“I need to English muffin.” BSC #127: Abby’s Un-Valentine (1999)

It’s Valentine’s Day (duh…) and Abby’s not feeling the love. Ross Brown asks her to the V-Day dance and she turns him down, because she’s not interested in dating, or dancing, or romance. Most of her friends don’t understand her attitude and try to get her to change her mind. Even Anna is trying to get Abby and Ross together, and when Abby realizes those two have more in common, she tries to get Ross to switch his affection. It doesn’t go right—he mistakes Anna for Abby and thinks the twins tried to trick him--but eventually, he and Anna hit it off and go to the dance together. Meanwhile, Kristy and Abby spend V-Day watching horror movies.

In the B-plot, Scout the guide dog puppy is graduating to real training, meaning it’s time for her to leave the Thomas-Brewer house. Andrew, who had gotten close to the puppy, is upset because Shannon is DM’s dog while the kitten apparently likes Karen best (stupid kitten.)

Interesting Tidbits

I love this cover. Abby has a real WTF look on her face.

Abby-logic: Valentine’s Day is not a real holiday, because they don’t close school for it. I sorta get that—especially if you don’t like V-Day—but then Halloween and most (especially non-Christian) religious holidays aren’t real, either. She also says that V-Day is just an excuse for candy and silliness, and she doesn’t like the silliness. WHAT? You’d think Abby would love ridiculosity. (not a real word, apparently, but it should be.) She seems to enjoy chaos, especially of her own making.

I like that Abby’s main objection to dating is that boys are completely immature at her age. She’s not opposed to dating, per se, and has mentioned several times that she finds various guys cute. (Including Sgt. Johnson…maybe she has a thing for older men?!? They’re…usually…not middle-school immature.)

“Mallory is no longer with us.” Whenever someone says something like that, I assume the person has passed.

One of Abby’s complaints about V-Day? Too much PDA. I have to agree with that one!

Do you think Abby read the BSC books before she joined the club? How else would she know that Erica Blumberg got the Most Creative Excuse award in mystery #4 or that Jacqui Grant was one of the girls who got busted for drinking at a concert in #76? I realize that the others could have told her these things, but who would remember all these details? She’d have to be Dr. Spencer Reid… (Yes, I am watching Criminal Minds right now. I bought the entire series on DVD in the past few weeks…)

Bad pun alert! Josh (remember him? He really only gets mentioned in Claudia book, and it’s been a while since I’ve done one of those) decorated up Claudia’s locker in candy and kiddy-Valentines. Abby mentions how…sweet…it is.

“Email and romance do not belong in the same sentence.” How true.

Abby’s version of the love story between Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert Browning (with a little bit of paraphrasing on my part): Lizzie Barrett enjoyed ill health and lying on a couch until the Robster came along. I’m remembering…something…I read once about how in the Victorian era, fainting and looking ill were trendy.

There’s this whole Little Sister plot about how Karen and Andrew’s mom and stepdad, Lisa and Seth Engle, moved to Chicago for six months. Karen and Andrew were supposed to live with them, but Karen got too homesick and moved back to live with her dad. Much like the whole Pumpkin-the-kitten-thing, it’s barely mentioned in the BSC books, until now, when Andrew moves back.

I’m not up on beef suet, but is that the sort of thing most people just have sitting around in their fridge? We never did growing up, and I certainly don't now. MA uses it to make the pinecone bird feeder craft, but I remember making the same thing in Brownies with just peanut butter, which most people DO stock.

Interesting. At one point, Abby says that neither she nor Anna has too many friends. Later, she mentions that she and Kristy aren’t close, because Kristy’s too bossy. (Read: both Kristy and Abby are bossy and the neither of them likes it when the other bosses her around.) So who does Abby consider herself to be close to?

Heh. Abby keeps turning nouns into verbs. Anna is violining, while Abby bagels herself. (Kristy’s response is the title quote.)

Kristy is actually pretty insightful about her friends’ behavior. She tells Abby that Mary Anne, Claudia and Stacey all want Abby to get together with Ross because they’re happy with their boyfriends and want Abby to feel that too. Kristy also says that she knows that people can be happy when single, but her friends have a little growing up to do. I don’t know about the last part, but some people do have to learn that they can be happy when they’re single. A friend of mine from high school constantly had to have a boyfriend, and if she broke up with one, she instantly found someone else, no matter how unsuitable, to date. She’s now married to a guy whom she told ‘propose or I’ll break up with you’ and that worked out so well that she’s cheated on him for most of their marriage. But I think it’s overstating things to say that most people don’t know that you can be happy without a significant other, especially at an age where a lot of girls have never had a date before.

Kristy relates the Abby-Ross relationship to hers with Bart. She says that she went out with him to dances and stuff mostly out of peer pressure, even though she knew she’d never feel romantically about him. Abby then stares at her…and somewhere, some people’s minds go straight to the two of them kissing. (I know I made fun of the over-‘lesbianity’ of fanfic. I want to straighten out my opinion…I don’t have a problem with ficters choosing to interpret the characters as gay. I just want to see a logic behind it, or a buildup.)

“Thanks for the roses. They’re very…pink.” Here’s what’s interesting about Ross showing up at Abby’s house with a bouquet. Claudia, Stacey and Mary Anne were all horrified that Abby turned Ross down, and that she didn’t do it gently, because she might have hurt his feelings. Seems they couldn’t be more wrong. She needs to be even more obvious with him.

Claudia spelling: cant, beleve, leeving, shes, warnd. She also uses fore for four (type that four times fast), its for it’s, groan for grown, and to for two.

Nannie has a catering business? That must also have been more of a plot in the Little Sister books. This is pauling me off. I don’t want to have to read those awful books in order to understand what’s going on in Kristy’s house! (I used to post at message board that would turn curse words and certain ‘trigger’ words into ****. The name Paul was considered a trigger word for reasons that are far too stupid and complicated to explain. For a long time, I would say that things pauled me off instead of pissed me off, since both words turned into ****.)

Jessi has to play peacemaker during a BSC meeting. It’s actually a nice role for her; with Mal gone, she’s got no set place anymore. Abby gets tired of the three with boyfriends trying to shove her at Ross, so she (not-so-nicely) insinuates that they would date anyone just for the sake of having a boyfriend. When neither side will back down, Jessi jumps in with a question about the Andrew plotline that throws everyone off her stride.

“Charlie, you’re a guy, right?” If I were Charlie, my answer to this would be so sarcastic: ‘Well, I haven’t checked in the last half hour or so….’ Instead, he actually listens to Abby and then gives her solid advice.

When will the BSC learn that their ‘great ideas’ that involve manipulating people will never work?!?

Is anyone surprised that Valentine’s Day is on Saturday? No, me neither. Moving on.

I love this: Abby makes a pun in her head, and it cheers her up. She doesn’t even need to share it with anyone else.

Kristy and Abby’s V-Day plans? They’re skipping the dance in favor of pizza and a movie: Pepperoni Man, a horror film about a delivery guy. I’d watch it! (Abby makes a horror movie pun about sitting dead center.) She even wins a prize at the theater: a giant box of chocolates to share with her Valentine. She says she’ll take it to the BSC meeting on Monday, but I couldn’t help but think that she went back to sit next to Kristy….

Outfits

Claudia: blue, white and gray woolly sweater covered in snowflakes, long black tights, thick blue socks, hiking boots with silver snowflake shoelaces

Stacey: short brown leather skirt, pale stockings, knee-high boots, soft butter-colored sweater with pearl buttons

Shannon: jeans and blue sweater

Abby: sweats

Anna: jeans and old sweater

Next: #128

“You guys wouldn’t mind if I did a little embezzling, would you?” BSC Mystery# 35: Abby and the Notorious Neighbor (1998) AND BSC Little Sister #111: Karen’s Spy Mystery (1999)

Oh, holy hell. I haven’t read this Abby book, but I have seen it summarized and nitpicked on a couple other blogs. So while I was picking up Little Sister books for my niece a year or so ago, I found this Karen book. And realized, “Hey, wait a minute…isn’t this the exact same plot, only simplified for younger readers?” And it so is. Heck, look at the covers:

Different angles, but almost exactly the same. Karen’s obviously taking notes, while Abby, being Abby…has a box of tissues so she can blow her nose. Oh, and Abby has Anna hair, but that’s another story.

Let’s start the book summary by saying how jealous I am of Abby. I watched America’s Most Wanted for years, wanting to recognize and catch a criminal. Abby’s home with bronchitis, and while watching hours of television, catches a show with wanted fugitives. Later, when she gets super bored, she starts spying on all the neighbors and realizes that one of her neighbors, Mr. Finch, looks exactly like an embezzler she saw on the show. She and Kristy begin spying on him, looking at his mail, and peeking in his windows. They get some proof that he’s actually the embezzler by digging in his trash.

Meanwhile, all the kids are building go-karts for a soap box derby. There’s a few little dramas, like the triplets not wanting to let Nicky be on their team, and a girls team (Vanessa, Charlotte and Becca) and a boys team (the Rodowskys) copying each other. At the last second, the race is won by a ‘secret’ team that Abby learns about by spying.

Interesting Tidbits

Before I get to the books—I will comment on the Karen Krap at the end of this blog entry—let’s talk about Karen’s glasses for a moment. Or rather, the one time in my life I made a Karen-related comment that wasn’t mean, and nobody was around to appreciate it. I was once glasses shopping and, as usual, hated every pair of frames. I finally found a pair I didn’t hate, and considered getting two pairs of that frame. As I was making up my mind, I realized that they had the same pair, in another shade. I ended up with two pairs of glasses, same frames, two different colors. I said, “Just like Karen Brewer! She’s my role model, after all.” And of course, no one got the joke. Maybe that’s why I’ve never bought matching frames like that again….

We first meet Mr. Finch when he’s mowing his lawn. At eight o’clock. On Monday morning. Mrs. Stevenson decides she should go talk to him, because that’s just too early. Two comments to this: a) Someone in Kristy and Abby’s neighborhood actually mows their own lawn?!? b) They should meet my old high school teacher. He lived in the school district, and his neighbors reported that he would mow his lawn at six am on a Saturday.

The title quote is from chapter two. (See, sometimes it pays to read chapter two.) Stacey says there’s enough money in the club treasury for a leather jacket she’s been eyeing. This is even funnier, given the comments about Stacey’s dad in last week’s entry.

As Abby is flipping channels while home sick, she watches a snippet of soap opera: “Oh Jose, I never knew love could be like this—or perhaps I did, before I was kidnapped and developed amnesia…” That’s kinda funny. My favorite moments on soaps have always been the ones where a) they insert random comedy and b) they acknowledge the absurdity of their situation. For the former, there was a scene between a father and son (Luke and Lucky, General Hospital) who are doing the bachelor thing. Lucky doesn’t have a napkin, so he says he’ll wipe his hands on his shirt. (He’s about thirteen.) Luke tells him to wipe his hands on the dog instead. For the latter, there was a wedding on As the World Turns years ago. A woman was sitting in the pews and muttered, “I’m the sister of the groom and the mother of the bride.” And she was completely accurate, yet no laws had been broken! Ahh, soaps.

Abby calls her mother Ma at one point. That actually sounds pretty New England. My dad called his mother Ma, and so do a lot of my cousins in Rhode Island.

Apparently, three different buses drop off elementary school kids in Abby’s neighborhood. And they conveniently all arrive at the same time…. Abby already has binoculars out, for some innocent bird watching, so she starts watching the kids instead. She doesn’t want to call it spying, but that’s just semantics. Even if she calls it looking or watching, it’s still spying. I mean, she’s observed the fact that Scott Hsu’s underwear is sticking out of his pants, for crying out loud. If that’s not snooping, I don’t know what is.

Heh. When Mal and Stacey are supervising two teams of go-kart builders, the girls—Vanessa, Charlotte, and Becca—stop for a candy break. Becca squeals and Mallory’s first response is…to ask if she needs the Heimlich maneuver. Abby says the BSC all know how to respond to choking. But if that’s true, shouldn’t they know you never do the Heimlich on anyone who can make noises, like Becca was doing? I think the funniest part about that is that, to me, that was more of a Mary Anne, worry-wart type of response.

The BSC doesn’t believe that Abby actually spotted a wanted criminal, but Kristy is especially dubious. Later, Abby is ‘watching’ Mr. Finch again, and becomes convinced she was right about him. She calls Kristy, who is so ridiculously sarcastic about the whole thing (and I can’t blame her). She suggests Abby saw him holding a machine gun, and then after finding out he was just eating dinner, says, “Oh my lord! How suspicious can you get?”

Abby calls the Mystery Trackers hotline to ask some questions about the two men she saw, trying to sort out details she was only half watching in a feverish haze. She talks to a summer intern, who is completely clueless and says something like, “Oh, cool, you spotted one of our criminals? Should I call the authorities?” I never called America’s Most Wanted, but I imagine that they have a script they would have to follow, and it never includes saying how cool the information is.

Ooh, Mary Anne goes to talk to Sgt. Johnson. He gives her a ‘Look’ when he suggests that there’s no harm in checking into Mr. Finch as long as he doesn’t know about it. Not only does that sound so wrong—like he’s giving the BSC permission to spy—but I totally read that Look as a sexy Look rather than a ‘don’t go spying’ Look. Now we know why Sgt. Johnson takes the BSC so seriously: it’s not because they’re good detectives, but he and Mary Anne have a little thing on the side. (Later, Abby says that he’s good looking.)

Claudia and Stacey do some cyber-sleuthing for information about Mr. Finch and the two criminals he might be. Janine helps them use the computer. Not only is it so far too modern for the BSC, but it’s also hilarious now. First, there’s the squeal of dial-up. And then when they search the criminals, they decide to print out some pictures of them to compare to Mr. Finch. And only ten minutes later, they have their pictures! It’s so technological!

Abby finally convinces Kristy she’s right about Mr. Finch, and they discuss the fact that Arthur Maguire—the embezzler they think is Finch—abandoned his kids, who were ‘about six and eight.’ Kristy says that all six year olds draw houses with smoke coming out of the chimneys, and all eight year old girls draw horses, while all eight year old boys draw rocket ships. First off…the hell? Really? That is the most ridiculous generalization ever. Let’s assume for a second that it might be true. Even if all eight year old boys do draw rocket ships, they probably also draw aliens, robots, cartoon characters, and all kinds of other objects. We all know, of course, that not all six year olds draw houses. I’ve never drawn a horse in my life, for example. At age eight, I was more into ‘fashion’ design.

I love that they actually built a ‘don’t try this at home’ into the plot, right before Abby and Kristy do something stupid. I have no idea what, as I haven’t read it yet. But the BSC are always doing things in these mysteries that are supremely bad ideas. When they’re not chasing counterfeiters down the street, they’re chasing dogs into suspect’s houses…

Kristy goes and peeks in Mr. Finch’s window, looking for proof that he really is Arthur Maguire, and almost gets caught. First Kristy called and made up a story to get him out of the house. I misread the part when he comes back, and thought he’d used *69 to call back whoever had pranked him. Instead, Abby actually hit redial to force him into the house, and it worked!

Claudia spelling! There was actually a brief moment of it earlier in the book, when she wrote serfing and awsome. This time, we get waching and curiose. She also uses sped for speed, there for their and herd for heard.

Okay. Now that we’ve learned all there is to learn about Abby spying, let’s talk about Karen. In Karen’s Spy Mystery, the Dawes family, who live across the street, go on a business trip to Seattle. A family friend, Bill Barnett, is going to be housesitting, and Karen is supposed to give the family kitten eye drops in the middle of the day and watch the house while Bill is at work. Karen starts spying on the house because she doesn’t like Bill. (He finds her annoying and slams the door in her face, and that’s all it takes for her.) She sees some mildly suspicious behavior and jumps to the conclusion that Bill is trying to rob the Daweses. Hannie tries to talk her out of it, but Karen follows him around and even puts a tape recorder in the Dawes house to try to catch him doing something bad. She records him admitting that he stole money from Nancy’s father’s bank, and the police take him away.

Let’s compare here. Each story features a young female who becomes convinced that a neighbor is doing something illegal. They both have a friend they can’t convince of that fact, until they do some serious spying and get a small amount of evidence. The two friends then do something unethical and probably illegal to get enough proof for the police. Not only do the police accept the tip solely on the basis of hunch and illegal evidence, but each girl gets reward money for her bad behavior.

So what did we—and the preteen girls who read these books—learn? Always trust your instincts when it comes to your neighbors? I think the message is more like “Spy on your neighbors and you will reap in moola.” I’m suddenly glad we didn’t own a pair of binoculars when I was a kid, and that the houses in my neighborhood were far enough apart to not be able to look in windows.

Next: #120

“Which team is this dog registered to play on?” BSC #110: Abby the Bad Sport (1997)

I’ve never read this book before, for one blatant reason: I knew I was going to hate the dated, non-‘people-first’ language. Actually, if I remember correctly, I started reading it and stopped for that exact reason. Let’s see if I have better luck this time.

Abby’s joined what the book calls a Unified Special Olympics team. Special Olympics athletes are playing on a team with athletes without impairments; quite frankly, the only reason I can see for this is that they can throw a PSA about the Special Olympics, because the rest of the plot doesn’t seem to benefit from that fact. One of the other athletes, Erin, is as good at soccer as Abby is, which is something Abby isn’t used to, and she’s given the position Abby wants. The two of them start competing against each other, trying to one up another, and refusing to play nice. The Krushers form a booster club to support the team, so all the kids get to see Abby acting badly and find out that both Abby and Erin get benched for two games. Abby accepts her position, apologizes to Erin (and Kristy, who calls Abby on her B.S.) and moves on.

Meanwhile, Abby’s mother decides the family needs to spend the weekend of their late father’s birthday with his parents, whom they haven’t spent much time with since he’d died. Abby doesn’t want to go, so she sorta lies/sorta misleads her mother into not making her go. He real reason for not wanting to go? She hates visiting her father’s grave, because it’s too real.

Interesting tidbits

Aaaaaand Abby starts the book with a pun on page one. She’s so late to the meeting that she’s running. You know how BSC books almost always start with the narrator describing the scene and then saying, “I’m getting ahead of myself”? This time, Abby is running ahead of herself.

Abby’s now firmly described as being medium, instead of super-tall like she originally was. This is the second book in a row to use that adjective for her.

In order to verify what I’ve said recently, Abby is indeed allergic to tomatoes and shellfish. Going back to the last book, Abby ate with the Brewers and Derek’s friends at a seafood restaurant. There would be plenty of things she could eat there, but depending on how severe her allergy is, she might have problems just eating near shellfish or if the same cooking surface was used.

Aaaaaaaaand, we have our first ‘mental retardation’ on page 6. It definitely could be worse though, because at least it says ‘players with mental retardation.’ By the way, the players with impairments are known as athletes and the ones without are called partners. I think it’s kind of offensive for them to even create a distinction.

Abby tries to convince the rest of the BSC that soccer is awesome. She tells Claudia it’s a moving art form, and Stacey points out that it’s all based in geometry. I don’t think she could convince my cousin, though, who spends the entire World Cup whining each time because it’s taking televised time from ‘real sports people actually care about.’

Did you know that Kid Kits are not kids used to assemble children? Abby is sooo hilarious.

Since when do middle schools have varsity and junior varsity? We always had A team and B team, which is the same thing SMS has in book #129.

Other players on the team: Jojo (lol), Petra, Connie, Sandy, Annalise, and Jeana

Abby admits to expecting less out of the athletes than partners, simply because they have impairments. I think that’s fair enough, because how many people with mental impairments have they ever met before?

I swear they only have a player named Petra so Abby can make the pun that she looked petra-fied.

There are seriously a whole bunch of pages just explaining soccer positions and rules, and it’s wicked boring. And, unlike my cousin, I love soccer.

Abby’s competition with Erin starts before the first practice even begins, when the two of them get into a race during laps. And then Coach Wu gives Abby’s preferred position—center forward, pretty much the plum position on the team—to Erin, so Abby’s jealous.

Ha! The name of the ice cream store Coach Wu takes the soccer team to? Thirty-two Flavors and Then Some. That’s not so subtle there.

Abby really is a horrible sport. She resents Erin for getting ‘her’ position and being more popular with her teammates, so she decides Erin is a ‘showoff’ and the rest of the team are ‘phonies.’ Later, after the team wins, she tells Erin she knows more about soccer than Erin does…after Erin (truthfully) says that they lost because Abby kept leaving her defensive position to try to score. (It may not have been exclusively Abby’s fault, but when she’s spending all her time in midfield or forward, trying to score, it makes it a lot easier for the other team to get past the defense.) Then again, when Abby was first introduced, she said she wasn’t a team player, so maybe that’s the real problem.

The title quote comes from when Shannon-the-dog decided to join the soccer game and a soccer player tripped over her.

At one point Haley calls the soccer team ‘footballers’ and Karen gets ready to argue with her about it. Haley would be right in just about every other country in the world. (Plus, footballers sounds so much cooler than soccer players.)

Mallory mentions that the triplets play soccer, yet I remember at least once Jeff complaining that the triplets didn’t like soccer. I guess it’s just a sign of the times; in 1986, soccer wasn’t very popular, but by 1997, it was a lot more played.

Stoneybrook United loses a second game, largely because Abby refuses to pass the ball to Erin, who was wide open. Instead, she takes the shot herself and misses; the other team scores through the empty hole Abby created in the defense. She and Erin get into a shouting match and nearly pound each other. The most obnoxious part of this, though? Karen and company sitting on the sidelines, saying things like “Isn’t she supposed to pass now?” “They’re not going to fight, are they?” and “They were bad sports.” We all know all that without the kiddie commentary.

Abby doesn’t tell anyone she’s benched. Instead, Karen finds out by talking to Erin, who was also benched. Kristy gives Abby a totally contemptuous look, but I can only imagine the look Kristy would have given if she’d known the whole story. (Abby didn’t tell her mother she’d been benched either, and used the game as an excuse not to go spend the weekend with her paternal grandparents.)

Claudia spelling. Yay! Hapen, rihgt, wasch, allot (a lot), leest, fighte. She also uses your for you’re, twice.

The boosters throw a carwash, which is (mostly) too boring to mention. But the first customer is the Pink Clinker, which Nannie then agrees they can park on the corner to gather attention for the carwash. They describe the Pink Clinker as “the big, old pink car.” I’ve mentioned before that I pictured the Pink Clinker as a Volkswagen Beetle, but this totally has me picturing an early-80s Cadillac: a giant boat of a car.

Odd. Abby goes running in Miller’s Park, mentioning that “from what I’ve heard” there was a fight with a developer over the park that ended with it being declared a historic monument. Umm, that happened in Mystery #24. Abby’s first mystery was #23, so she was around when that happened.

Leave it to Abby to suggest a whole bunch of really punny soccer team names when Kristy suggests a Krushers-spinoff soccer team.

So Abby tells her mother the truth about the soccer team, and about why she didn’t want to visit her father’s grave. Her mom understands her and accepts Abby for who she is and what she’s done, which is really nice, if you think about it. I mean, Abby’s apologizing for not talking to her mother and for not being ready to go back to her father’s grave…and neither of those is really a crime (or even necessarily something to apologize for). And her mom is cool with it because Abby can’t help what she feels, and she’s already worked out for herself that she made some bad choices.

So the Special Olympics aspect could have been way worse. They actually use people-first language throughout the book, and don’t refer to the actual mental impairments much. Instead, a point is made of how similar the athletes and partners are. Most of the time, the only way you can tell the difference between the athletes and partners are that one of the athletes stutters and several of them are described as acting a little younger than the partners. (When I taught special education, my students—ages nine through thirteen—largely still believed in Santa and many of them acted a year or two younger than they really were. It’s not always true, but it’s not horribly offensive, either.) The only awkward part is when Erin calls Abby on her bad sportsmanship. Abby tells Erin she’s a better athlete than Erin is, and Erin replies, “Why? Because I have mental retardation?” I cringed big-time at that point. It’s poorly phrased for a couple different reasons, at least partly because mental retardation is a dated-sounding term. I wouldn’t have been nearly as bothered if Erin had said, “Why? Because I’m in special education?” or used the term special needs or even disability.

Outfits

Claudia: crop top muscle shirt batikked in green and blue, skinny black shorts, one blue sock and one green, Doc Martens, button earrings; oversized t-shirt with purple and white soccer balls and matching earrings

Stacey: purple silk t-shirt

Mary Anne: purple striped shirt

Jessi: purple leotard

Mallory: purple and white socks

Next: Our final super special! Saaaaaaad!

“Mom, Abby’s allergic to Stoneybrook.” BSC Portrait Collection: Abby’s Book (1997)

The story of Abby! Dum da dum! Heh, drama.

From Birth to Backpack: Abby as a small fry, looking identical to Anna but not acting identically

Red and Blue Just Won’t Do: In first grade, Abby and Anna’s teacher couldn’t tell them apart, so she makes them each only dress in one color

Without Dad: Abby’s dad dies in a car accident

The Shooting Star: Abby’s family goes on vacation to Florida, but they don’t spend any time together until Abby makes them enjoy each other’s company

New Places, New Faces: Abby’s point of view on moving to Stoneybrook

Interesting Tidbits

The cover: Abby’s actually kinda cute here. And according to the note on the inside of the book, that’s actually a real Aretha Franklin CD cover.

Abby says she doesn’t approve of forcing kids to write about their lives instead of living it. But we’re also talking about a girl who forgot she had to write a whole autobiography assignment until the weekend before it was due, so that explains a whole lot.

Anna is eight minutes older than Abby, but she walked a couple of hours earlier than Anna did. I would have thought, given their personalities, that Abby would have walked early and Anna would have chilled for a month or two until she decided to join her.

This is stupid. Abby’s parents knew they were having twins. They even knew they were having identical twins and that they were girls. But her parents were completely surprised by the fact that their twins arrived early. I would think that would be something they’d prepare for, since that’s pretty par for the course for twins.

Oh, Abby. She even makes preschool puns.

Abby hates that no one can tell her and Anna apart in first grade and calls them both Abby-Anna. Being five, she can’t vocalize what’s bothering her. You’d think that the kids would figure it out eventually, since even then, the two of them had completely different interests, but it’s not helped by the fact that the two girls insisted upon identical school supplies and insist upon wearing the same outfit. It’s the same story as the Arnold twins: twins with different interests and different personalities, who dress identically. Only difference? Mrs. Arnold made her daughters dress that way. It just never occurred to Abby and Anna that they could wear different clothes and still be twins.

I’ve always wondered when schools switched to allowing twins to be in the same classroom. When I was in elementary school, twins had to be separated so they would develop separate identities. I can see how that would be difficult for some twins, though, so I could see letting them stay together for a couple of years.

Abby and Anna switch colors so that Abby can prove no one can tell them apart. When their dad comes to school at recess, he can tell they’ve switched but goes along with their scheme. Unfortunately, the girls think their dad can’t tell them apart either, and it depresses them enough that they tell their parents what’s been happening at school

So, school starts after Labor Day where Abby lives, yet by October 15—six weeks later—there’s been enough time for a) everyone to confuse the Stevensons’ identities b) the two of them to wear their colors and c) the two of them to look different long enough that they establish separate friends who know their identities. Sure.

Abby and her dad have an ongoing joke about Abby rolling her eyes and saying how much she love meatballs. I’m not sure if there’s something I’m not getting or if it’s just a lame joke. (That’s actually the last thing she ever said to her dad before he died, so I have to wonder how long it took before she ever ate another meatball.)

Oh, and with all the pasta here—the spaghetti and meatballs Abby’s dad was going to make for dinner that night, the ziti casserole a neighbor brings over after hearing about the accident—all I can think is, isn’t Abby allergic to tomatoes?

Abby overhears her grandfather say that his death was instantaneous, so her dad didn’t suffer. I was Abby’s age when my grandfather died and no one told me anything, but I overheard stuff. A lot of stuff. Some of it made it harder to sleep and some of it made me easier. Honestly, looking back, I really wish someone had just told me straight up that he had a DNR and they’d pulled the plug, but I think they didn’t think I could handle it.

Even though this book is really lame, I found myself trying not to cry when Abby and Anna were talking to their mother. It had been a little more than a month since their dad died, and there was no food in the pantry, no dishwashing detergent, a house full of dirty dishes and full trashcans, and Abby admits she’s worn the same pair of socks for three days in a row. Abby says they need to pull the house together, and her mother says she needs to pull herself together. It’s sad because it’s actually realistic. I can’t even imagine what it must be like to lose a husband…never mind having to carry on for your daughters. Hard.

I like this: Abby’s family pretty well fell apart after her father died. This was partly because he was all about routine and traditions, and her mother couldn’t stand to follow those routines because they hurt too much. They got back into routines a couple months after her father died, when Rachel Stevenson decided to pull herself together for the sake of her daughters. But it took them several years to figure out that they needed to start new traditions as a way to honor their father and become a family again.

Abby’s friends from Long Island? Elvia, Jennifer and Joyce. I go back to the idea I had last week that the writers just started using a random name generator at some point and didn’t stop to think how many people named Elvia or Joyce were born in 1984. (This book: 1997. Abby’s friends: 13.)

Oh, and apparently all/most of Abby’s LI friends were also Jewish.

It’s so much more obvious in the Abby books how all these characters are so one-dimensional. When the Stevensons decorate their Stoneybrook house, Anna picks out a four-poster bed and flowery, Laura Ashley-esque wallpaper—a match for the types of clothes she is usually portrayed wearing—and is mostly concerned about where she’ll put her stereo and CD collection. Abby picks a traditionally-masculine wallpaper with tan and blue stripes and is interested in a fold-out couch for her friends to sleep on. At their going away party, their friends give Anna violin CDs and Abby a bunch of balls. It’s obvious through all this that Anna is very introverted while Abby is—duh—the extrovert of the two, and then of course, one likes sports and the other likes music….

Actually, I think it would be a lot more interesting if Abby, the outgoing, smart-mouthed one, dressed like a future nun and played the violin, while Anna, the introverted, quiet one, were into sports and dressed like she had no fashion sense.

Anna says the title quote, followed by, “We have to go back to Old Woodbury.” (Their mother reiterates that Abby also ‘has allergic reactions when she’s under stress.’ So she’s suggesting that Abby’s allergic to her emotions?

Abby acknowledges that she and Kristy have a lot in common, commenting how odd it was that Kristy seemed to like Anna better when they first met. She does admit that she was telling her crappiest jokes at the Thomas’ house when they spent the night there, but otherwise seems confused as to why Kristy was so opposed to her in the first place.

When Abby makes a really bad rhyme-pun, Kristy compares her to Vanessa. This is both awesome and awful at the same time. I can’t decide who should be more insulted, Abby or Vanessa.

Abby gets an A-. Didn’t some of the other girls get two grades, one for content and one for mechanics? I know Claudia did, because she got a decent grade for content and a lousy grade for mechanics like spelling.

Outfits

Five year old Anna and Abby: white t-shirts, green cardigans, black jeans; overalls and a yellow shirt (Abby); flower-print dress (Anna)

Nine year old Abby: jeans, turtleneck, cowboy vest

Next: #107

“Going out with him would be like going out with one of the Pike triplets!” BSC Mystery #28: Abby and the Mystery Baby (1997)

I’m still angry about this book.

I’ve never read it, you see. But it has been thoroughly spoiled for me. I first started re-reading the BSC because I found a blog similar to this one. That blog was incomplete, only covering a smattering of the stories in the vastly-complex BSC universe. (I don’t think there is a blog out there that could cover every BSC universe book, including all the Little Sisters and Kids in Ms. Colman’s Class. Your brain would rot long before you ever got too far into those series.) I was aware of most of the BSC titles, but I hadn’t kept up with the mysteries. When I found out there was a book titled …and the Mystery Baby, I was excited. When I was a child, I always wanted to find a baby on my front stoop and get to keep it. I actually thought that if I did, my parents would let me raise it, even though I was ten or so.

So why am I so pissy? My local library is part of a large library system with a lot of branches. They have most of the BSC books, but my local branch only had about ten or twelve of them. I took home every one of the BSC books I’d never read, including Abby in Wonderland, and then I requested to have some of the books I really wanted to read transferred over from other branches, including this book. But before it ever arrived, Abby in Wonderland totally and completely spoiled the entire mystery of this book. I got crabby enough that I never bothered to read it. Why bother?

Abby finds a baby on her front stoop, and, despite police and social services involvement, the Stevensons are allowed to keep the baby. They name him Eli and the BSC attempts to figure out who he is and why he was abandoned. It turns out that Abby’s aunt, Miriam, left her son with the Stevensons because she was ill and needed to go to the hospital. Miriam hadn’t spoken with her family in years because they didn’t accept the baby’s father. Miriam recovers and she and the baby—really named Daniel—are reunited with the family.

In the B plot, Mal and Jessi suggest a ‘writing month’ and poetry slam for the kids.

Interesting Tidbits

The cover: That poor baby, sitting uncovered on a front porch in what is clearly in the middle of winter. Brr!

When Abby first finds the baby on her stoop, she is a lot less surprised that I would have been. I probably would have started off by saying, “What the…?” Abby just drags the car seat inside, gives the baby a cuddle, changes his diaper, and calls him a cute little booger. When she finally does stop to wonder why the hell a baby was just randomly on her stoop, she does the most logical thing…and calls Kristy. Kristy shows up with Nannie, which is a little surprising, given that Kristy seems to think that 99 percent of mysteries don’t require any adult involvement.

The BSC gets introduced by what they would bring to caring for the strange baby. Kristy had already met the baby and called the cops, because she’s so logical and such a leader. Claudia would make a mural or mobile. Stacey would start a college fund. Mary Anne would knit a blanket or booties. Dawn would read up on organic foods for babies. Mal wouldn’t panic because she’s used to babies and Jessi…would fit the baby for ballet shoes. Hm. Poor Mal and Jessi. They always get the short end of the stick.

At the BSC meeting, Stacey is wearing Hush Puppies. I know those are shoes, but I always imagine the fried food instead. I’m actually picturing Stacey wearing greasy yumminess on her feet.

“I know it’s a mistake to confuse fiction with fact,” says Mal, for whom there is a whole book of her doing exactly that. Maybe she learned her lesson…?

This should be a huge clue to the mystery of the baby: Abby’s mom announces they’re allowed to keep the baby, ‘for now.’ Tessie—my best friend and pseudo-sister, for those of you not in the know—is a social worker and a foster parent. I don’t care what state you’re in, if a baby is dropped off on your doorstep, you don’t just get to keep it…unless you can offer some evidence that you are biologically related.

Come to think of it, at this point, no one has stopped to wonder why the baby was dropped off at Abby’s house of all houses. If you decided you couldn’t raise your baby, where would you drop it off? I know these days you can, in many states, drop your child at a fire station or a hospital without penalty. But if you were going to choose a house, how would you decide? Abby’s house isn’t the first house off the highway or even in a neighborhood. It’s got a long, imposing driveway, and doesn’t look particularly family-friendly. In fact, if someone were watching the house, they’d realize that it was occupied by a couple of latch-key teenagers and a harried parent who’s rarely home. If I were driving around Abby’s neighborhood with an infant I couldn’t care for, I’d be more likely to drop it off at, say, Kristy’s house or the Papadakises’. There’s probably a stroller on the front porch, a child’s bike or two in the front yard, or at least a mini-van with a car seat in the driveway….all good hints that this is a family who has and loves children.

Right after I put all that logic and thought into the last post, Mal theorizes that Abby’s house was selected because she lives in a rich neighborhood. So at least someone is thinking, even if that’s really a simplistic way of thinking.

The first two clues: Abby finds a pharmacy receipt from NYC in her yard. Later, Maria Kilbourne mentions that she saw a green car drop baby Eli off.

I love how we have to be reminded that Abby’s Jewish in ‘subtle’ ways on a regular basis. Her grandparents use pretty common Yiddish phrases all throughout a brief phone call with Abby, and they all get explained. I knew what mazel tov meant when I was pretty young, and bubbelah as well. But even if you didn’t, kids old enough to read these books should be able to use context clues to determine approximately what those words mean.

Ahh. I kinda love this. The Pikes have gotten into the spirit of Writing Month…which means the triplets are writing disgusting poems, of course. Actually, everyone is writing poetry, which makes Vanessa upset. I can only imagine: Pretend you had a huge family and you only had one personality trait…and then everyone else in your family decided to tread into your territory. But my favorite part is that, even at nine, Vanessa responds to the drama that is her life by becoming a mopey, Emo teenager who hates everyone and everything. Remember when I mentioned teenaged Mal as the fangirl with the nose ring, thick eye liner and chunky glasses? Vanessa would totally be dressed all in black with even more eyeliner than Mal, still writing really horrible poetry. Only now, it would all be about death and none of it would rhyme, ‘because life has no rhyme or reason.’

This is ridiculous. The sentence above regarding Mal not being able to distinguish between fact and fiction comes from Mal and Jessi’s writing workshop. A woman in that group had written a story in which a woman abandoned her baby right before baby Eli turned up at the Stevensons’, so M&J are convinced that means she might have done the same thing. So the two of them start stalking her and never see her with a baby. She never buys diapers or baby food or anything else for a baby. Which verifies for Jessi and Mal...that she must have abandoned a baby…as opposed to the thought that maybe she never had a child to begin with….

Kristy, on the other hand, suspects the weird nanny that Mrs. Stevenson hired to take care of the baby while she’s at work…mostly just because she’s a little odd. No solid concrete evidence, but that’s never stopped Kristy before.

The BSC and Anna are looking at the Stevensons’ Bat Mitzvah pictures when Claudia spots a cute boy. The title quote is Abby’s response. (I almost went with ‘Check out Kristy in a dress,’ Stacey’s commentary on the photos.)

Claudia spelling: Malory, quesion, whant, writter, leav. She also uses no for know and your for you’re. It’s a joint entry with Mal, and all I could think during the first part was, how does Mal not go through and copyedit Claudia? I would have such a hard time with that if it were me. But then Mal ends the entry by suggesting it’s a good thing that Claud doesn’t want to be a writer, given her spelling. Ha, ha! This is actually followed by a mistake where Abby says that Claudia wasn’t offended by Stacey’s joking, not Mallory’s.

I like this, too: The Arnold twins are fighting over ridiculous things like the fact that Carolyn is jealous that Marilyn’s toothbrush is purple and hers is ‘ugly green.’ That sounds almost exactly like 20 different arguments that my sister and I used to have. Realism!

Carolyn really is a girl after my heart in this book. When she sets up a writing station, she includes paper, pencils, a dictionary, a thesaurus…and a baby name book. I name a lot of characters through baby name books. Although, why do the Arnolds have a baby name book? You can’t imagine they used one to name their twins, who have the stupidest twin names ever. (What would they have named two boys? Sean and John? Mark and Clark?)

This should be enough for most people to solve 90 percent of the mystery. Abby called the pharmacy on the receipt she’d found and attempted to verify it wasn’t her mothers. She checked on whether they had any prescriptions in her mother’s name, Rachel Stevenson, and even her mother’s maiden name, Goldberg. Obviously, the pharmacy had never heard of HIIPPA or however you spell it, because they had no problem telling Abby they had a prescription in the name of M. Goldberg. A couple chapters later, Abby sees the name Miriam written in her mother’s office and remembers that’s her aunt, the sister her mother talks about. Obviously, Miriam Goldberg would be the M. Goldberg from the pharmacy.

Come to think of it, the Goldberg family isn’t exactly the most forgiving bunch, is it? Between Rachel and her parents not talking to Miriam for years and Gram Elsie not talking to her sister for years over a little case of blabber mouth, they really are unforgiving. It’s actually kind of interesting because you can see Abby pushing her little family unit not to be like that in a few books. The Stevensons aren’t as dysfunctional as say, the Kilbournes, but they aren’t really terribly close either.

Abby actually makes the M. Goldberg connection after she realizes that Miriam is ‘Eli’s’ mother. Abby’s mom had been horrified/fascinated by the blanket the baby had been wrapped in. When Anna and Abby finally find a picture of Miriam, she’s barely more than a baby herself, clutching the same blanket.

“You’ll be grounded for fifteen years.” I can’t decide whether Anna is serious or hyperbolic.

Apparently Miriam was never married to Daniel’s father, which is pretty progressive for a BSC book. But it sounds to me that Abby’s grandparents largely disowned her because she was in a relationship with this guy, but long before she ever got pregnant. Makes you wonder: was he a drug dealer? A pimp? A hippie? Hmmm….

Abby actually likes the triplets’ rap about boogers and puke. Makes the comment about wanting to date one of them take on a whole different spin. Hee hee!

Just when I thought the ‘Mary Anne cries about everything’ shtick couldn’t get any worse, she actually cried at a song about chlorophyll.

So what happened to our other suspects? Mal and Jessi’s suspect, as you can imagine, never had a child; her story was just a story. And the nanny was nervous because this was her first nanny job, so she was acting a little jumpy. That’s it, that’s all. Lame.

Outfits

Claudia: red flannel mini-dress, black and white checked vest, black tights, red high tops, red scrunchie

Stacey: stonewashed jeans, white shirt, green v-neck sweater, brown hush puppies

What’s next? #106

“…as if her earlobes were these weird earlobe cat doors.” #96: Abby’s Lucky Thirteen (1996)

Oh, boy! I kinda like this book. Abby gets in trouble for something that really isn’t her fault, which happens sometimes in real life. Plus, as I’ve said before, I like Abby and I especially like the fact that Abby isn’t really studious and her mother isn’t all Kishi-like about it. Abby’s allowed to get mediocre grades without it causing World War III in her house. It’s a nice contrast to poor Claudia, and realistic to boot.

Before I explain that any further, let’s vlog the BSC and social media.

And yes, you’ve seen all of me now!
Abby buys a ‘study guide’ off a kid she doesn’t know for a test she didn’t prepare for. What she doesn’t realize is that the guide is actually a copy of the test with the answers all written in. The teacher figures out what’s going on because a group of kids all have the same exact answers to every question, including the ones that were wrong on the ‘study guide.’ Abby tries to explain that she didn’t know what she was buying but the teacher doesn’t believe her, so she gets suspended. Meanwhile, Abby and Anna are studying to become Bat Mitzvahs and all these family members are coming together. Abby’s mom catches her trying to hide her suspension. Abby learns a lesson about being and adult because of all of this. Best of all, after another BSC member almost buys a study guide as well, Abby is vindicated in the eyes of her teacher.

In the subplot, the parents of Stoneybrook decide to turn off the television, so the kids start making up their own television shows and acting them out.

Interesting Tidbits

The cover: Abby looks really Goth, especially compared to Anna in pink.

Am I the only one who has the urge to pronounce Anna as ‘Ana’, like Princess Anna from Frozen? I’ve always said it that way, and I’m not sure why.

Right above the ‘manuscript assistant’ notification in this book is another thanks, to a group of people who shared their Bar Mitzvah and Bat Mitzvah stories. One of them is David Levithan. Think it is the David Levithan?

Abby says she used to be the star of her old middle school’s soccer team, but in #89, Anna said Abby wasn’t a team player and didn’t join sports teams. I guess the authors changed their mind.

Abby makes a couple of violin puns so bad I’m not going to repeat them. Instead, I’ll do it one better and quote Emily Litella: “What’s all this fuss I keep hearing about violins on television?”

Did you know a Bat Mitzvah can’t bite you in the ankle? I learn something new every time I read a BSC book. *snicker*

Real book: Turning Thirteen.

Abby starts off by sorta lying to her mother. She was out with a cold two days before a math quiz she flunked. She tells her mother her teacher didn’t care that she’d been out, which was true. But Abby doesn’t mention that she’d been neglecting her math for a while before and didn’t work on it at all during her two days out sick.

This is (slightly) interesting (probably only to me): Abby lists the members of the group and calls Jessi Jessica. But she calls Kristy and Stacey by their nicknames. I’m not sure what that means, but I find it intriguing.

Also interesting, and something a lot of feminists say: Abby posits that people who call Kristy bossy are just uncomfortable with a self-assured, outspoken female. I disagree to some extent—Kristy IS bossy—but it’s sort of true. The friend of mine I mentioned in my vlog who is all about causes is, among other things, all about feminist causes. She says that people who call women bitches are just uncomfortable with a confident woman who won’t back down…which I don’t completely disagree with.

Abby likes Claudia’s snacks…because athletes need carbs. This is proof that you can twist any piece of information any way you want to make it sound good. This, and my local newspaper, and my Facebook feed….

Claudia showed up to the BSC meeting looking like a bumble bee. See below.

Mallory’s mentioned having brown eyes, but I swear the whole Pike family has blue eyes. Anyone back me up on this? I know they mention it in book #14, but they also say Mallory has chestnut-brown hair in that book as well. In later books they alternate between saying her hair is red or reddish brown.

Abby keeps referencing Leave it to Beaver. It’s what she was watching instead of doing her homework, and then she’s thinking about how surreal it is during math class instead of paying attention. (Sidenote: The Cleavers? Surreal? Really? Abby doesn’t say surreal, but it’s what she’s alluding to. I guess in an era of divorces and dysfunctional families, the ‘Gee Shucks’ type of world of Leave it to Beaver would seem pretty surreal. Never mind.)

Claudia spelling: terible, plott, parnts, togethar, telavision. Oh, and she references Jeny Prezzziohso. Hee hee!

Hmm. Mary Anne’s babysitting for the Arnold twins, and it got me thinking: does AMM think that all identical twins have completely opposite personalities and one of them likes music? I knew a set of identical twins when I was young whose names were just as similar as Marilyn and Carolyn, and the two of them would finish each other’s sentences and liked all the same things. As they got older, they could have developed separate interests, but I always pictured them being more like Adam and Jordan Pike, who share the same interests and are very good friends….

Mr. Arnold is Jack. Why are so many dads in this series Jacks/Johns/Jonathans?

Margo is a fan of a show called Mr. Pinhead. I’d watch it!

This is funny: Claudia suspects that Jenny Prezzioso (Jeny Prezzziohso?) will grow up to be a patron of home shopping networks.

“When in doubt, eat chocolate.” It’s a slogan MA once saw on a t-shirt. How did she see my shirt? (Okay, I don’t really own a shirt that says that. But I want one now!)

Abby is startled to discover the study guide another kid she didn’t know sold her was a copy of the actual test. She tries to get up the nerve to tell the teacher what happened, but it doesn’t happen. And then—I like this—her conscience gets the better of her and she keeps having nightmares and being plagued by having done something wrong. Buying the study guide—if it actually was a study guide, like Abby assumed—wasn’t wrong, but not telling the teacher the truth once she figured out what was going on was.

Anna quotes a Nike commercial, but doesn’t mention the brand name. She just says ‘athletic shoes.’ At first I thought this was funny because they have no problem mentioning certain brand names in this series—Laura Ashley, anyone?—but then I realized it was more Anna not being athletic herself and only paying a little attention to the commercials. She heard the ‘Just do it’ but not the rest of the ad.

Abby’s math teacher is Ms. Frost, which leads to this: “Her voice was cold. And for once, no pun is intended.”

Abby and four other kids are all suspended. Much like another math-cheating story, the teacher becomes concerned because Abby’s score is exactly the same as the other kids. Not only that, they all missed the same question…in the exact same way. I can understand both the teacher and principal’s assumption that the kids cheated. And in a way, they did. They didn’t copy each other, Shauna style, but they cheated all the same. (Abby’s cheating was, of course, inadvertent.)

Okay, so here’s the thing that gets me. Abby doesn’t want her mother to know about the suspension, so she erases the message from the school on her answering machine. In my experience, that kind of deception makes things much worse. I would have been in so much trouble if I’d gotten suspended at Abby’s age…but so much more trouble if I’d erase an answering machine message about it. Anna even says as much to Abby when she finds out. (See below.)

Mallory: “You can tell Vanessa’s really upset. She forgot to speak in rhyme.” And Mal doesn’t whisper this to one of the other sitters…she says it out loud, causing half the group (which includes all the Brewer-Thomas kiddos, the Pikes and the Braddocks) to snicker.

The combined group then goes on to create their own ending to a Ghostwriter-style kids mystery show called Cassandra Clue’s Casebook that they love. I was thinking of a book I’d read where the children created their own soap opera based upon The Edge of Night. I was realizing how similar the two plots were…when I realized that the other book was Ann M. Martin’s Belle Teal. Now it all makes sense.

Abby actually takes the bus to school even though she’s suspended. When I was in school, they told the bus drivers when kids were suspended so that they wouldn’t let them on the bus. I know her mom is home, so she has to leave the house, but wouldn’t it have been just as easy to leave the house and then walk into town? Especially because she lies to the BSC so they don’t know about the suspension either. She tells them she’s staying home to study her Torah. How does she get on the bus and not arouse Kristy’s suspicions?

This is funny: “It sounded almost as if I were missing school. Even worse, it sounded as if I were missing the school lunches!”

Ha! I do love this as well. Abby goes to eat lunch at Pizza Express the last day of her suspension…and her mother catches her. Going back to what I said earlier, it’s hard to tell whether Abby’s punishment is worse because she lied to her mother, but I do know this. Abby’s more hurt by her mother considering her a liar and saying she’s disappointed in her, than she is by the month-long grounding.

Come to think of it, Abby’s grounding is a lot less severe than Kristy’s from the last book. Yes, it’s a lot longer, but she’s allowed to go to her afterschool activities and babysit…she just can’t visitors or make phone calls.

I do like this, too, for its realism. When Abby told Ms. Frost the truth about the ‘study guide,’ she didn’t believe her. It does sound like a bit of a ridiculous story, after all. (Think about it as an adult…why wouldn’t Abby realize what she had was a copy of the test? And how did she come to buy it from someone she doesn’t know?) But then Mary Anne also buys a copy of the test from the same student, but Abby stops her from using it. The two of them go see Ms. Frost together. Because Mary Anne is a good student who doesn’t pull the kind of crap Abby does in class, Ms. Frost actually believes her. That’s the part that rings true the most to me, having taught school before. Also, I like the fact that Ms. Frost acknowledges that Abby was the only one of the five students suspended who explained what happened, which should have been a hint that she was telling the truth.

Building on the Belle Teal comment from earlier, Stacey refers to the kids’ ongoing drama as a soap: The Young and the Reckless. Another, Smaller World. I’ve always been amused by made up soap opera names, because they’re either jokes upon real soap names (like these) or sound exactly like the joke names, only less jokey. (The Brash and the Beautiful, for example.)

“Who knows what weirdness lurks in the hearts and minds of people and jerks.” Thank you, Vanessa. Even funnier, though, is that the ‘soap’ starts with a keyboard ‘organ’ and sauce pan ‘cymbal’ theme song. Soap operas haven’t had themes like that since the seventies at the latest, and this is a bunch of kids who, at this point, were born in the late 80s.

Mallory chides Stacey for not knowing about the kids’ drama because it’s all over the notebook. Stacey changes the subject. Hee hee!

I once read an essay on the history of what Jewish people named their children. First generation Americans and people whose children would be first generation wanted their children to fit in, so they didn’t give them Hebrew or Yiddish names. They found what the essay called ‘English Gentleman’ names, such as Sheldon, Morris, and Morton. Over several generations, those names became known as ‘Jewish names’, because other groups weren’t using them. So then they started straying away from those names in order to blend in again. By the seventies and eighties, the popular names for the country were also popular for Jewish parents. But at the same time, some families started moving back toward Biblical names (which, it must be pointed out, were also on the rise in the general population). But that led to traditional Hebrew and Yiddish names coming back into favor as well. These days, many Jewish parents don’t mind giving their children names that mark them as Jewish.

What was the point of me bringing that up? We get an extended Stevenson family tree synopsis in this book. Some of her relatives have the English Gentlemen names like Morris and Mort. Others have Biblical names like Ruth, David, Micah, Esther, Saul, and Aaron. And other names are neither, like Jean, Amy and Sheila.

Two last notes about this: Abby thinks her family is huge because there are seventeen people in it, including great aunts and second cousins and whatnot. Uh…I have twenty-four first cousins. I counted up recently and if I were to invite my family—parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins (and their spouses and children)—to my wedding, I’d have to invite 78 people. And it would number in the hundreds if I invited all my grandparents’ siblings and their children and grandchildren….

And Abby says her mother has no siblings, which sets up a whole plot that pops up later…

There are a whole bunch of vague description of all the party clothes everyone (including all of Abby’s little cousins) are wearing, but I’m only going to put complete outfits that characters were know about are wearing. I’m trying to figure out why Mary Anne is wearing exactly the type of clothes she fought to stop having to wear at the beginning of the series.

Abby and Anna each have to give a sermon about what being an adult in the eyes of Jewish law means to them as part of their Bat Mitzvah. Anna plays something on her violin (which feels like cheating but suits her all the same.) Abby, on the other hand, talks about how important it is to make the right decision in all choices and to be honest and truthful. She actually does sound like an adult at this point. Isn’t it amazing that she had this adventure so that she could learn all this and have something to talk about?!?

Abby and Anna, like most religious Jewish people, also have Hebrew names. Logically, their Hebrew names are Avigail and Hannah. Abby mentions that Abigail/Avigail means “father’s joy”, so it’s very appropriate for her situation. Makes you wonder if that’s why it was chosen for the Name the New Sitter contest winner.

Abby mentions her twentieth high school reunion and Shannon shrieks that she doesn’t want to be that old ever. This is both realistic (I think a lot of kids feel that way) and funny. Especially considering that, for people who grew up with the BSC, 38 isn’t that old anymore. Hell, some of the original readers from the mid-80s are probably older than that themselves.

Outfits

Claudia: leopard tights, black ankle boots, black bike shorts, yellow leotard, black fuzzy sweater with yellow buttons, leopard earrings (see the title quote); tunic shirt, long skirt, lace socks

Mallory: rust brown sweater and jeans

Jessi: rose turtleneck, jean skirt, tights, pink legwarmers and flats

Brad Simon (the kid who sells the tests): jeans and flannel shirt

Kristy: corduroys and button down shirt under sweater

Mary Anne: yellow wool skirt, dark tights, plaid vest, turtleneck

New characters

Amy and Sheila (5 and 3)—24 and 22

Sarah and Lillian (5 and 4)—24 and 23

Aaron, Bette and Jonathan (6, 4 and 2)—25, 23, and 21

Next: #97