Thoughts before reading:
I have no memory of reading this as a kid, so I don't think I did. Otherwise I would remember a little something about it, because I have a pretty good memory for my childhood books. Plus I was always a huge re-reader, so I went through favorite books countless times.
Nothing really stands out about this cover, except that Claudia's outfit looks way too boring for her. Is this because she's trying to be a serious artist in here? Even babysitting for Jackie, I doubt she ever just wore jeans and a white shirt. Also noticed Ashley's shoes: I so remember when every guy wore these every day!
There's a graphic novel adaptation of this coming out in 2021.
The basics:
A new girl, Ashley Wyeth, starts in Claudia's English class and catches her eye. Claudia's also taking a pottery class on weekends and she sees Ashley in it. During the class, the teacher announces that a new art gallery is opening up in town and they are hosting a sculpture contest. Ashley compliments Claudia's artistic talent and is adamant about her entering the show. She promises to help and Claudia is flattered because she's really impressed by Ashley's art.
After this Claudia starts spending pretty much all of her time with Ashley, working on getting ideas for her sculpture piece. They attend an art show, and Claudia's late for a BSC meeting. She starts eating lunch with Ashley every day, and starts ignoring her other friends. She justifies this to herself because she's Ashley's only friend. Almost immediately, she stops attending any BSC meetings. The club is still meeting up in her room, and Claudia still expects jobs. There's also an incident where Claudia cancels a shopping trip with Stacey to do homework, ends up with Ashley instead, and Stacey finds out.
Eventually Claudia and Ashley get into a fight because Ashley is giving her a hard time about babysitting. She thinks Claudia should focus only on her art. Claudia finally realizes Ashley cares about her art instead of her as a person, and isn't a real friend. This makes her realize what a terrible friend she's been, and how she's neglected everything else in her life. To make it right, she apologizes to her friends, buckles down on her school work, and decides to sculpt Jackie Rodowsky but not enter in the show.
Claudia's art teacher ends up entering her piece anyway, as a work in progress. She wins an honorable mention, and all of her BSC friends come see the show. Ashley sculpts a fire hydrant and wins first place. Claudia talks to her again and they make up, becoming casual friends in the process.
Timeline:
Fall of 8th grade? No mention of Halloween yet though, so who knows...
My thoughts:
This book actually did a pretty good job of showing some real middle school aged friendship problems. At first I was feeling bad for Claudia, because when she made a new friend outside the BSC, they were mad at her for wanting to eat lunch with someone else. Everyone got immediately possessive, which annoyed me because in the past they've eaten lunch with other people and it's never been a huge ordeal. So far everyone still has separate friends. I'm guessing in this case the main problem was that Claudia didn't invite Ashley to sit WITH the BSC, she wanted to eat alone with Ashley. This is definitely real middle school politics territory, though, so I can't really fault anyone. I remember who you ate lunch with could cause some real lasting drama at that age. (We didn't have any real problems yet, clearly.)
I did switch sides later though, which is why I think both sides were well shown. Her BSC friends end up genuinely thinking she doesn't like them anymore, because she's not spending any time with them at all. She's ignoring Stacey, her best friend, and blowing off plans. Then she's also blowing off every meeting and being a brat about them not offering her jobs. Why would they? At one point Stacey and Mary Anne are both in tears thinking Claudia doesn't want to be friends with them anymore. Stacey, in particular, thinks she's lost her best friend. That's a really painful feeling at any age, especially when you've been overthrown for a new BFF.
Claudia does at least acknowledge her actions when she realizes what she's done. She shows some pretty mature self awareness when she's able to see that she was spending all of her time with Ashley because Ashley made her feel important. She's pretty starved for praise, and used to failing, and now this new person has entered her life gushing over how talented she is. It causes her to get caught up in it, which I totally understand. Who hasn't had a new relationship, friend or romantic, that leads to a total whirlwind where you forget about the outside world? Everyone's been there, and this was well addressed here, and for an age group that really could benefit from reading about it. I definitely wish I had read this one as a kid.
On a side note, I enjoyed the petty things the BSC did to Claudia while in her room for meetings. They left her mean notes hidden around her room, ate up her junk food, and moved things around. It brought me right back to doing dumb stuff like this when I was mad at friends as a kid.
Misc.
*Jeff's trouble in school escalates, into an incident where he throws an eraser that breaks a mosaic and causes a classmate to cut her leg. Yikes. You would be expelled for that nowadays.
*Ashley wearing bell bottoms to school was such a huge faux pas, but when I was in school in the 00s they were actually really popular...
*Kristy snaps at Mary Anne during a meeting, and she immediately shuts Kristy down and defends herself. She doesn't get nearly enough credit.
*I hate how in certain books the BSC sits for the same client over and over to serve the plot. See the Pikes in #9, the Delaneys in #11, and the Rodowskys in here.
*It annoyed me how Stacey and Kristy made snide comments to Ashley about her weird clothes. I get they have good reason not to like her, but didn't the snobs just do the same thing to Kristy in the last book? She knows better.
Books mentioned:
Claudia's English class is studying the Newbery Award winners, and they can read any they want. I thought this was a clever way to interest child readers in these books. Here's a list of those mentioned:
*The Yearling, by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
*A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, by Betty Smith
*The Westing Game, by Ellen Raskin
*From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, by E. L. Konigsburg
*Sarah Plain and Tall by Patricia MacLachlan
*The Twenty One Balloons, by William Pene du Bois
*A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L'Engle
My rating:
3 stars, not a lot going on in here, but I would recommend to kids for the friendship dynamics.
No comments:
Post a Comment