Welcome Back, Stacey! (RS#28)

Original Publication Date: 1989

Ghostwriter? No

Synopsis:

Remember how Stacey's parents have been fighting? Well, they're divorcing now. Stacey takes the news hard, as I imagine anyone would. She's mad they won't try to work things out, and that they've put her in the position of dealing with the fact that parents are splitting up. Both parents decide to move to new places, her dad to the East Side and her mom back to Stoneybrook. They tell Stacey she will decide where (and with whom) to live, which seems like an incredibly difficult position for her. She ends up choosing Stoneybrook over New York, which means living with her mom rather than her dad. Even though she's confident she's picked the PLACE that's best for her, she can't deny that she'll miss being in New York with Laine, her baby-sitting charges, and, most of all, her dad. The book ends with her acknowledging that: she's going to be happy in Stoneybrook, but something will always be missing.


Established or continued in this book:


The Girls (and Logan):

Claudia candy: Oreos in her closet, Lifesavers, Twinkies, and taco chips

Stacey describes Kristy as "wiry."

Dawn is vegetarian in this book rather than just eschewing red meat.

Stacey makes a brief reference to the fad doctor she had to see in RS#3, and we see Judy again a few times.

Stacey's a grade ahead in math, like I was.

Laine (who we learn has brown eyes) gives Stacey half of a best friends necklace.

Stacey impresses herself by moving beds from one room to another with Claudia and her mom's help. I've moved beds all by myself as a teenager; it's not that hard. But then, I don't have THE DIABETES (but I do have asthma).


Their Families:

Becca plays a make-believe game that she's working in an office, which gets recalled in a later book.

Stacey's dad proposed to her mom in Central Park on a carriage ride.


The Club:

Kristy's Krushers have yet to beat Bart's Bashers.

Charlotte Johanssen has tonsillitis.


SMS: Nothing new


PSA time:

"The divorce rate is 50%." That's misleading; it's for all marriages, not first marriages. So, not half of everyone who marries will divorce. (Still is a lot of divorce, though)


Misc:

Again with the Brontosaurus garbage (and not capitalizing the Latin names). Stacey's baby-sitting charge wants to know if one could beat a Stegosaurus in a fight. At least diplocids and stegosaurids are from the same time period (Jurassic).

What kind of terrible real estate agent would show someone the crummy homes first then the nice one in a good neighborhood which is still in the client's price range? Stacey's mom ends up taking, too: behind the Pikes' house. It's the one that was owned by the foreign neighbors who the Pike kids spied on while playing Secret Agents.

I used to think living in a big apartment building sounded glamorous, going off Stacey's descriptions. Now that I've lived in dorms and apartments (not in New York's Upper West Side, though)...I can't wait to move to the new duplex tomorrow and then to a house down the road.

Stacey's mom asks her to open the envelope Laine gave her (to keep her entertained on the trip back to Stoneybrook), saying "Open it before I have an accident. I'm dying of curiosity!" When I read that as a kid, I didn't realize she meant a CAR accident.


The numbers:

Starting 8th grade: 2

Halloweens in 8th grade: 1

Summers after 8th grade: 1

BSC Fights: 5

SMS Staff: 13 (2 6th grade, 3 7th grade, 4 8th grade, 2 elective, 1 vice-principal, 1 secretary)

Students: 32 8th graders, six sixth-graders

Clients: 22

Types of candy in Claudia’s room: 36 (bubble gum, Butterfingers, butterscotch candy, Cheese Doodles, a chocolate bar, cookies, Cracker Jacks, crackers, cupcakes, Ding-Dongs, Doritos, gumdrops, Fritos, Gummi Bears, Heath bars, Hershey's kisses, Ho Hos, jawbreakers, licorice, licorice whips, Lifesavers, M&Ms (regular and peanut), Mallomars, marshmallows, mini candy bars, Oreos (Double Stuf), popcorn, pretzels, Ring Dings, root beer barrels, salt water taffy, Snickers, taco chips, Tootsie Roll Pops, Tootsie Rolls, Twinkies)

Crushes: Claudia-4 (Austin Bentley, Timothy Carmody, Trevor Sandbourne, Will Yamakawa), Dawn-1 (Parker Harris), Mary Anne-2 (Alex, Logan Bruno), Stacey-4 (Toby, Pete Black, Scott Foley, Sam Thomas), Kristy-1 (Bart Taylor)