Young Adult Revisited

The BSC is off for a week long trip to a ski lodge. Apparently the owners of the lodge have a ton of money and offer free or reduced price trips to kids all over the East Coast. A winter war is also taking place, where the kids are on a red or blue team and compete in different winter sports. The night they get there, an elementary class crashes on the way. The teachers are injured and the BSC steps up to help out. Kristy spends the whole book bragging about her team and how they will kick everyone’s ass. She gets pissy at Claudia who judges the ice sculpture contest for letting someone on her team win. She wins her leg of the skiing competition, but watches everyone else lose. Then she forces a bunch of kids to do cross-country skiing, despite having no experience. One of the guys, Jay, falls and breaks his ankle. She cries to Mary Anne, but he forgives her and even dances with her. Dawn attempts a bunch of different activities and fails at every single one. Some kids make fun of...

Stacey has been spending a lot of time with her boyfriend Robert and his friends. She goes out frequently with his group, shows up late for BSC meetings and doesn’t take any responsibility for her actions. When his group decides at the last minute to go out for pizza, she asks Mary Anne to take her sitting job at the Pike house, saying she had an emergency. Of course Dawn follows her, sees what she’s doing and confronts her. She then tells the rest of the BSC and they gang up on her. She makes plans to go shopping with Mary Anne to make it up to her. When they get ready to leave, she realizes she has a sitting job and has to cancel their trip. This pretty much explains the whole book: she knows she’s doing something wrong, but keeps doing it anyway. Robert’s group then decides to throw a party at his house. Stacey gives it some thought and decides to invite Claudia, but no one else from the club. She decides this after seeing Kristy, Mary Anne and Dawn acting up at a restaurant. Cl...

Lizzy, her little brother Luke and his friend Clay are out with their parents, driving to a local zoo and amusement park. Their dad decides to not bring along a map, assuming that signs will be posted everywhere telling them how to get to the park. They keep driving and find absolutely nothing: no stores, cars and no other people. They stop to check again for a map and she notices a huge monster looming overhead. It turns out that they are only one mile away from HorrorLand amusement park and they decide to go there instead. They park in the almost empty lot and as they near the entrance, their car explodes! Mom doesn’t seem too fazed and wants to just enjoy the day. All of the workers are in monster costumes and they promise that they will fix everything. Despite that, dad is still worried and wanders off with mom, trying to find a phone. The three kids wander off and see some super weird things, like black ice cream, snakes dangling from trees and wolves roaming the park. They de...

Claudia comes home one day to find her room completely ransacked! Okay, that’s kind of an overstatement because things are just moved around. Things get even weirder when Jeanine suddenly starts taking an interest in girl stuff, like hair, clothing and makeup. She even gets grounded, after coming home late and not telling anyone. Claudia decides to follow her sister and sees her meet a really handsome guy at the park near the school. They shake hands and then walk off together. Claudia starts watching her sister carefully and trying to figure out what could possibly make her sister change so much. Jeanine even borrows her favorite sweater multiple times and asks for advice about putting on makeup. At the same time, Derek Masters has come back to town since his show is on hiatus. Word gets out that in the next season his character has to kiss a girl in his class. Derek plays things up, making it seem like he’s kissed lots of girls and is an expert on kissing. The Pike boys keep brin...

Mary Anne loves her adorable little kitten Tigger, as if we didn’t know. At the beginning of the book, Dawn goes with her to pick out some new toys for him, since he keeps rolling them behind the refrigerator. A few days later, Logan comes over and they sit outside playing with Tigger. A few neighborhood kids stop by and she thinks it’s super cute, but Logan acts kind of put off by everyone interrupting their date. When it comes time to leave for her BSC meeting, Tigger doesn’t want to go inside. Instead of making him, she lets him stay outside, thinking she’ll let him in when she gets back. But when she shows up after the meeting, Tigger is missing. Richard isn’t too concerned because he thinks he’s napping and will come back later. When he isn’t back at bedtime or the next morning, he gets a little worried too. Mary Anne calls Kristy, who declares an emergency meeting. The girls pool their money and take money out of the treasury to create a reward. They make flyers, Kristy’s mo...

Mallory is excited about the new Short Takes class at SMS. Not only is the topic children’s literature one of her favorites, but she also has the cute, new teacher at school. Once class begins though, she isn’t too thrilled. The teacher spends more time with the guys, especially those from his baseball team. He only gives the girls a few seconds to answer, but lets the guys take forever. He also lets the guys yell out answers, but the girls wait with their hands raised forever. At the same time, the sixth grade class must plan a fundraising event and use that money for the school. As one of the class officers, Mallory has to help plan the events. She volunteers to check out the old classes and see what they used the money for. One class donated $1,000 for a student lounge in the library, but the money disappeared. She enlists the help of Sondra, another officer. Sondra is a smart girl, but she keeps dumbing herself down for guys because guys don’t like smart girls. I feel so sorry ...

The twins are back from London and Jessica is (naturally) ready to fall in love again. When Liz starts recapping their adventures, she convinces Lila to go for a job along the beach. A Frisbee comes out of nowhere, almost taking off her head. When she looks up, a gorgeous man is standing in front of her. Lila wanders off with his friend, but Jessica stays with the hot guy. They share a “moment”, he kisses her and just as she’s falling in love (yet again), he announces that he can never see her again and rushes off. Jessica is heartbroken because, despite the fact that they only saw each other for three minutes, she is absolutely certain that he is the great love of her life. She even tells Liz and her friends that he means more to her than Sam, which makes them realize that she’s serious. I love that, considering how many guys she’s been with since Sam died! There was James, Todd, that guy in London and now a new guy. At the same time, Alice’s old college roommate had a daughter Su...