#23, Dawn on the Coast

I have fond memories of this book. One day in fifth grade, my mom took me to the eye doctor in the middle of the day, and afterward, we went into the bookstore and bought this book, which had just come out. I took it to school and a few other girls were jealous that I had it because they didn't have it yet. It doesn't sound like much but for some reason, the memory has always stuck with me.

The book starts out with Dawn packing for a trip to California to visit her father during spring break. She hears her mom get home and "I could hear her kick off her shoes in the living room, drop her purse on the couch and her keys on the kitchen table. That's my mom, all right. I love her, but she is a little on the disorganized side." Judgmental much, Dawn? None of that seems egregiously disorganized to me.

Dawn is a little worried about leaving her mother all alone, but Sharon assures Dawn that she will be fine, because she has her parents (Granny and Pop-Pop) nearby and also is going on a date with the Trip-Man, who basically exists in this series for Dawn to whine about because she wants her mom to only date Mary Anne's dad. Like, in this book, she describes Trip-Man as "a real conservative type. Tortoise-shell glasses, you know what I mean?" First of all, no, I had no idea what she meant when I read this at ten years old. Secondly, being conservative is bad? Dawn, have you met Richard Spier?

Dawn goes to a slumber party at Kristy's house and the girls order pizza. Dawn wants broccoli on her pizza and everyone acts like that is the worst thing they've ever heard, although they do end up ordering broccoli on half of a pizza for her. I hate when people get all bitchy about pizza toppings, so I'm actually on Dawn's side here, and I hate broccoli.

On the flight to California, Dawn has trouble with a stewardess who looks like a Kewpie doll (another thing I had zero idea about at ten years old in 1989 when this book was published. I don't think I or any of my friends ever had one.) The stewardess doesn't serve Dawn a drink and messes up her meal, and then when the coffee and tea are served, and Dawn asks for real milk for her tea, the flight attendant gives her two packets of the white chemical stuff. THE HORRORS.

Dawn's dad takes her and Jeff to Disneyland. The first thing Dawn does is buy souvenirs for all her friends, then they go on several rides and attractions. It would probably have been easier to do the rides first and not lug the souvenirs around all day, just throwing that out there. Then, when they get home from Disneyland, Dawn goes over to her California best friend's house and discovers that Sunny has started a baby-sitting club of her own, the We <3 Kids Club. Dawn even takes a baby-sitting job for her old favorite clients.

There's a chapter where Claudia and Mary Anne babysit for the Newtons, their cousins the Feldmans, and the Perkins girls while their parents go out somewhere together. This is the second appearance of the Feldmans in the series and as far as I know it's the final one, which is too bad. (In their first appearance, Kristy threatens to punch Rob Feldman's lights out, which is not a thing she would say later on.) It's not a very interesting chapter.

Dawn's father takes Jeff, Dawn, and some friends to the beach. I guess this is the scene pictured on the cover, although in the book, Jeff tosses a sand crab on Dawn's lap instead of splashing her with a bucket. Dawn has a great day at the beach and thinks about how she really feels like she's at home in California. Then Dawn babysits for Clover and Daffodil Austin. Dawn informs us that their parents were flower children, which she thinks means hippies. Mrs. Austin is a weaver who works out of her home. I bet their whole house smells like patchouli oil, just saying. Mrs. Austin suggests that Dawn take Clover and Daffodil to a little carnival that is set up nearby. Clover likes the pony rides and Daffodil wins a pink stuffed animal at the ring toss. Dawn realizes she's gone the whole day without thinking of any of her friends or family back in Connecticut.

There's a chapter where Jessi babysits for Kristy's siblings, and Karen wants to play Let's All Come In. The boys don't want to play but Jessi says she'll play. There's nothing in the dress-up trunk to fit her, so Karen says they'll have to go upstairs in Ben Brewer's room and get some antique clothing for Jessi, because that's what people do with antique and vintage clothing in these books, is allow their kids to unpack old trunks and ruin the clothes. Karen gets freaked out because someone has written "TURN BACK!" in the dust on the stair railing and left an ominous note in the clothing trunk. Jessi deduces that it was Sam who did these things, but she makes no effort to tell Karen that, instead letting her think that it is proof the house is haunted. Great baby-sitting right there.

Dawn goes to another meeting of the We <3 Kids Club and thinks about how California is much more her style because the kids are more relaxed and eat health food. She wants to stay in California forever...or at least, maybe she does. She goes home and talks to her dad about staying, then makes a list of pros and cons about California vs. Connecticut.

Another random chapter where Kristy and Mallory babysit the gross Pikes. Mrs. Pike orders them to feed the kids canned ravioli and homemade coleslaw for lunch. That combination doesn't even sound good. Even Byron, the fatty triplet, complains about it. Adam mixes the two foods together and announces that they look like snake guts. I don't know why ravioli and coleslaw mixed together would look more like snake guts than any other kind of guts, but I guess it does. The triplets are being mean to Nicky and Nicky is upset. He talks to Kristy and says he misses Dawn. Dawn kind of misses him, too.

Dawn makes her decision. She is going to go back to Connecticut. When you even miss the gross Pikes, it is clear that your home is now Stoneybrook. She calls her mom and cries and tells her that she had considered staying, which doesn't surprise Sharon at all.

On the flight home, Dawn is on a flight with the same flight attendant who ruined her last flight, so she moves across the aisle to another section. Sharon brings the whole baby-sitters club to meet Dawn at the airport. She is glad to be home.

I don't even hate Dawn in this book and I enjoy reading all the descriptions of the things she does on her vacation. My score: 7/10.

#37, Dawn and the Older Boy

This book starts out with a BSC sleepover at Kristy's house. The girls are doing each other's hair and makeup, and Dawn describes a Claudia outfit for us.

Today, for example, she had stuck to two colors: black and white. Black cotton bib overalls over a white turtleneck with a shiny black patent leather belt looped around her waist. Black suede ankle boots and white cotton socks. Long black hair swept off her face with giant white plastic barrettes. Anyone else would look like a penguin in that get-up, but Claudia looked great.

 They get up the next day because it is 11 am and Mary Anne wakes everyone up and says she's sure the Brewers are expecting them for breakfast and they've already wasted half the day. They all look like shit because they all fell asleep without washing their faces, which is really good when you're a young teenager and prone to acne anyway. Dawn is wearing a "tattered old nightgown and three sizes too big terry robe" which is a super classy thing to bring to a sleepover in the first place. They go downstairs to find basically Kristy's entire family eating breakfast. David Michael, Karen, Andrew, and Emily are eating cereal, and Sam and Charlie and one of their friends are also having breakfast. I don't understand why young children are having breakfast at 11 am. Don't kids usually get up before 9? I don't know why Mary Anne was so worried about the Brewers expecting them for breakfast if they normally serve it at midday. Anyway the girls rush back upstairs to shower and brush their hair. Dawn spends an hour getting ready and when she goes back down, Travis the gorgeous guy is still eating breakfast. She is quite taken by the fact that he is eating granola, because nobody else on the entire East Coast eats granola. Except that he's eating at someone else's house, so apparently the Thomas-Brewer family eats granola, unless they buy it only for Dawn to eat when Kristy has slumber parties. Dawn and Travis chat, and she finds out that he is also from California. He tells her she should always wear blue, because it brings out her eyes, just like the ocean. Because that is a thing a straight teenage male would say.

A few days later, Dawn and Mary Anne are raking leaves at their house when Travis shows up driving a blue Chevy. There is some boring conversation about his car and the fact that he can drive, and then he presents Dawn with a pair of blue hair combs and tells her she should get 3-4 inches cut off her hair because it would give it a little more lift. Because that is a thing a straight teenage male would say. Also, if your hair is down to your waist, not that it ever is in the cover illustrations, and you get three inches cut off of it, it is really unlikely that anyone would even notice.

A couple of days later, Dawn is walking home from school with her friends and Travis pulls up and asks her to go shopping with him to pick out a birthday present for his dad. After a quick trip to the sporting goods store, he takes her to a restaurant and orders for her, which she doesn't like. She doesn't mention that she doesn't eat meat but he orders grilled cheese for them both. I guess this is one of the books Dawn is a vegetarian in. I should keep track of that, because in other books she just doesn't eat red meat. Then Travis takes Dawn to the Merry-Go-Round and buys her a pair of silver butterfly earrings. He tries to convince her to have a third hole pierced in her ears to wear them in because he thinks the butterflies would look better higher on her ears. Because that is a thing a straight teenage male would think about.

Here's the cover. Travis looks about thirty-five and is wearing pretty much exactly one of the outfits Dawn described herself as wearing. Dawn, despite being in middle school, apparently has a letter jacket. Maybe she lettered in baby-sitting, or maybe she's wearing Travis's jacket. Dawn's hair is not down to her waist. I don't know who the children are supposed to be.

When Dawn gets home, she gets in trouble for riding in a car with a boy her mom and stepdad hadn't met. This is one of the more logical reactions any of the parents in this series ever has, but Sharon ruins it two pages later by saying that she'll probably allow Dawn to continue to see Travis after he meets them. Richard and Sharon argue about this, because Richard thinks that a middle-school girl shouldn't be dating a high-school boy with a driver's license. I can't really disagree with him here.

At a BSC meeting a couple of days later, Kristy casually mentions that Travis is dating a really hot chick. Kristy says that she is fantastic looking. Yes, it is in italics in the book. Dawn decides she needs to see what is going on. She waits outside SHS and follows Travis and the girl. This is not the only book in which Dawn sneaks around and spies on people. Apparently it's one of her hobbies. Dawn sees Travis take the girl to the same restaurant he took her to, and to the Merry-Go-Round, and then they kiss. Dawn is pretty devastated. When she explains the situation to her friends, Kristy points out that Travis never actually asked her on a date or tried to kiss her (thank goodness), but Claudia says that a boy coming to your house and bringing you presents is a pretty strong indication that he likes you romantically. Dawn is just sad because her dreams of becoming Mrs. Travis...well, I don't know if she even knows his last name, but her dreams have been crushed like a bug.

Dawn follows Travis and the hot chick again and talks to them in the Merry-Go-Round, where Sara refers to Dawn as the little girl Travis was telling her about. Dawn is very upset. When she gets home, she talks to Mary Anne, who says that Travis spent all of their time together trying to change Dawn, instead of appreciating her for who she is. Dawn realizes that this is so, and she calls Travis to yell at him and tell him goodbye. She says she hopes he finds the perfect girl for him, but it's not her. The perfect person for Travis is maybe actually a dude, but as the book was published in 1990, Dawn does not expand her statement in that direction.

The subplot in this book is that James Hobart has written a play that he is putting on with some neighbor kids, and his friend Zach keeps making fun of him for playing with girls. They have several rehearsals for the play spanning the course of the book. I used to try and get neighbor kids to act in plays and none of them ever showed up for more than one rehearsal. James wants Zach to like him so he goes and plays with Zach and hurts the little kids' feelings. It actually feels developmentally appropriate to me but of course the club is concerned that James is changing himself so Zach will like him. At the end they put on the play for an audience, and although the audience loves it, James goes off to play with Zach after it is over instead of hanging around so people can give him accolades.

M#2, Beware, Dawn

This mystery is terrible. Not because it's a Dawn book, though that doesn't help. Not because the premise is pretty stupid, though that doesn't help either. No, it's terrible because almost every chapter is about a babysitting job. I know that's supposedly the main focus of these books, but it's really not why I liked reading them. Give me the plots that are all about the girls having boyfriends and vacations with a couple of sitting chapters inserted in such a way that you can skip them and not miss anything.

Here's the cover. How come Dawn never has waist length hair on the covers even though it's always mentioned in the books?

Even the first chapter is a babysitting job. Dawn is babysitting for James, Mathew, and Johnny Hobart while their mom runs errands and Ben and Mallory go on a hot nerd date to the library. She helps Johnny with a find the picture activity in his Highlights for Children magazine while the older two play ball or something with some neighbor kids, including Zach and Mel. As previously mentioned, Zach and Mel are only friends with the Hobart kids, not anybody else in the neighborhood. While the kids are playing, Dawn notices that Mel is calling the Hobart kids names (Croc is his insult of choice. Like Crocodile Dundee, the book explains. It feels contrived.) Dawn mentions this to Mrs. Hobart when she gets home.

At the club meeting, Dawn doesn't describe anyone's outfit. See? I told you that this is a terrible book. Then we get another chapter of her babysitting. She babysits Kristy's younger siblings. The kids want a snack, and she gets out a box of Cheez-Its, which she manages to do without making any snotty comments about their lack of organic ingredients. This book must have been before Dawn became Super Militant Dawn. She hands the box to Karen and tells her to take some and pass it, but Karen tells her that they like to eat their crackers in bowls. I approve of this, because pouring crackers into bowls is a lot more sanitary than letting four kids stick their grubby hands in and contaminate the whole lot. Mind you this is one of my personal hangups and I don't judge you if you reach your hands into bags of chips and boxes of crackers. But I'm not going to share them with you either. Then the kids have a slow eating contest with the crackers and Karen yaps about how her goldfish are getting pretend married. Dawn is thinking how it's nice to have a relaxing job where the kids are mostly entertaining themselves. But then David Michael comes in and takes her picture and tells her that there is a Sitter of the Month contest and Jamie Newton's mom is going to help with the voting and they're going to send the winning sitter's picture to the newspaper. And since this is Stoneybrook, the newspaper will probably publish it, too.

Dawn decides that she needs to really liven up the sitting job by playing a fun game with the kids. She chooses to play Let's All Come In. Frankly I am surprised I've done this many recaps without this game coming up. It's a game Karen Brewer invented. The premise is that the kids dress up in various outfits and pretend to be checking into a hotel. I'm not saying I wouldn't have played it but it doesn't sound all that fun either. Just dressing up and checking into a hotel? Yeah. I read somewhere (either Ann M. Martin's biography or one of those letters to the reader in the back of one of the books) that Let's All Come In was a game invented by her father and aunt when they were kids and the younger one had to play the crappy parts like being someone's dog. Just like Andrew does in the books.

David Michael doesn't want to play because the game sucks and is boring, but Dawn convinces him to join in and she invents new characters for him to play. Bruce Stringbean the rock star, Darryl Blueberry the baseball player, and Dawn herself dresses up as Ladonna the rock star. I am mostly surprised that Dawn has any idea who Bruce Springsteen, Darryl Strawberry, and Madonna are to make characters based on them. They seem far too modern. Not that I'm complaining.

At the club meeting, the girls are all feeling pretty competitive about the Sitter of the Month contest. They talk it over and decide not to go overboard trying to show each other up, although not till after Kristy makes some snide comments to Dawn for daring to add new characters to Karen's game.

In the next chapter Dawn babysits for Jenny and Andrea Prezzioso. It's pretty boring. There's only so much description of getting a baby ready for bed and then watching a four year old color that one can handle without eyes glazing over. After the kids are in bed, Dawn writes a letter to Jeff.

"Dearest Little Bro," I wrote. "What's up? What's fresh? Everything's cool back here in Stoneybrook. What's happening out there in sunny Cal?" 

That was better.  

I told Jeff the latest news about the neighborhood and about our mother. "Mom actually cleaned out the refrigerator the other day," I wrote. (Our mom isn't the world's best housekeeper.) "Guess what she found? That G.I. Joe you lost while you were visiting."

Two things. First of all, I hope Jeff and Dawn, despite being fictional characters, kept the letters they wrote to each other, because it would be fun to have them to look back at and remember the days when you wrote things like "What's fresh?" in all seriousness. Secondly. Why the hell was the G.I. Joe in the refrigerator in the first place? Did Jeff put it there and forget? Did Sharon find it lying around somewhere and absently hide it behind the sprouts? And most of all, how does a man who alphabetizes the soup cans have a refrigerator in enough of a state that you can hide a G.I. Joe in it?

There is a weird phone call where the caller just hangs up (ah, 1991. Caller ID would make this book so much shorter.) and then after the kids are in bed, the doorbell rings and Dawn finds a creepy note on the front step. It's made of cut out letters from newspapers and signed "Mr. X."

The very next page finds Dawn babysitting for the Rodowsky family. There is another hangup phone call and another creepy note. The Rodowsky kids are older and they notice that something's going on and they see the note. Dawn tries to play it off like it's nothing. Then she remembers the plot of Claudia and the Phantom Phone calls and decides it must be Alan Gray playing pranks on her. She calls his house, but his mother answers and says he's been at a basketball game with his dad all evening, so Dawn is back to square one. She decides not to mention Mr X to the other sitters because she is afraid it will cause her to lose the contest.

The next chapter has Jessi babysitting for Becca and Squirt. Again there's like a whole page description of Jessi getting the baby ready for bed. Becca talks her into watching a scary movie after Squirt is in bed. The description of the movie sounds really stupid, but apparently it terrifies Becca. Then after Jessi shuts the movie off in the middle and sends Becca to bed, there is a hang up phone call and a note from Mr X. She also decides not to tell the other sitters.

The next chapter has Mary Anne and Mallory babysitting for the gross Pike kids. They are eating spaghetti for dinner, and they are all being stupid with it. All of them want their spaghetti served in different ways because the Pike kids like to be annoying as hell. Oh but when I say all of them, I of course mean that the triplets all want theirs in cereal bowls because heaven forbid that Adam should eat his out of a mixing bowl and Jordan put his in the blender and drink it through a straw. They are triplets, so they have to want the same things. After the meal gets over, there is a ring of the doorbell and a note from Mr X.

Mary Anne tries to hide the note but the kids see it and proceed to be stupid with their hamster for the rest of the chapter. They take it out of its cage and put it in a shoebox and keep moving the shoebox to different spots. As though none of them are aware that hamsters can chew through cardboard. Also the hamster gets loose twice and breaks for freedom, but alas, escape is but a dream. Mary Anne and Mal decide not to tell the rest of the club about Mr. X.

The next chapter is another damn babysitting chapter. Kristy babysits for the Korman kids on Friday the 13th. Nothing mysterious happens and there is no visit from Mr. X. When Kristy gets there, Skylar the 1.5 year old is napping. Then she shrieks and Kristy gets her up. They go downstairs to the kitchen and Kristy makes hot chocolate and then the kids play a game and then it is time to get ready for bed. So, I guess Skylar was napping at 7 pm? And after getting up, is ready for bed at 8 or 8:30 or whatever? It just seems weird.

There is finally a chapter where nobody is babysitting. They have a club meeting and talk about Mr. X. Dawn suspects Kristy might be Mr. X because nothing happened when she was sitting, but she doesn't say anything. Kristy isn't dumb. If she was going to do this Mr. X shit why wouldn't she say she'd gotten a note or a phone call? Dawn's reasoning for suspecting Kristy is that she might want to win the sitter of the book contest. I don't understand why the contest results would be jeopardized by the actions of outside persons, but I am not one of the people voting, either.

The next chapter is right back to the babysitting bullshit. Claudia babysits for Charlotte Johanssen and they take turns reading out loud to each other from a chapter book. I bet listening to Claudia read out loud is excruciating, I'm just saying. There is a hangup call and then a doorbell, but no note this time. Instead, someone has covered the porch with a couple of cans of baked beans. Claudia and Charlotte hose them off into the bushes. Gross.

Then in the next chapter, Dawn freaking babysits AGAIN. This time for Jamie Newton, who spills the beans that Mel Tucker is doing "secret babysitting checks". Dawn decides that Mel must be Mr. X. She and the rest of the club spread a story that Dawn will be babysitting a cousin from out of town at her house, and the night of the fake job, they set up to catch Mr. X, assuming he will use the secret passage to try to scare her, which he does, and it does turn out to be Mel Tucker, who is mad at all the babysitters because he got grounded for two months because Dawn tattled to Mrs. Hobart that he was calling her kids Crocs. So he has been making creepy letters and phone calls, and sneaking out to leave the letters when the sitters are babysitting. That's...pretty disturbed, really. Mel Tucker's parents say they are going to take him to a psychiatrist. And Dawn goes home and the club has a pizza party sleepover, but it is too little, too late as far as non-sitting portions of this book are concerned. Oh and then at the end we find out the entire club tied in the Sitter of the Month contest. I bet Mrs. Newton fudged the numbers a little, just to save Mallory's self-esteem.

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.