes to him in person when they get to Paris, to make sure the airline doesn’t lose them again.  Stacey starts reading up on WWII and gets interested in it.  She ends up going with the guy (and her mother) when he spreads the ashes on the beach in Normandy.

Abby gets to be the focus of our interactions with Victoria. All of the BSC members go visit her, but Victoria only invites Abby to come along when she’s in some ceremony where she gives flowers to the Queen.  Abby thinks this means she will meet the Queen, and gets all nervous about it.  But really, she’s only in the back of the very large room.  Later, she manages to accidentally step on the feet of some prince.

Kristy gets the vacation romance story in this book, which I think is a first for her, at least in a Super Special. She meets this guy Michel, from the Toronto middle school, who she “hates” on site.  They spend the whole trip fighting and driving each other crazy.  Then when they get separated from their group in Paris, they decide to “pretend” to get along until they meet up with everyone else. They end up having a lot of fun and people they see on the street call them a cute couple. On the last night of the trip they kiss goodbye.

Back in Stoneybrook, the rest of the club’s working at a playground camp.  Cokie Mason’s also working there, trying to get her hands on Logan, who’s totally not interested. So, nothing new there. The head counselor at the camp’s Janine’s ex-boyfriend Jerry, who’s kind of a jerk to her.  This makes Janine take out her anger on Claud, making her miserable.  But in the end Janine tells off Jerry, and she and Claudia come to a bit of a truce.

High/Lowlights

• In the backstory chapter, Jessi says that Stacey has a normal life, other than having to give herself daily injections.  I have to say, that’s not exactly a minor detail.

• Someone mentions that Elvis was in the army and may have been “overseas.”  Then Abby guesses that it was for the Civil War.  Seriously?  Has Claudia been tutoring her or something?

• I’m guessing there was another book between the Playground fight one and the actual Super Special one, because they give no explanation whatsoever about how Stacey’s mom ended up as chaperone. I know I said I liked having a set up book, but having two seems to be pushing it.

• There’s this ongoing story surrounding the fact that the teacher chaperoning the trip (Mr. Dougherty – Mallory’s creative writing teacher) keeps disappearing on his own to look at things and always shows up late.  So, Mrs. McGill ends up having to cover for him.  Now, they don’t say how many kids are on this trip, but only two chaperones?  That seems seriously low.  There are teachers from the Canadian school, but they are watching their own kids.

• I remember in the Hawaii Super Special, it was a big deal when Abby wanted to go to the beach to shoot that commercial, because people needed to stay in the group.  But in this one, all the girls have side trips on their own, and it doesn’t seem to be an issue. 

• Claudia says she’s never worked as a camp counselor before.  I guess technically that’s true, but what about when she was a CIT?

• Alan Gray purposely acts suspicious at the airport, because he thinks it’s funny.  It’s just a thing that jumps out at you reading, because the scene wouldn’t have played out that way in current times.

• I can’t believe everyone was cool with Mallory just going (alone) to the house of some people she’d never actually met, just because they’re related. 

• I’m surprised more teachers wouldn’t want to chaperone.  Yes, they’d be working on their vacation, but they’d be in Paris/London for crazy-cheap prices.

• When the SMS students meet the other school they are traveling with, their chaperones make them do this lame icebreaker where they all put one shoe in a pile, then take someone else’s and walk around trying to find the owner.  Kristy’s actually thinks this is a great idea and is all excited about doing it.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone excited about that kind of thing. 

• At camp, they have to move things inside because of a rain storm. Mary Anne ends up going back outside, because she’s looking for a camper that Cokie lost track of.  When she comes in soaking wet, Cokie says ”Is this a BSC wet T-shirt contest?…not that anyone would notice.”  Is she saying what I think she’s saying?

• At first, I thought the Jessi dancing thing was ridiculous, but they did give her a little time to practice at first, and she mentions not doing everything perfectly, so it’s somewhat realistic.  Especially since she was just one person in a group dance scene.

• The BSC all thought Victoria lived in a castle, just based on her telling them that back at home.  But I would think they knew Victoria well enough to know she exaggerates…she’s in a relatively normal house.

• Abby mentions how she and Mary Anne were the closest BSC members to Victoria. However, this isn’t really how I remember it, considering Mary Anne narrated the two books where Victoria was featured.  I bet Mary Anne would have known Victoria was lying about a castle.

• Robert gets a chapter because he’s contributing to the trip journal the BSC’s doing.  I’m not sure how Stacey convinced him to do this AFTER they stopped dating, but whatever. 
•                                                                
• One day, Dawn ends up missing a day at the Playground Camp to fill in at this other camp for kids with disabilities. They should have had Dawn have reference her experience with cerebral palsy. I actually thought they would make a point of saying she was picked to fill in because of that experience, but I guess I was too optimistic. They do reference her experience with Down’s syndrome, so I’ll give them some credit.

• At the camp, we get a run in with Susan Felder, from way back.

• Dawn’s an idiot.  The camp head tells her about this machine Susan has, and says that kids with autism use because it comforts them physically without having to touch other people (which they usually don’t like).  Then, when Dawn brings Susan to the machine, and sees it “touching her,” she calls the person back all worried.  The councilor’s all, “I thought you got that it was a hugging machine.” Really I don’t know how Dawn could have thought something else.  I was surprised that she was confused, because it was so obvious what the councilor was saying.  It’s like in the second Twilight book, when I couldn’t understand how Bella didn’t get that Edward left to protect her.

• How come Mallory always writes stories where the main character is her?  Seriously, it’s annoying. 

• Abby thinking for even a second that she was going to meet the Queen was ridiculous.

• Every room in their Paris hotel has a balcony looking at the Eiffel tower.  Is that even possible?  Don’t some rooms need to be on the other side of the building?

• I understand Stacey getting interested in WWII based on what happened with the suitcases, but it seems a bit pushy when she asks to go with the guy to spread his friend’s ashes.

• In the Playground Fight book, they say that the Europe trip is in the middle of the camp session.  But in this book, the camp starts at the same time as the others leave for the trip.

• Kristy and Michel get separated when touring the Louvre with their group.  They say the backup plan for when this happens is to go to some group meeting place at the end of the day.  So, the two of them just go off on their own for the afternoon.  They leave a message at their hotel that this is what they are doing, and the teacher leaves them one back saying that it’s okay.  Now…what the hell kind of chaperone would be okay with that?  I can’t believe they would even leave the museum without doing a head count.

• Apparently, Janine broke up with Jerry, got back together with him, then dumped him again.  Which, leads to their tension at the camp.  I would like to know which book this happens in, cause I want the story about this breakup.

• Michael (Kristy’s love interest) plays a “prank” on her, that Kristy claims humiliated her.  Basically, he told the girl working at the counter of a café to pretend that she doesn’t speak English, so Kristy had trouble ordering. Then she’s embarrassed when she finds out the girl really spoke English. I don’t get what’s so humiliating about that.  Isn’t it sort of expected that communicating will be hard when you don’t speak the native language? The girl didn’t yell at her or anything. 

• Jessi convinces Mallory to stop working on her latest story and enjoy the trip.  You would think she would mention how she went through the same thing in Hawaii, but she makes no reference to it.  Maybe she was purposely avoiding it because she thought it would make Mal feel bad (since Mallory was the person Jessi was writing everything down for)?  Or maybe the ghostwriter completely forgot.  I’ll let you decide.

“You just want to boss kids around”…….BSC # 122: Kristy in Charge

Memory Reaction

I first read this as an adult, but it was a few years ago.  I don’t really remember much, except that Kristy came off as really unlikeable. 

Revisited Reaction

SMS is having another school-wide project.  In this one, students can volunteer to be a “teacher of tomorrow” (TOT) and get to teach a class for 3 days (over a week).  Kristy thinks this is awesome, because she’ll get to prove to her teachers how she could do their jobs so much better than them. Kristy, Mary Anne, Stacey, and Mallory sign up for the program.  Kristy gets assigned to a girls’ gym class, Stacey to a Math class, Mary Anne to a Social Studies class, and Mallory to an 8^th grade English class.

The TOTs have to attend training where they learn about lesson plans, and curriculum that needs to be covered and all that.  Kristy thinks the idea of lesson plans are cool, but assumes she doesn’t need to do one for a gym class.  Then she finds out that she has to work with the TOT for a boys’ gym class, since the classes are currently doing a soccer unit together.  The TOT in question is Cary Retlin, who doesn’t plan to take the project seriously and doesn’t even doesn’t care about extra credit.  He and Kristy don’t really end up doing much planning to start.

In her first class, Kristy tries to get the kids to warm up to some “fun” music from the 1970s, but Cary laughs at her in front of the kids, so the class is a bit unproductive and out-of-control.  Afterwards, the actual teacher tells Kristy that she DOES need a lesson plan and that she needs to work with Cary. So for their second class, Kristy and Cary decide they will split the kids into two teams and will each lead one of them.  This is a huge disaster.  The other kids end up picking up on their competitiveness and basically start their own war.  It doesn’t help that most of the people on one team take karate together.  The actual teachers have to break up multiple physical fights, and Cary and Kristy end up having to explain to the Vice Principal why they totally screwed up.  Amazingly, they’re still allowed to teach their last class session.  Kristy comes up with the idea to do some kind of passing drill instead of a game.  In it, the person passes the ball to their partner.  If the partner misses, the original kicker’s out of the game.  It goes well, and Cary works with her, so they sort of redeem themselves.

We don’t hear much about Mary Anne or Stacey’s experiences, just that they generally go well.  But the 8^th grade class Mallory’s assigned to is a bit of a challenge.  First of all, Mal’s terrified of have to present in front of 8^th graders and thinks they won’t do anything they say.  And, apparently Mal’s pretty smart, because that’s exactly what happens.  The girl does know her weaknesses.  But her lack of confidence probably makes things worse. On her first day she keeps dropping things, and earns the nickname “Spaz Girl.”  She keeps trying to run the class and the kids just ignore her and interrupt.  Kristy and Mary Anne are in the class and try to help, but the other kids are louder and more successful.  The actual teacher has to step in and threaten the class with extra papers to write, and that doesn’t even help.  Mallory says that the nickname Spaz Girl has spread to other students in school, and she’s really upset about the whole thing.

As usual, some kids in Stoneybrook finds out about the cool middle school thing, and decides to do their own version of it.  In this case, Vanessa decides to start a poetry school and make all her younger siblings attend.  At first Claire and Margo like it, but get bored with it.  And Nicky was bored with it to begin with.  But Vanessa blackmails them into staying in the class by threatening to tell their parents about things the others did.  Eventually, Vanessa realizes this is wrong and manages to get everyone into poetry by making it seem fun, instead of demanding they write about what she wants.

High/Lowlights

• I can’t believe Mary Anne would sign up for the Teacher of Tomorrow.  Standing in front of a room talking for entire class periods?  Super shy Mary Anne? Seriously?  Was the ghostwriter for this book new or something?

• Claudia outfit:  “A long-sleeved white T-shirt on which she’d painted a bald man’s head from a side view.  All the lines were sharp, not natural at all. His nose was purple, his eyes were orange, and his skin was green.  Jagged yellow lines like lightning bolts sizzled around his head.”  Apparently, he’s a person having a great idea.

• On Kristy’s application for the TOT programs, she basically says how she wanted to prove that she could be better than all her teachers.  Then she sees Mal writing about how she wants to share her love of books/writing.  So she adds something like that about sports to hers.  I just think it’s sad that Mallory who was so into the idea of teaching was torn apart by the students.  For Kristy it was just a game.

• At this point in the series, Andrew’s in Chicago for a few months with his mom, while Karen’s living full time at the “Big House.”  Maybe that’s what makes Kristy so obnoxious in this one.

• Claudia’s sitting for the Pike’s and she compliments Claire for spelling house, H-O-S-E.  Oops.  It’s really sad when Margo corrects her.

• I don’t know why Kristy thinks the kids will like using music from the 1970s.  This book was published in 1998, so I can’t imagine any 12-year-olds being excited by it.

• Vanessa’s apparently a Claudia-in-training, because she says how spelling isn’t important (even for a writer?) because editors and secretaries can fix it.  Interesting that Vanessa, who’s supposed to be a book-lover and poet is saying this.  Also, notice how she doesn’t mention spell check on a computer?  These books can be so dated sometimes.  And this was a late book.

• I feel like the last few books I’ve written about have had the main character acting like a complete jerk.  Did the writers get tired of the series by the end and try to make everyone look bad? Or am I just getting less tolerant?

• At the second training session, Kristy says 50 teachers are waiting for them (to give one-on-one training for each class/TOT.  That seems like a really high number.  I can’t remember how many teachers there were in my middle school, but it doesn’t seem that high.  Plus, you would think that each teacher would need to train multiple TOTs, since they have multiple classes in a day.

• A Kristy outfit, for one of her teaching days: “I wore plaid pleated shorts and a white short-sleeved polo shirt.  Over the weekend I’d woven a blue-and-white lanyard and attached a whistle to it.  I wore it around my neck like the other gym teachers did. I’d even gone over my sneakers with some white shoe polish so that they’d be super-white.”

• Stacey tries to stop Vanessa from blackmailing her siblings by saying real teachers don’t do that.  But Vanessa just says, of course they do, they always threaten to call our parents about stuff.  Interesting point.

• Assigning Mallory to 8^th grade doesn’t make sense to me.  Not just because of the whole issue of authority over kids who are older than her, but because she hasn’t leaned the 8^th grade content yet.  The program would make more sense if it was just for 8^th graders.  Or 7^th and 8^th graders teaching 6^th and 7^th graders.  Mallory’s smart and likes English and all, but it doesn’t mean she’ll know 8^th grade curriculum two years early.

• When Kristy complains to the gym teacher that she can’t work with Cary, she’s surprised to hear the teacher say that many of the actual teachers dislike each other but still work together.

• The gym teacher Kristy’s working with is the one that gave Mal a hard time a while back.  And she coaches the archery team, in this land where middle schools have archery teams.  But that’s hardly the most unrealistic thing about SMS.  I was glad to see a reference to the earlier book, but I did notice the older book says SMS has gym twice a week, and in this one Kristy’s class meets three times in one week.  (I can't believe that information has stayed in my head.)

• Kristy rolls her eyes when a kid in her class refers to someone as her “sworn enemy.”  I guess she thinks that’s immature, but aren’t we always hearing about Alan being her sworn enemy?  Or Cokie Mason, depending on the book.

• There’s some serious damage after the fight.  One kid’s missing a tooth, one has a black eye, and one’s at the hospital with a possible broken arm.  I’m surprised they let Kristy and Cary teach the last class or get any extra credit.

• The kid who’s missing his tooth is keeping it in a glass of milk?  I had no idea that was a thing.

• Kristy’s trying to make Mal feel better about being called “Spaz Girl” and asks her if she’d be offended if a sitting charge called her “Poo-Poo Head.”  Mallory says no, because that would be “silly.”  Because Spaz Girl’s some sophisticated insult?  People in my middle school were much meaner.

• After the last class goes well, the gym teachers offer to let Cary and Kristy coach the game at the end of the unit.  Now….I have an issue with this.  Because they were able to come back and teach a class with no incidents after creating a complete disaster, they’re being rewarded? 

• When Mal’s teaching and getting ripped apart, Mary Anne actual jumps up and tells the other kids to stop giving her a hard time.  Mary Anne can be sort of awesome when a crisis comes up.

• And to close, here’s a limerick that kids in Mal’s class pass around while she’s teaching:  “There was a Spaz Girl named Mallory/ She taught, but not for salary/Her joy was to aim/Deadly chalk and maim/Her students, like ducks in a shooting gallery”……Mallory should be pleased, because she was teaching about limericks, and they seem to have grasped the concept.