Original Publication Date: 1994
Ghostwriter? Yes, Peter Lerangis
Synopsis:
Mary Anne's been sitting for the Kuhns a lot lately, and notices that Jake could use a male role model, his dad living so far away and all. She enlists Logan to come on occasion and hang out. Unfortunately, Mrs. Kuhn arrives home early one day and thinks Mary Anne was hanging out with Logan and ignoring the kids. Instead of just explaining things and solving the problem, Mary Anne just stammers out a weak apology (doesn't help that Logan runs off without explaining). Mrs. Kuhn even calls the BSC to complain, and they aren't too nice to Mary Anne about her HONEST MISTAKE.
It's also almost Halloween (the same Halloween as in the Dawn mystery). Some of the kids decide to make a couple haunted houses, one to scare people and one to be funny/gross. Logan ends up helping with the latter and Mary Anne voices concern that doing so is unfair. She needn't worry, because none other than Alan Gray helps with the other haunted house. Guess he's good for something!
Greer at http://blog.stoneybrookite.org/ is diligently posting about the BSC Challenge. Here are my next answers:
Moments/scenes from the books that stand out to you: The description of the "dark and stormy night" in Claudia and the Phantom Phone Calls, the generic and genuine fear that The Ghost at Dawn's House inspired in me before I finished it (I was young, okay?), the scene in Claudia and Crazy Peaches when Claudia finds out about the miscarriage, the Pikes eating the melting ice cream in Snowbound!, and (spoiler alert) Sunny's mom's last words in the California Diaries series (they were my nana's too).
Favorite Claudia outfit: I've never been too into outfits, so only a few even stand out in my memory, including the Ms. Frizzle outfit from Claudia and the Middle School Mystery and the one that she tie-dyed a bunch of colors that ran in the rain on her way to sit at the Newtons'.
Favorite Stacey outfit: The only one that I even remember is the one with the plum-colored pants that leave a stain in the snow in Stacey and the Cheerleaders.
Established or continued in this book:
The Girls (and Logan):
Claudia candy: Gummi worms, Mallomars, chips, Chunky bar, pretzels, Milk Duds, Heath Bars, M&Ms
This is the book in which Shannon mentions her desire to take sackbut lessons (a musical instrument).
Claudia, at first, is very sweet and understanding to Mary Anne in this book. Before everyone gives Mary Anne the cold shoulder enough for me to add to my BSC fights count.
Their Families:
Mary Anne's dad is watching his cholesterol.
The Club:
Buddy Barrett and Jake Kuhn come up with devastating insults for each other: Cruddy Carrot and Fake Prune.
SMS:
A few people from the basketball team are mentioned, and the context fits which, frankly, surprised me.
PSA Time:
You can order extras of most prescriptions, contact lenses included, before you run out of them to avoid having to go without. Or you can call your doctor's office at 4:45 on a Friday because you took your last pill yesterday (why no, I've never worked at a doctor's office and taken dozens of calls like this, why do you ask?).
Misc:
Got nothing this time. Merry Christmas to those of you who celebrate it, and to the rest, have a good Sunday.
The numbers:
Starting 8th grade: 7
Valentine's Days in 8th grade: 2
Halloweens in 8th grade: 4 (plus one in seventh)
Thanksgivings in 8th grade: 1
Summers after 8th grade: 7
BSC Fights: 9
SMS Staff and Faculty: 47
Students (other than the BSC): 165; 101 8th graders, 6 7th graders, 42 6th graders, 15 unspecified
Clients: 31
Types of candy in Claudia’s room: 97
Crushes:
Stacey-11
Claudia-8
Dawn-5
Jessi-3
Mallory-2
Mary Anne-2
Kristy-1
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3 comments:
Yeah, I guess Alan isn't all bad. :)
Hasn't anyone else in the BSC ever made an honest mistake before? (You'd think they could lighten up. Best Friends You'll Ever Have, indeed.) But then if MA and/or Logan had just TOLD Mrs. K. (in private, even, if they didn't want to say why Logan had been coming over in front of Jake), then the whole thing could've been averted. When an 8-year-old is more mature than the 13-year-olds....
Moments that stick out: Jake getting lost/hurt on his way home from the game in Kristy and the Missing Child and then Matt and Kristy finding him at the construction site and Jake asks Kristy to tell his mom where he is because he knows she'll be worried. Also when the 8th graders give Kristy the award for finding Jake during their Awards' Night.
"Continue on is redundant." But because Dawn didn't care what redundant meant, I didn't get to find out from the book and still had to look it up. Also Kristy hating that Janine points out the difference between having permission to do something and being physically unable to do something.
Jessi inviting Matt's class to the ballet.
Karen guessing that Charlie Thomas is over 35 and then Charlie says that "35 is practically over the hill" and Mrs. T. tells him to watch what he says because "if 35 is over the hill, I'd better start shopping for Geritol and Dent-U-Grip."
MA wondering if dreaming about being mortified on Author Day would make the awful things happen, even though she doesn't believe visualizing good things would make them happen either.
Stacey wanting to invite Mal to NY because she was impressed with how she handled Toby and her decision to remain true to Ben Hobart.
Mal using dibble 87 billion times in Poor Mallory!
Claudia wondering why Gertrude had to make cookies anyway and if she did have to make cookies, why did she have to measure out the chocolate because if it was Claudia making the cookies, she'd just dump in as much chocolate as she had. (I must admit to taking this same approach, at least with chocolate chips in cc cookies.)
Posting in two additions because I couldn't have a post longer than 4,096 characters.
So continuing with moments that stick out to me - Jessi working so hard along with Elise on their synchronized swimming routine.
Mallory's description of a best friend. ("Oh, Mal, Mal, Mal! You'll never in a million years guess what happened!")
Shannon giving Kristy one of Astrid's puppies.
Logan's version of his sitting job for Jakie Rodowsky in Logan Like Mary Anne!
Claudia having to hide junk food and Nancy Drew books. The idea of hiding one or the other (or both) was and is just foreign to me. But my parents don't forid junk food, nor have they ever prevented me from reading anything and everything I wanted.
Dawn - eating chicken on the flight to Cali in SS 5 but not eating chicken on the flight to Cali in Dawn on the Coast.
Probably lots more that I just can't think of right now. Will possibly add more as I think of them.
Favourite Claudia outfit: her Ms. Frizzle from CatMSM. (Though this book does show that Claudia has at least some idea that she might not look fabulous is every one of her creations because while she's in the meeting over her cheating in Principal Taylor's office she thinks that she'd never have worn the Ms. Frizzle outfit if she'd known she was going to end up in the principal's office that day.)
Stacey outfit: the ones that always stick in my mind for her are the one she puts together with the bodysuit and hot pink silk jacket from Zingy's for her dad's party in Stacey's Choice and the tuxedo she wears to Coppelia in Jessi's Secret Language.
(As for Stacey's plum pants, I remember Claudia mentioning that she'd have to wash those pants separately and I find it hard to believe she'd know that much about laundry. Otherwise she wouldn't have to worry about what her parents would say when they saw her bedspread/comforter with the melted chocolate bar all over it - in MA vs. Logan - and would've just washed it herself.)
Claudia candy: Heath Bars? Doesn't Claudia prefer Skor? Doesn't the whole club prefer Skor? Wasn't that the result of Claudia's Heath/Skor taste test?
This is the book that taught me how to pronounce 'Kuhn'. I'd always thought it was Kun (rhymes with fun), even thought the H comes after the U. But I guess it's Kyoon. And I always used to pronounce Barrett something like Bare-rett (barette) until I heard Mallory from the TV show pronounce it smoothly as bare-ett.
It's fun to see what stands out in other people's memories. Some of these I didn't remember at all!
Ha, good point about Claudia and laundry. I've been doing my own laundry since mid-elementary school (around 8-10 years old, I think) and never realizes that about her.
As for Heath vs Skor, the BSC likes one better but doesn't hate the other.
The pronunciation seems to be a common revelation for people who read this book. I guess I was lucky to know people with that last name in real life. They do pronounce it rhyme with prune.
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