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The Baby-sitters Club

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Post  queenofdenile Fri Nov 16, 2012 9:25 pm

The Baby-sitters Club is getting an e-book release, at least of the first twenty books. I figured it was a good time to open a new thread.

Ann M. Martin also talked about her top 10 of the first 20 books here, and if she thinks The Ghost at Dawn's House is top 10-worthy but Mary Anne Saves the Day isn't, she's smoking more crack than Mary Anne in that hilarious fanfic I can't find.
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Post  Gilraen Fri Nov 16, 2012 9:59 pm

Ann M. Martin seems like a nice person, but this cracked me up:
“It never occurred to me that after I wrote this book I would hear from so many readers who actually recognized the warning signs of diabetes and diagnosed themselves based on Stacey’s story.”
Ann, everyone who read that book diagnosed themselves with diabetes!

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Post  Unlucky Bear Fri Nov 16, 2012 10:49 pm

Ha, that is so true. I lived in constant fear of getting diabetes every time I was thirstier than normal growing up.
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Post  mayram Fri Nov 16, 2012 10:55 pm

queenofdenile wrote:The Baby-sitters Club is getting an e-book release, at least of the first twenty books. I figured it was a good time to open a new thread.

Ann M. Martin also talked about her top 10 of the first 20 books here, and if she thinks The Ghost at Dawn's House is top 10-worthy but Mary Anne Saves the Day isn't, she's smoking more crack than Mary Anne in that hilarious fanfic I can't find.

Seriously, 10 books out of 20 is a pretty wide margin and Mary Anne Saves the Day was pretty pivotal (it's where she introduces Dawn, right?) Although I have less of a problem with her inclusion of The Ghost at Dawn's House (I can relate to her Nancy Drew-inspired fantasies of discovering a mystery in your house) than with Miss Stoneybrook and Dawn or Jessi's Secret Language from the list.

However, I'm totally with her on this one:

Book 8: Boy-Crazy Stacey
“The setting for this book was inspired by my love affair with the Jersey Shore. I grew up vacationing in Surf City, Avalon, Stone Harbor, and Cape May.” David Levithan also names Boy-Crazy Stacey as his favorite BSC title: “You can’t go wrong with a summer at the shore.”

Hands down my favorite BSC title and the Jersey shore backdrop is a huge part of it. It totally reminded me of my Jersey shore summers and I still reread it like once a year.

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Post  Gilraen Fri Nov 16, 2012 11:04 pm

As a West Coast girl, I could not relate to the Jersey Shore, but it sounded magical. What was that hamburger place they'd go to with the tree that you picked a ticket from? And possibly they had a sauce made by mixing ketchup and mustard together?

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Post  katesti Fri Nov 16, 2012 11:43 pm

Yes! I LUV Boy-Crazy Stacey. It's how I found my favorite book of all time, actually - Mary Anne packs A Tree Grows In Brooklyn, but it's only mentioned in passing. When I was ten-ish, I saw it in my school's library and checked it out, not knowing anything about it. I eventually stole that copy and have two additional copies on my shelves right now. So thanks "Ann"! (Or, maybe Ann was still writing at that point? It was only book eight, after all...)

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Post  big chicken Sat Nov 17, 2012 12:04 am

Poor Mallory. None of her books are among Ann's favorites.

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Post  Arabella Sat Nov 17, 2012 12:09 am

big chicken wrote:Poor Mallory. None of her books are among Ann's favorites.
That's somehow fitting, though, isn't it?

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Post  queenofdenile Sat Nov 17, 2012 12:17 am

Although I have less of a problem with her inclusion of The Ghost at Dawn's House (I can relate to her Nancy Drew-inspired fantasies of discovering a mystery in your house) than with Miss Stoneybrook and Dawn or Jessi's Secret Language from the list.

I definitely preferred Little Miss Stoneybrook...and Dawn to the ghost one, mostly because I think Ann M. was TERRIBLE at writing any of the mystery-esque books, and the Little Miss Stoneybrook one at least had amusing bitchiness among the eighth-grade babysitters. But I'm also biased because I hate Dawn and even prefer Mal and Jessi to her.

(Or, maybe Ann was still writing at that point? It was only book eight, after all...)

I've read that Ann didn't start passing off the duties to ghostwriters until the mid30s books, so you can definitely thank her for A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.
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Post  particle_person Sat Nov 17, 2012 12:22 am

Dawn was how I learned what cappuccino was. I think that was in one of the Super Specials?
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Post  eventide82 Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:00 am

I can barely remember any of the Super Specials except the one where Watson Brewer (I think?) pays for them all to go on that cruise. I have no idea why this one sticks in my mind, since we had all of them growing up and I read them about a billion times.
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Post  LadyGayle Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:12 am

The only I Super Special I remember at all is the one where they go to summer camp and Mary Anne gets in trouble for trying to sneak over to the boy's camp to see Logan. And I think someone started a food fight at some point.

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Post  big chicken Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:59 am

There was one where they win the lottery and go to California to visit Dawn's father. I remember thinking Dawn's dad was an idiot to agree to chaperone all those girls even if his girlfriend did help out. Mallory dyed her hair blonde and bought a bunch of makeup and then Stacey and Claudia ended up buying the makeup from her.

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Post  katesti Sun Nov 18, 2012 1:20 am

I LOVE the Super Specials. There were two winter-y ones that were great, one where they went on a class trip to a very Shining-seeming lodge and there was a Dramatic Bus Accident, and then the one where they got snowed in and Stacey and her mom got stuck in the car after they went malling (a term I still use). Others that haven't been mentioned are the one where Claudia and Dawn get shipwrecked, the one where they all go to New York to see Stacey, and the one where they all go to some lake and Sam and Stacey pine. Again. Some more.

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Post  particle_person Sun Nov 18, 2012 1:37 am

I read the New York Super Special and the cruise one. I don't think I read any of the others. For some reason the cruise sticks out in my mind too, maybe because I'd never been on a cruise so OMG.
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Post  queenofdenile Sun Nov 18, 2012 1:44 am

There was also the one where they all performed Peter Pan for the school play, and it was amazing. Jessi was convinced she'd be cast as Peter Pan except they gave the part to Kristy, and Jessi was all petty and jealous and had a personality trait other than "black." Dawn had a feminist rant about the show and it was actually pretty funny, and Sam and Stacey were the Darling parents and had awkward chemistry.
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Post  big chicken Sun Nov 18, 2012 2:14 am

I love the one where Claudia and Dawn got shipwrecked because I love survival stories even if they were never in danger of dying.

Was Claudia ever diagnosed with a learning disability or was she just a creative/inattentive speller? Didn't she spell her own name wrong once or was that in a fanfic?

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Post  Gillian Sun Nov 18, 2012 3:33 am

I'm pretty sure the only Super Specials I never read were the one where they went to camp and the Peter Pan one. I did get my hands on a copy of the camping one a year or so ago when a teacher at my school was getting rid of a bunch of books from her classroom library. I'm kind of mad at myself for not reading it yet after all this time.

I think my favorite Super Special was the one where they went to Watson's cabin at the lake. It's the one I remember re-reading most often. I also remember of the Super Special mysteries where it was winter and somebody was stalking the girls in the club. They went out to the lake at one point, and the bad guy followed them there. I'm pretty sure that's where the final showdown took place, but I'm not positive.

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Post  punkysdilemma Sun Nov 18, 2012 4:35 am

Gilraen wrote:As a West Coast girl, I could not relate to the Jersey Shore, but it sounded magical. What was that hamburger place they'd go to with the tree that you picked a ticket from? And possibly they had a sauce made by mixing ketchup and mustard together?
I believe that would be Burger Garden, where the servers are dressed as animals and you sit on mushrooms.

...silly-billy-goo-goo.
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Post  inversed Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:15 pm

I LOVED the shipwrecked Super Special! When I was little, my sister's boyfriend came over for Christmas and gave me one of the Super Specials so I immediately loved him forever. When my sister broke up with him (because he was kind of a deadbeat loser), I was devastated. How could she leave someone who gave me a BSC Super Special?!?!

I always wanted to like Mallory because she loved to read and write stories like me, but man she was just so annoying, wasn't she?

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Post  pinguerin Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:37 pm

big chicken wrote:I love the one where Claudia and Dawn got shipwrecked because I love survival stories even if they were never in danger of dying.

Was Claudia ever diagnosed with a learning disability or was she just a creative/inattentive speller? Didn't she spell her own name wrong once or was that in a fanfic?

I think she was diagnosed with some kind of learning disability at one point, but I could be misremembering.

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Post  queenofdenile Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:57 pm

I also love the Claudia/Dawn shipwrecked one because Claud's my favorite and gets to kick ass and save the day.

One thing that alternately cracks me up/enrages me about the books is how possessive and bratty the baby-sitters get whenever one of them makes friends outside the club or develops her personality in any way. It was bad enough when the BSC became icy and mean the second Claudia started hanging out with Ashley Wyeth, and they were all shocked and horrified when Stacey wanted to pass up babysitting for a date with her boyfriend, but I don't think anything beats the way they froze out Mary Anne when she got a haircut.
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Post  Francie Nolan Sun Nov 18, 2012 1:09 pm

Was the NYC Super Special the one where Kristy orders filet mignon but she pronounces it "fill-it mig-non" because she is not from NYC and therefore not sophisticated like Lane and Stacey? Or was that just a regular book? I always felt a little smug about that, because I was a) from NYC (albeit an outer borough), b) had eaten filet mignon at my cousin's wedding, and c) knew how to properly pronounce filet mignon. In my mind, I passed the Ann M. Martin litmus test for sophistication.

I think Claudia was diagnosed with dyslexia at some point, right? I remember her spelling her name "Caludia" once, but maybe that was just the internet making fun of Claudia?

I distinctly remember doing a book report in fourth grade on one of the Mystery Specials--Kristy and the Missing Child, I think? The one where one of Kristy's Krushers goes missing and they find him at a construction site. I cut out letters and spelled out the title to make it look like a ransom note, of course.

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Post  big chicken Sun Nov 18, 2012 3:10 pm

queenofdenile wrote:I also love the Claudia/Dawn shipwrecked one because Claud's my favorite and gets to kick ass and save the day.

That's why I loved the shipwrecked on too. In general, I liked Dawn but she was condescending to Claudia in this one so I was glad when she fell apart and Claudia was all WE HAVE TO FIND SHELTER AND WATER AND MAKE A FIRE AND FIGURE OUT A WAY TO SIGNAL PASSING AIRPLANES AND RATION THE FOOD. Meanwhile, Dawn made sure the kid who got a fever didn't roll into the fire.

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Post  katesti Sun Nov 18, 2012 4:53 pm

punkysdilemma wrote:
Gilraen wrote:As a West Coast girl, I could not relate to the Jersey Shore, but it sounded magical. What was that hamburger place they'd go to with the tree that you picked a ticket from? And possibly they had a sauce made by mixing ketchup and mustard together?
I believe that would be Burger Garden, where the servers are dressed as animals and you sit on mushrooms.

...silly-billy-goo-goo.

If we're doing Claire, I'm pretty sure she's the one who called it Gerber Garden.

Speaking of Laine! I've spend twenty-five years trying to figure out how pronounce her name correctly. Remember when she and Stacey went in a limo to Tavern on the Green and the terrible rollerskating Andrew Lloyd Webber show?

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