BSC Super Special #4: Baby-sitters Island Adventure

Tagline:  Who thought they'd end up... shipwrecked?

Only the Baby-sitters can save the day!

Dawn and Claudia have a perfect day planned. They've invited Dawn's brother and three other kids to join them on a sailing race out to Greenpoint Island. The girls have even packed a picnic lunch for the adventure.


But then a big storm blows up in the middle of the race. And Claudia and Dawn and the kids never return from the island.

The Baby-sitters can't believe it's true - two of their members are missing!

Super Special Gimmick: Dawn wants a record of her adventure, so she asks all her friends to go back and write about their memories of the weekend so she can put them together.

So Dawn and Claudia have been taking sailing lessons together at the community centre. On their last day, they decide to have a boat race. It's pretty close, and everyone declares it a tie. The counselors, pleased with how the girls handled themselves, say that the girls have officially completed the course and no longer need them to go sailing anymore - provided that they just don't sail alone. Claudia decides to call a rematch on the Saturday when they have a long weekend. Dawn agrees, but only if Jeff can come on her boat since he's visiting and she doesn't want to miss out on time with him. This prompts Claudia to want to a crew mate, leading Jessi to suggest her younger sister Becca. Becca tells Haley Braddock, who also wants to come, so to round out the group (and even out the teams), they rope Jamie Newton in on it. They decide to make a whole afternoon of it, and have a picnic. While on their race, a storm blows them off course, and Dawn's boat ends up getting a hole and sinking. They all use Claudia's boat to wash ashore on a random little island, but fail to secure it, so it soon washes out. With no boat, it's up to a rescue team to find them.

Dawn narrates most of this book. Her story starts before they set sail: she and Mary Anne are fighting because Dawn forgot to give Mary Anne a message from Logan, causing them to fight. However, she's pretty excited about the race and tries not to let Mary Anne get to her. Dawn has Jeff and Haley on her boat, and her picnic basket includes bananas, peanut butter sandwiches, granola bars and water and juice. Dawn learns over the course of the book that she's not as handy in an emergency as she thought she was. She's not resourceful at least. Luckily for her, she's got Claudia and Jeff helping her. Dawn ends up mostly taking care of Jamie Newton, who gets strep throat and an ear infection while on the island. The situation just gets to her and she ends up being more than a little cranky. It makes Dawn feel ashamed of herself, but she pulls through and now knows more about herself than she did before.

Claudia on the other hand, learns how resourceful she can be. Even though she's not school-smart, she's good at keeping her cool. She manages to keep her spirits up and tries to distract the kids. Claudia even manages to figure out a way to catch rain water for them to drink. She's also the one to find the piece of mirror and to see right away how they can use it to hail a plane. Pretty much everyone would've been fucked if Claudia hadn't been there haha I do have to shake my head though at Claudia packing 15 chocolate bars as part of her picnic lunch. Uh, that's like, 2 and a half chocolate bars per person!

Mary Anne is feeling super guilty. Because Dawn forgot to give MA a message from Logan saying he couldn't show up to the library for their study date, MA calls Logan and reams him out for standing her up. Of course, Logan gets upset that MA would even jump to such a conclusion and apparently thinks so little of him, so basically the two of them are having an epic fight. MA blames it all on Dawn, decides to stop talking to Dawn. She doesn't even come to the community centre to see Dawn and Claudia off, even though Claudia is her friend and three of her usual baby-sitting charges are there. Worse yet, her last words to Dawn are, "You know what? I wish I never had to see you again. I wish you would get out of my life - forever." So yeah, MA's wrecked with guilt, feeling as though maybe she inadvertently caused the accident. She's pretty much useless this book, mostly just baby-sitting for charges when their parents want to join the search.

Kristy is feeling surprisingly emotional, considering it's Kristy and she's not particularly close to anyone who is missing. I think mostly Kristy feels helpless. All the adults are reacting pretty well, keeping their heads, organizing search parties, and all that jazz, so there's really nothing for Kristy to do, no big ideas to save the day. However, she also had planned a big softball game against the Bashers on Monday, with the intent to hold extra practice on Sunday for her Krushers. Obviously, between everything that's going on, that's out of the question. So Kristy has to phone Bart to cancel. She's nervous about phoning Bart cuz she likes him, but she expects him to be cool and understanding. Unfortunately, he's not! He thinks Kristy's being a drama queen and is looking for reasons to cancel because she's afraid of her team losing the game. This upsets Kristy, but she tries to instead focus her energies on joining the search parties. After everyone is found and rescued, and Bart starts seeing the news footage, he realizes that Kristy wasn't exaggerating, and calls to apologize. He says sometimes Kristy gets carried away and it's hard for him to tell when she's being serious, or when she's just being hyperbolic out of excitement. Kristy promises to try not to send him mixed messages anymore, and they part on a good note.

Mallory doesn't have much to do in this either. She doesn't even have a plot like Kristy does. She's just there because her family goes out on two separate boats to search, allowing her and Kristy and Stacey to do some searching firsthand. She only has one chapter, and it's when they're out searching. However, Mallory's not even the one to make the discovery of Dawn's broken boat: it's Stacey.

Stacey is supposed to be spending the weekend with her father, in NYC. She heads down Friday evening as per planned, but Saturday evening, just before she's to go out, she gets the phone call about the disappearance. Stacey is understandably upset, and wants to go home. Even if she can't actively do anything, she wants to be around, and is too upset to really enjoy herself with her father. Plus she doesn't feel right going out to fancy dinner reservations and Broadway shows while everyone in Stoneybrook is worried and searching. Of course, Ed McGill won't stand for that! He guilts Stacey into staying, telling her how it's his weekend with her, and how hard it was for him to make these reservations and get tickets and what not. After another day of that, and still no word, Stacey digs in, and heads home early on Monday morning (instead of staying all day and heading back Monday evening). She writes a letter to her dad about how she doesn't feel like he (and subsequently her mother) are being fair to her about how she spends her time, and that she feels likes she's constantly being put in the middle of them. She gets back in Stoneybrook just in time to join Kristy and Mallory on the search, and is the one to find Dawn's broken boat.

Jessi has been left home alone for the weekend, in charge of her sister and her baby brother. Her parents gave Becca permission to go on the trip, so Jessi spends Saturday running around after Squirt and having a grand ol' time. Until Becca doesn't come home. After calling around, Jessi figures out that no one has come home. Realizing that something is seriously wrong, but not wanting to ruin her parents vacation (not like they could really do anything atm), she breaks down and calls her dreaded Aunt Cecelia. Of course, Aunt C arrives right away, and immediately starts blaming Jessi for everything. She determines that Jessi's parents are clearly incompetent and have given Jessi too many freedoms and liberties, so Jessi is essentially on house arrest for the weekend. Jessi can't wait for her aunt to leave, but even when her parents come back, Aunt C sticks around, mentioning how nice Stoneybrook is...

Random Thoughts

• Unlike the first three Super Specials, this was the first one I really enjoyed as child. I read this one a lot. I really like #5, #6 and #7 as well
• This is also the first one to have the illustrations in it. I really like the illustrations, although I was confused cuz Claudia totes does not look Asian in them haha
• There's a nice call back to Claudia liking skiing, which comes up periodically over the course of the series.
• Somehow, when the counselors said that Claudia and Dawn shouldn't sail alone, I don't think they meant to bring a bunch of random kids with them. Jeff going makes sense: he's Dawn's brother and has some boating experience. Becca and Haley are random, but whatevs, at least they're older. But Jamie Newton? A 4 year old?? Really??? As if his parents let him!
• Shame on Mr and Mrs Ramsey too, letting Jessi be in charge of her siblings for the entire weekend. My parents wouldn't have let me stay home alone for an entire weekend at age 11, let alone have me be in charge of an 8 year old and a toddler! I think I might have been able to stay home alone at age 12 or 13, provided that one of my immediate neighbours was around to check in on me regularly (instead of disrupting both of our routines by making one of us spend the weekend at the others' place). But they definitely still wouldn't have left me in charge of my siblings!
• I feel bad for Jessi though, because none of this is her fault. Of course if her parents say she can stay home and be in charge, she's going to do it! And they're the ones who let Becca go, with or without having left Jessi in charge. Really, Aunt Cecelia should be tearing Mr and Mrs Ramsey a new one, not Jessi.
• This book really makes me like Jeff. He's great with the kids, keeps his cool, and manages to figure out how to go fishing. It makes me excited for when Dawn's back in California. I can't remember much about Jeff, but I'm definitely liking him more during this read-through.
• I'm surprised at how much news coverage the story got. Must have been a slow weekend haha I mean, I'm not surprised that it was a big deal in Stoneybrook itself, with the staff and students of both the middle school and the elementary school getting involved. Stoneybrook doesn't seem like it's that big, so 5 of its residents (young kids at that) disappearing would be a thing. But I don't think being missing for 48 hours is cause for state-wide coverage. The group was to have come home by Saturday afternoon. By Saturday night, people are starting to worry. Sunday morning is a slow news day: how did out of town news people hear of the story?? At this point, the group had been missing for maybe 24 hours. I feel like if they hadn't been found when they were (Monday afternoon, approximately 48 hours missing), then the rest of Connecticut could have gotten in on the action. However, at just 48 hours missing and a happy ending? Seems like the state made too big of a deal. But then again, I don't really follow news, so I'm not sure what constitutes a big deal or not (short of week-long disappearances and murders haha)
• The book kinda makes it sound like the Pikes own their boats, but I'm pretty sure they don't. The Pikes don't seem loaded enough to be able to afford two boats. I think it's that Mr and Mrs Pike both have their sailing license, and are therefore able to rent boats from the community centre when they want to. Between the community centre and Sea City, I'm not surprised that the Pikes have gone on several boating day trips.
• Man, Mr McGill is total jerk. No wonder Maureen left him! This is just one of the many instances that he insists that since it's his weekend with Stacey, he gets to dictate everything that happens. Poor Stacey. Unlike most divorced kids who see their non-custodial parent regularly (like Karen and Andrew Brewer, who see their dad every other weekend), Stacey has to travel 2 hours by train to see her dad. Yes, 2 hours isn't that much, so she can see her dad more often than Dawn, but it's enough to take a toll on her. Especially when Mr McGill crams the weekend so full of stuff. At least Karen and Andrew get to spend a regular weekend with their dad: chilling at home, hanging out with friends, doing homework, family dinners, etc etc. It just happens to be in a different house. Essentially Stacey spends Monday to Friday in school, and then hops on a train, and from the moment she steps off, her dad whisks her to dinner and restaurants and shows and museums and events. The only time she's really at home is to change her clothes and sleep. She's even expected to do her homework on the train! I know personally, that would drive me crazy. And it's like that every time she goes to visit her dad. Then the one time something actually comes up, and she needs to change plans, it's a no-go.
• On another note: Stacey's subplot is probably my favourite of the book. I really like reading about Stacey and her struggles with her parents and the divorce haha
• This is my first time reading the series in order (like, consciously reading the books in order; I think I read the last 20 books or so in order when I was younger, but even then I didn't even read every single one and wasn't really making a point to), and so it's fascinating to me, because the next book in the series, Aunt Cecelia moves in with Jessi's family. I didn't realize that this happens immediately after the events in this book.