#38, Kristy's Mystery Admirer

I wanted to do some Halloween books, because I love Halloween, and I knew this one was a Halloween book, because the only thing I remembered about it besides who sent the love notes was that Kristy and Bart wore lobster costumes to a dance.

Kristy is wearing her "uniform" of jeans, a turtleneck, and a sweater. I think this is one of the few covers where she's actually depicted wearing that combination. She's rolled her jeans up at the bottom almost past the tops of her socks, a fashion that David Michael has apparently felt compelled to copy. And I thought David Michael was supposed to have curly hair. At least Shannon is looking super cute in her school uniform.

The blurb on the back tells me "Of all the Baby-sitters, Kristy's the last one anyone would expect to have a secret admirer."  Harsh, back cover blurb. Harsh.

The book starts out at the end of a Krushers game. Kristy tells us it's the bottom of the ninth, the score is tied, the bases are loaded, and there are two outs. I thought the Krushers and Bashers only played 7 inning games, so I guess this is an extra-innings situation. Anyway, Jackie Rodowsky gets the game-winning hit, and the Krushers go apeshit, because apparently they've never beaten the Bashers before. Kristy does make sure to point out that the Bashers are missing several of their best players. Charlie shows up to help Kristy and David Michael get the equipment home. Kristy says they could have walked but it was nice of him to come. Just as they are loading the last of the gear into Charlie's car, Bart comes and asks Kristy if she wants to walk home with him.

Okay, I am going to derail here and obsess over random details. Remember early in the series, when Kristy's mom was getting married and Kristy found out she'd have to move across town, weren't they all freaking out because it was so far? Because Kristy wouldn't be able to come to meetings if she didn't have anyone to drive her, because it would take her about half an hour each way to ride her bike, and in the winter it would be dark by 6:30 and not very safe. And Kristy rides the bus to school, but the other baby-sitters walk. And a lot of the kids they sit for walk to school too, like the Pikes. So the elementary and middle schools must be closer to Kristy's old house than her new house. But in this book, Kristy has time to get home from school, get her shit together, walk to the elementary school with David Michael, and hold a Krushers practice. So how far away can the school be from Watson's house? It sounds like it's a longish walk but not so long that a 7-year old can't manage it.  Oh! I know what will help! I'll look at the map in my trusty Complete Guide!

I put it extra large so you all can look with me. Oh, we'll need the key, too, or the map won't help at all.

Huh. So apparently the rich neighborhood is only a little further from the elementary school than Claudia's neighborhood is, and is actually closer to the middle school if you cut across instead of going around. And the middle school is right by the horse stables where Mallory took riding lessons. Oh and Stoneybrook University (wth, I thought it was a community college) is smaller than the old folks' home. And there's the train station, but there are no train tracks drawn in. I especially like how the big rock in Brenner field is easily the size of the baseball diamond. So I guess the map was really no help at all. :sadface: Also I notice that the Stone farm is not located on the map, so I think I'll start reading the books as though the farm and Elvira the goat are figments of their imagination.

Kristy and Bart chat as they walk home, and instead of just chatting about softball and sports like they usually do, they talk about their friends and Bart tells Kristy a funny story about something that happened at school. He also tells her that he's in a band, which she didn't know. Emily Michelle and Nannie are waiting outside to greet Kristy, and Emily is cute and runs to give Kristy a hug. Kristy tells us that Nannie is her special grandmother who doesn't act like a grandmother because she goes bowling, wears pants, and has tons of friends. I would find Nannie a lot more strange if she only wore dresses and skirts and had no friends, honestly. Why is wearing pants ungrandmotherly? I mean maybe if this was 1955, but the book was published in 1990.

Chapter 2 is boring except for this bit about fashion.

That's another thing. Claudia's clothes. She's a real fashion plate. Talk about distant. Her clothes are so distant. Claudia is the most interesting dresser I know. She is always wearing things like Day-Glo high-top sneakers, cut-up jeans, off-the-shoulder sweat shirts (sometimes torn), and friendship bracelets. (Her best friend is Stacey McGill, the club treasurer, and Claud braided friendship bracelets for both of them.)

I am not going to pretend that I never made a friendship bracelet, but I would never have listed them as being the height of cool clothing in the eighth grade. Maybe it's another of those things where anyone else would have looked like a 3rd grader, but Claudia looked cool. Sorry, I mean distant. Sorry, I mean so distant.

Kristy gets home from the BSC meeting to find that Shannon has called four times while she was out. Apparently Shannon was unaware that Kristy would be at a BSC meeting on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday between five thirty and six. Kristy calls Shannon back, using the cordless phone and hiding inside a closet for privacy. Ah, 1990. Shannon comes over with an envelope with heart and flower stickers on it addressed to Kristy. It was accidentally put in the wrong mailbox. The book tells us that Shannon and her sisters are in charge of getting the mail and sometimes no one remembers until after dinner. Yes, it's in italics in the book. I am not too scandalized by this failure to get the mail in a timely fashion because if we're not expecting anything important (by which I mean Netflix), my roommate and I get the mail about once a week, and sometimes much less often than that. Shannon and Kristy run up to Kristy's room where they open the envelope and find a note to Kristy from a secret admirer. It is "typewritten (or maybe word processed.)" Fancy. Shannon thinks it must be Bart, but Kristy assumes it's a joke, probably from Sam. She also says that the envelope looks like a girl wrote it because the I in her name is dotted with a little heart sticker. Shannon says, "A girl who wants to go steady with you? Kristy, grow up." I really doubt that line would be included today. Kristy calls Bart and chats with him, but she doesn't mention the note and neither does he.

Next chapter, Stacey is sitting for the Perkins girls, and takes them to Krushers practice. Shannon is there, too, and she and Stacey chat. They don't know each other very well, because Shannon doesn't come to meetings and goes to private school, but they get to know each other a bit while watching practice. Kristy and Bart decide to have a World Series for the stupid Krushers and Bashers. Kristy wants a three game series, but Bart talks her into just one game. Apparently Bart is not too familiar with the meaning of the word "series". Kristy invites Bart to the Halloween Hop, and gets some more love notes. She shows them to her friends at lunch, and they talk about the events of last Halloween, when Stacey was living in NYC again for a while. Which was in eighth grade. And Halloween is coming up again. And they're in eighth grade. I'm just sayin'. Kristy gets another note, but this one is kind of creepy.

Mal and Jessi baby-sit for the Pike kids, who are choosing Halloween costumes. Vanessa shoots down Claire's idea of being a clown. Being a clown is so pedestrian. They decide to have a haunted house in their basement on Halloween and charge kids a quarter to go through it.  Clearly they have not thought this through in terms of time spent to candy gained ratio. Vanessa is allowed to invite the other two Krushers cheerleaders over to decide on matching Halloween costumes, and they decide to dress as the Three Stooges. They check the TV guide to see if any Three Stooges shows will be airing soon, so they can copy the costumes. Don't worry, kids, you live in Stoneybrook, where black-and-white is the only kind of television!

At the BSC meeting, Kristy reveals that she's gotten four creepy and vaguely threatening notes. She's worried that someone might want to kidnap her because she is Watson Brewer the Genuine Millionaire's stepdaughter. She's also worried that Bart might be a psycho or might be trying to psych her out so the Krushers will lose the World Series. Her friends think maybe Sam is sending the notes, and Kristy points out that she totally said that several chapters ago, and maybe they should listen to her once in a while.

There's a game between the Krushers and Bashers, and the accounts and descriptions thereof prove that the ghostwriters don't know a ton about baseball. Sorry, softball. Shannon gets hit in the head with a foul ball hit by Buddy Barrett. The Krushers lose by 9 runs. Kristy is not speaking to Bart because he might be the creepy note writer, and Shannon had refused to speak to him at school.

Mary Anne babysits for the Barrett kids, and amazingly, they are going to Krushers practice. Suzi reveals that Buddy has developed a giant crush on Shannon, and Buddy threatens to tattle on her about some unspecified crime if she doesn't shut up.  Kristy has gotten another creepy note, this one with fingernail clippings in the envelope. She is really pissed at Bart now, so she's not entirely pleased when he shows up on her doorstep wondering why he's getting the silent treatment. He admits to writing her the Mystery Admirer notes, but only the first ones, not the creepy ones. He really likes Kristy. Aww. Kristy invites Shannon over, too, and the three of them try to figure out who could be sending the creepy letters, but come up with nothing. Kristy remains convinced that it's a random lunatic.

It's World Championship Game day! Kristy's a bit intimidated as usual because the Bashers have matching shirts and hats, and their cheerleaders have actual uniforms. Who funds this shit? Why aren't these kids playing Little League? Kristy always says her team is made up of kids who are "too young or not good enough" but the Bashers are older and better. Also I don't know if it was a regional thing or what, but when I was little, 4 year olds could play tee ball in Little League. A quick Google search for little league minimum age brings up a lot of places with four or five as the cutoff. So really of the kids on Kristy's team, only Gabbie Perkins the amazing two and a half year old who has enough attention span to play organized sports would be too young for tee ball.

Kristy spies Cokie and her friends in the stands and wonders what the hell they're doing there but doesn't have time to go attempt to kick them out of public bleachers. She and Bart go over the rules and she does say that it'll be a seven inning game, so I was correct at the beginning of this post, which was really a long time ago, and I'm sorry this got so long.  Cokie comes up to talk to Kristy, probably just to rub it in Kristy's face that she's there, and accidentally uses a phrase from one of the creepy letters, which clues Kristy in that Cokie was the writer. Cokie has a lot of damn free time apparently. Kristy yells out that Cokie wrote the letters and Cokie admits to it. She saw the original notes when Kristy showed them to her friends in the cafeteria, and decided to try and scare Kristy. In later books (think Mary Anne Misses Logan) Cokie is portrayed as basically illiterate, but these letters took some doing. There was creepy poetry and everything.

Cokie and her friends leave, there's a ball game, The Krushers win. Kristy is afraid Bart won't want to be her boyfriend now that her team of lovable imps beat his, but he still does. Shannon comes over to help Kristy with her makeup for the dance, but as they are doing so, Bart calls and announces he has matching lobster costumes they can wear. They go with that option and have a great time at the dance, and Bart kisses her on the cheek. Kristy has a sleepover at her house, and there's a mention made when they're taking off their costume bits about Mal's clown shoes. Apparently Vanessa's derision of Claire's costume idea didn't stop Mallory from being a clown. Kristy announces that she is taking her siblings trick-or-treating the next day, which is actually Halloween, and they are dressing as characters from the Wizard of Oz. Just as they are about to go to sleep, Kristy finds another scary note with cut out letters from the newspaper, but Shannon's laughter gives away that she did it as a prank. Kristy laughs and gets the idea to write a fake note to Cokie and put it in her locker, and then they finally really do go to bed, and the book is over.

So, yeah. That ended up being really long, which I am sorry about. Next up I have more Halloween themed books: a Little Sister, a mystery, and a Super Mystery.

LS #98, Karen's Fishing Trip

So I bought this book new a couple years back. The bookstore in the town where my parents live had some BSC books still on the shelf. Yellowed around the edges, but otherwise new. I bought three LS books and I think 2 BSC books that I didn't own, and I didn't have to get yucky old library copies off of ebay with tape all over them and broken spines. I mention this because I think I broke the spine on this book in the process of scanning some of the inside illustrations, and that makes me sad, but I think you will agree it was worth the effort.

There's Karen on the cover, rocking her side ponytail. I don't know why Karen always had a side ponytail on the covers, but she did, except for on the book where she got the mullet. She looks kind of freaked out here, like fish are gross and she is just now realizing it. Watson, on the other hand, is really gleeful with his net there.

Anyway, this book opens up at the very start of summer vacation, and Hannie and Nancy come over to play with Karen. They are all so happy they could just shit, because hells yeah summer vacation! Karen mentions that she does love school, and loves her teacher Ms. Colman. Hmm, Karen? If this is truly the start of summer, shouldn't Ms. Colman now be moved to the box of former teachers? Won't you be in third grade next fall? Look, over yonder, so tantalizingly close but yet completely out of reach, there's third grade over there.

A few nights later at dinner, Watson announces that he and Elizabeth think it would be fun to take a family trip to Shadow Lake for a week. Sam and Charlie beg off, because they've both just gotten new jobs. Sam will be washing dishes at the Five Happiness restaurant (Google results for this are for a restaurant in New Orleans; I guess Sam's got a bit of a commute) and Charlie will be making deliveries for an auto parts store. Those are actually feasible jobs. Sam's a little young, but does anyone else remember how he used to have a job delivering groceries for the A&P? It was at the beginning of the series, and I never really understood why a 14/15 year old kid with no car would be your go-to guy for grocery delivery. Nannie doesn't want to go either, because she has a big order coming up for her chocolate business. Elizabeth tells her, "If you need to stay home, that is okay," and I know I can't read tone here, but I'm thinking up sarcastic replies from Nannie when her daughter is giving her permission to stay home from a last minute vacation instead of just abandoning her customers.

I put this picture in just because two pages earlier, Karen was telling us how at the Big House they all sit on long benches at their table. Either Karen or the illustrator is lying to me.

Karen gets permission to invite Hannie and Nancy, Kristy invites Mary Anne, and David Michael gets to ask Scott and Timmy Hsu, but it turns out the Hsu family already has plans for that week. They're going to Adventure Land, and invite David Michael to come with them instead. Andrew won't be there either, because this is one of the books where he is living in Chicago with his mom and stepdad and Karen is living in Stoneybrook. Karen realizes that without Charlie, Sam, David Michael, and Andrew, it will be a girls week at the cabin! The only male will be Watson. Manicures and pillow fights ahead, yo! 

Karen, Hannie, and Nancy are super duper excited for the trip and plan together what to pack, even deciding to each bring one book and trade when they are done reading. I guess this could be a little annoying, but I so totally would have done that when I was a kid. I loved making packing lists before trips. I remember one camping trip, I'd just been reading a Hardy Boys survival guide, and added aluminum foil to the list. My mom okayed it, but when she went to look for it, she found that I'd taken a long sheet of aluminum foil and folded it up tightly into a one-inch square so I could use it as a reflector or emergency cookware or whatever. I distinctly remember feeling really stupid when my mom went back in the house and just got the whole box of foil. Also now I really want to find that survival guide again. I loved it and read it probably two dozen times.

The only sadness for Hannie and Nancy is that they will be returning to Stoneybrook the day after Father's Day, and they will miss celebrating with their dads.

At Shadow Lake, Karen explains the layout of the cabin to us. There are two very small bedrooms, one of which is where Watson and Elizabeth sleep, a main living area, three bathrooms, and two dorm-like bedrooms with six sets of bunk beds each. The girls all head for the one they traditionally use as the girls' dorm, but then Kristy and Mary Anne realize that with no boys along, they don't have to share with the 7-year olds, and they head off to the other room. Karen, Hannie, and Nancy are super excited about that, because that means Kristy won't be around to tell them to shut the fuck up and go to sleep. They decide to sleep in different beds every night, and start out by making up three top bunks.

They go to the lodge, where Karen runs into her friend Keegan, who she met at Shadow Lake in an earlier book. (Karen's Ski Trip) Karen is happy to see Keegan there, but Hannie and Nancy are giving him the bitch-face-est bitch faces that ever faced.

After they leave the lodge, Hannie and Nancy are all, "Dude wtf, it's a girl vacation, why are you talking to that guy? I swear to god if you ruin our girl trip--" and Karen doesn't want to be rude to Keegan so she convinces Hannie and Nancy that they can have a mostly girls week with a little Keegan time.

There's several chapters of the stuff they do while at Shadow Lake, and it mostly falls into the category of fun to do but boring to read about. The girls practice fishing to prepare for the big contest, but they don't catch anything all week. Emily catches a fish though. Watson tells them stories about the alleged Lake Monster. Karen wants to photograph it, so they build a shelter to wait and see the monster come up for air. In the Shadow Lake Super Special, didn't Dawn basically make up the Lake Monster because she is annoying as hell? Yet now Watson has stories of it. They play doubles ping-pong with Keegan. Mary Anne and Kristy start a business selling earrings made from fishing lures. One rainy day, Keegan shows the girls how to catch worms, and Karen catches a coffee can full of them for a Father's Day gift for Watson. For some reason Keegan's worm catching methods involve carefully digging away dirt around the worms, then getting them to wriggle onto sticks, and picking them up that way to dump them in the can. Because if it's raining and the worms are at the surface, just picking them up is too easy? I really don't know. Elizabeth helps the kids make Father's Day cards. Kristy makes a Father's Day card for Watson. Karen tells us that Kristy never sees her bio dad. Hannie and Nancy are still sad that they won't see their dads on Father's Day. Nancy finally catches a fish. Karen invites Keegan to go on her family's boat for the fishing contest after finding out that his parents are separating and this leads to my favorite Watson line pretty much ever. 

"Hmm," said Daddy. He scratched his chin. "Actually, I am not sure we will have room for Keegan."

 I stared at Daddy. "Oh, no! But we have to make room for him somehow. His parents are separated. He is so sad. I just cannot tell him that we cannot take him with us."

"Maybe we can work something out," said Elizabeth. "I bet we can find a way to fit Keegan in. Right, Watson?"

 "Yes, I guess so," said Daddy with a sigh. "I have no choice but to end up with a hundred children on my boat, as usual."

Ha! That's what you get for letting all of your kids bring everyone they know on every vacation you go on.

On Saturday afternoon, there is a huge surprise! Everyone else comes to the cabin to stay through Sunday. Sam, Charlie, David Michael, and Nannie; Nancy's parents and baby brother; Hannie's parents, brother, and sister. Everyone is very happy that they'll get to spend Father's Day with their parents and/or kids. Oh, except, wait. By everyone, I guess I mean everyone but Mary Anne. Karen knew about this surprise, which is why she is looking smug as fuck in the illustration.

Sunday morning comes, and Karen discovers that the can of worms she caught for Watson has tipped over and all the worms escaped, so she gets a pot and wooden spoon from the kitchen and runs through the cabin banging on the pot and yelling "Worm alert!" to wake everyone up. Instead of telling Karen what a horrible brat she is for waking everyone up so abruptly and rudely, Watson laughs and says worms can't travel very far, so Karen spends the next half hour rounding them up while her stepbrothers laugh at her. There is an illustration of her picking up a worm with a pair of tongs, and again, I don't really understand this worm catching method. Is Watson going to take the tongs with him on the boat to put the worms on his hook? I don't think so. So why can't Karen just pick them up and skip the theatrics? Oh, right, cause it's Karen.

They go fishing. Karen takes a bunch of pictures, but the only thing she catches is an old waterlogged baseball glove. Everyone laughs at her. Keegan wins the prize for biggest fish in the 12 and under division. Oh I forgot to mention that a few different times in this book, when they're discussing the upcoming fishing contest, Karen and Nancy make reference to wanting to win a prize for biggest or most beautiful fish. Because most beautiful fish, that's a thing, right?

The families all have a big fish fry, and the next day they go home. Later in the week, Karen's got her pictures back from the developer, and she invites Hannie and Nancy to see. They almost piss themselves laughing at the picture of Karen holding up the glove she caught, and they find one picture from the fishing contest where there is a shadow on the lake that shouldn't be there, and decide that clearly the shadow is actually the Lake Monster, lurking just below the surface. So Karen's pretty happy after all.

M#12, Dawn and the Surfer Ghost

This mystery was honestly so terrible that I had to set it aside for a few weeks to even be able to finish the recap. It's just boring and everyone in it is being stupid as hell.

Dawn is in California in this book, living with her father for a few months. Dawn ping-ponging back and forth across the country is one of my least favorite of the ongoing BSC story arcs. Except for the book where she steals her dad's credit card and books a flight. That's not this book, though, so I pretty much try not to think about the logistics of moving back with her dad for several months, moving back to CT, and then moving back to CA, this time for good, all in the space of a school year. The BSC time warp is a strange thing.

Anyway, this book. Right. The outfit Dawn is wearing on the cover is actually described inside the book, so that's one bonus point. Dawn is supposed to have waist-length hair, though, so there goes at least half of that point. I put the book at a bit of a kicky angle on my scanner so it would seem like a much more fun book, but I don't know how well it really worked.

Every chapter of this book starts with a letter that Dawn is writing to her friends back in CT, or a letter that her friends are writing to her. It seems like an excessive amount of letters, but I guess this is back when long distance calls were expensive. At least most of them are in Dawn's handwriting, which is easy to read.

Dawn reminds us that her friends in California all love to eat healthy food. They are eating spinach dip and organic corn chips. Don't get me wrong, I love spinach dip, but it's not exactly a low-fat food, and organic corn chips are still fried and greasy, I'm just sayin'. Dawn tells us that she and her good friend Sunny are going to be helping out at a flimsy plot device an after school program on the beach.  It meets several days a week, and afterward, she and Sunny will have time to surf. Because Dawn is suddenly really into surfing, and taking lessons, and she's even going to enter a competition.

On the first day of the program Dawn meets a surfer named Thrash at the shop where they rent their surfboards. He has long blonde hair, wears a distinctive ring, is about 20 years old, and is a fantastic surfer, probably the best on the beach. He's friendly while chatting with Dawn and we find that he has surfed all over the world. He gives Dawn advice about what kind of board to use and tells her it will be really stable even if she hits some gnarly waves. Dawn has apparently never heard the word gnarly before, even though six pages earlier some little kid was showing off his new ninja turtle action figure. I guaran-damn-tee you that if you were babysitting little boys back when the original TMNT was on, you've heard the word gnarly. Thrash calls Dawn by the name Kelea, which he explains as a reference to a Hawaiian princess who made friends with the water god and was a radical surfer. Looking this up on Wikipedia was more interesting than anything in this book. Sunny accuses Dawn of having a crush on Thrash but Dawn denies it, saying that Thrash is just a fascinating person.

(Dawn totally has a crush on Thrash.)

The next day, when Dawn and Sunny show up for the after school program, there's a big fuss on the beach. Thrash's surfboard has been found, destroyed, washed up on the beach, and everyone is assuming he's dead, although there's no body. Dawn feels a pressing need to go try and eavesdrop on the police who are interviewing people and searching for the body. She mentions a surfer named Gonzo, who is wearing wildly patterned jeans, and another named Spanky, who has a nose ring. He probably also has an embarrassing story about someone walking in on him masturbating in a really inappropriate location, because I can think of no other reason why someone would have a nickname like Spanky.

There is an evening session of the kids' program, with a cookout and a bonfire, and even though it is a misty night, they see a surfer out in the water, but when they run to the spot where he was, there's nothing there. Dawn decides that there is no other explanation than it being Thrash's ghost. None. She goes to talk to the police and ask if there's been any progress on the case, and says the atmosphere in the station is more informal than in CT, because the officers are wearing short-sleeved uniforms and seem friendly. I was unaware that short sleeved police uniforms were a symbol of a casual atmosphere. Apparently I live in a casual place, guys. I guess Montana is just more informal than stuffy old Connecticut. Despite the informal friendliness, the cops don't seem all that inclined to tell a random teenager whether there are any leads on the case. One suggests that since there's no body, there's not really a case to investigate. Just because a broken surfboard was found doesn't mean that someone died, and Thrash could have just moved on. This seems logical to me, but Dawn is pissed as hell that they don't seem to care what happened to Thrash. She tries to investigate by herself. She wants to prove that Thrash really is dead, and that he was murdered. I don't even know. She finds a discarded can of Thrash's special blend wax on the beach. This doesn't prove anything to me except that Thrash littered. Dawn, on the other hand, thinks maybe his ghost is using the wax.

I might actually have lost IQ points typing out that last sentence.

There's a new dude working at the snack bar, and Dawn realizes that it's Thrash! He's cut and dyed his hair and taken out a piercing and taken off a ring, so obviously nobody else has recognized him.

Dawn spies on Thrash while he's working but he doesn't do anything all that interesting. Then the day before the competition, Dawn catches Thrash messing with someone's board. She's outraged, blaming Thrash for the accidents that have been occurring, but he says he's only messing with this one board because the board's owner was the one who sabotaged Thrash's board. Dawn thinks he should enter the competition honestly, without messing with anyone's board, and she thinks she has a plan. Thrash tells her that he's been practicing at night, and she's all, nobody saw you, and he's all, goddamn you're fucking stupid, the surfer ghost? that was me.

The next day,  Dawn gets to the beach in time to see Thrash come walking up with his hair dyed back to blonde, wearing his earrings and ring. Everyone's like "Holy shit, there's Thrash!" because he looks totally like his old self now that he's replaced the earrings. Then for some reason Gonzo the surfer screams and runs away, and the cops arrest him for tampering with Thrash's board, except I don't know if there was any evidence of any kind that Gonzo was the culprit, so maybe if he'd just kept his stupid mouth shut and not bolted, he could have just categorically denied everything. 

Thrash wins the competition. He's headed off to faraway surfing lands, but gives his ring to Dawn as a gift to thank her for not letting him tamper with the surfboard. She plans to wear it on a chain around her neck.

(Dawn totally has a crush on Thrash.)

Dawn wins third place in the women's amateur competition, because this is the BSC, and they are all fantastic at everything they ever try, ever.

The subplot is that back in Stoneybrook, Marilyn and Carolyn Arnold (remember, they're identical twins, but you can tell them apart because Carolyn has a mullet and Marilyn plays the piano) have started a gymnastics class and their parents have set up a practice area for them in the basement. They've got mats and a balance beam and a huge mirror, and an "obviously secondhand" cassette deck. The twins have a routine to the song "Tutti Frutti."  Because yeah.

Anyway Carolyn gets hurt when Marilyn turns her back, so the twins become inseparable, because Marilyn feels guilty. This annoys the BSC, so they decide to make the girls do things separately. They get Haley to invite Carolyn over to play a 2-player video game (because obviously the rattail kid is friends with the mullet kid) and Margo Pike to invite Marilyn over to listen to a new cassette. The twins are reluctant at first but then decide they can be apart for a few hours.

#31, Dawn's Wicked Stepsister

You guys. This book has the most well-known inconsistency in the whole Baby-sitters club series. See, in this book, Dawn wants to take lots of sitting jobs because she is saving up to buy Mary Anne a "now we're sisters" present, because Mary Anne surprised her with one at the end of the last book. BUT. If you read the last book, it says that Dawn is the one who gave Mary Anne the present. Totally glaring error, amirite?

Oh no! Mary Anne and Dawn do not look like happy sisters at all! I hope there is not tension ahead in this book!


This book opens up at the wedding reception, where Dawn's mom Sharon is throwing her bouquet. Mary Anne catches it, and Dawn tries to congratulate her, but she's secretly feeling kind of pissy about it because she thinks she should have caught her own mother's bouquet. Then she says that there's no RULE that a daughter should catch her mother's bouquet. Really, no rule? Ya think? Also apparently Dawn had a hard time finding a vegetarian entree on the menu at Chez Maurice, which is where the reception was held.

Richard and Sharon are going to spend the night in a hotel in a nearby town. Jeff, who is in town for the wedding, is going to spend the night with friends, and Mary Anne and Dawn are going to spend one last night in Mary Anne's house, all alone. Their friends come over and hang out for a while, but after they leave, Mary Anne and Dawn wake up at every slight noise because they're not used to sleeping without any adults around.

Moving day is tense because Mary Anne is in a bad mood. Dawn tries to tell us that maybe Mary Anne just didn't get enough sleep, but it's pretty freaking obvious that she just doesn't want to leave the only house she's ever lived in. Mary Anne's kitten wanders around the house crying for six hours. Dawn and Mary Anne are going to share a room even though there are enough bedrooms for Mary Anne to have her own, because they are just soooo excited to have a sister and it will be soooo much fun. I give Mary Anne a pass here, because she was an only child, but Dawn has a brother. She should have known that siblings aren't all rainbows and unicorn farts. Also throughout this whole book, they keep calling each other Sis, and it feels like they're trying too hard.

The next chapter is at a BSC meeting and we have to hear what everyone's jobs are, and this annoys me because it's basically an appendix to chapter 2, which was when the club was at Mary Anne's old house, and Dawn already told us that Claudia wears funky clothes and Mallory has a big family and Stacey comes from New York City and no, the emphasis is not mine. So at the end of auxiliary Chapter 2, Mallory goes home sick from the meeting, and it turns out she has chicken pox. By the end of this book, every member of the Pike family will have a disease or injury. SPOILER: none of them are fatal.

Dawn describes a weekend day with her new family. Richard gets up early and makes coffee and breakfast and reads the paper, and arranges his socks in the drawer in alphabetical order by color. Oh, that Richard! He should know that Sharon hates pancakes and waffles and bacon, and let her get her own breakfast! Dawn can't believe she didn't forsee these problems. I find it interesting that Sharon hates pancakes, because IRL I only know one person who hates pancakes. I wonder if Sharon hates peaches and apples, too. And then they have a spring cleaning day and Dawn gets annoyed when her mom is just brushing shit onto the floor and Mary Anne is following her around with a Dustbuster. Then Sharon cooks supper, and it's vegetarian, and Richard and Mary Anne bitch about that, and then Richard cleans up the kitchen right away instead of waiting until the movie they're watching is over, and Dawn is pretty sure this marriage is doomed.

There's a school dance and Dawn is not going. She helps Mary Anne get ready and tries to rush her along to get her out of the house, but on the way out the door, Mary Anne yells, "Just try to enjoy the evening, Dawn. Don't think of yourself as someone who can't get a date, okay? It isn't healthy."

Harsh.

Dawn calls Jeff in California and bitches about Mary Anne, and finds out that her dad has a new girlfriend. SPOILER: way later in the series, they will get married.

Dawn and Mary Anne get in a fight because they are doing their homework and Dawn wants to listen to the radio and Mary Anne needs silence. Dawn is very excited when she turns on the radio and it is a Fifties Festival. Stoneybrook is so weird with their retro music and television. Richard sides with Dawn and Sharon sides with Mary Anne. She says she doesn't think the girls should be listening to music while doing homework. This is another thing that probably would have to be rewritten if the books came out today, because Dawn could solve the problem by popping in earbuds and listening to her iPod.

Dawn decides she will scare Mary Anne into wanting to have her own room. She doesn't want to talk to Mary Anne and suggest she switch rooms because she was the one who practically forced Mary Anne into sharing in the first place. No, talking is for the weak! Dawn cannot admit that she was wrong! She scares Mary Anne by using the secret passage and it works and Mary Anne moves her shit out and then she and Dawn get along a lot better. Then the family discusses things and Dawn tells Richard that her mom hates bacon and Richard says they should make a chore chart and Dawn makes sure to point out that Mary Anne doesn't like the way Sharon cleans things.

Other random things from this book: When all the Pikes are getting injured, Nicky breaks three fingers and the next time a sitter comes he is lying around on the couch, and he misses a few days of school.  I just have a hard time thinking I could ever have talked my mother into letting me stay home from school because I had broken fingers. When all of the Pikes are out of commission, Jessi and Kristy go to babysit, and they have to serve breakfast in bed to seven of the ten Pikes. Mallory is mostly better and helps them, and Nicky and Vanessa are almost healed and eat at the table. The others are all in bed. Fair enough, except Mr. Pike's injury is a burned hand. So apparently he was just like "Fuck it, I have people willing to bring me food, and I'm not getting out of bed." Mrs. Pike's injury was a knee injury from playing tennis, and earlier in the book Mr. and Mrs. Pike go to watch a tennis match because they are huge tennis fans. I will make a note to look for any references to that in any other BSC book ever.