Thoughts before reading:
I've never read this before, and I don't think I've even noticed it before. It looks pretty forgettable, as they do a lot of plots similar to this. I already have phantom phone caller vibes.
This is one of the worst covers. Poor Kristy looks completely out of proportion. Where even is her other arm? It shouldn't be completely hidden by her little brother's...
The basics:
Shannon Kilbourne calls Kristy to tell her there's a letter for her in with her family's mail. It just has her name on it, no postmark, and is covered in heart stickers. The girls open it together, and it turns out to be from a mystery admirer who wants to go steady with Kristy. Pretty quickly, she starts receiving a lot of similar love notes at her own house. Everyone thinks it's Bart, but Kristy thinks it's Sam, playing a joke on her. She has been hanging out with Bart a lot lately though. They're going to the Halloween Hop together, and having a World Series game for their softball teams.
By the fifth note, they have gotten really creepy instead of sappy. From there, they get progressively more disturbing and even threatening. As usual, Stacey is the voice of reason, telling Kristy she needs to ask Bart if he knows anything about them. She ignores this advice, and instead stops speaking to Bart. Shannon starts doing the same, so Bart naturally catches on and confronts Kristy. She finally tells him everything, and he admits to sending the first few love notes, but not the others.
On the day of the World Series game, Kristy is shocked to see Cokie Mason and her friends show up. (They have been enemies ever since the Halloween pranks that took place during #17.) Since Cokie hates the BSC and kids, Kristy knows she can't be up to any good and decides to confront her. It doesn't take long for Cokie to let slip that she wrote the creepy notes, by accidently using a phrase from one of them: "eternal togetherness". When Kristy calls her out on it, she immediately confesses. Her motive? Apparently it was revenge for how the BSC humiliated her in the graveyard last Halloween. Kristy says she'll tell the whole school about the notes, and Cokie flees with her friends.
The Krushers end up winning the game by one point. Kristy and Bart attend the dance together, dressed as lobsters, and end up winning a prize for most unusual costume. On the dance floor, Bart kisses her on the cheek: her first kiss.
Timeline:
Covers the month of October and Halloween, the second of 8th grade so far. The last one was in #17, Mary Anne's Bad Luck Mystery.
My thoughts:
This one was painfully predictable, and therefore incredibly boring. It was so similar to #17 that it was obvious what was going on the whole time. Apparently any book that mentions Cokie Mason will also feature her as the culprit. She's literally never mentioned otherwise. I really doubt this would even fool a kid.
Kristy was also so passive and frustrating in this book. She's supposed to be so assertive and out-going that it drives people crazy, but she took absolutely no action in this situation. There was a lot she could have tried to do: talking to Bart early on, asking Sam or Charlie if they knew anything, even staking out her mailbox (silly, but seems like a very BSC thing to do). It seemed to out of character for her to not only sit and worry, but not say anything to anyone who was suspected of leaving the notes. All of this only added to how pointless this book felt, when everything could have been resolved early on and easily. Also, why didn't anyone suspect Cokie? I would think they would have learned something from the bad luck mystery, which they even mention themselves in here several times. Kristy even says she thinks the notes look like a girl wrote them.
Even more out of her norm, Kristy worries she should have LET Bart's team win the World Series game so that he would still want to take her to the dance! That was the most shocking part of this whole book by far. Why is she suddenly that desperate? The whole reason she formed that team was so little kids who weren't very good players could practice and gain confidence! She would really take that away from them to get a date? How disappointing.
Misc:
*The Krushers win their first two games ever in this book.
*Kristy mentions how good natured Charlie is. He's always struck me as a really good brother, easy-going and kind. I'm sure he's mature for his age too, since he would have been around 11 when their father walked out, leaving him with a lot to deal with.
*Apparently Bart plays guitar in a band.
*Shannon wants a nose job because she has a ski jump shaped nose that she wants to get straightened out? Most people would kill to have that type!
*Kristy's worried about Stacey's health lately (this is a loooong build up for #43!)
*The first book since #11 where Shannon's around.
*Kristy says the notes look like they're from a girl, and Shannon replies, "A girl who wants to go steady with you? Grow up." Apparently in 1990 this could not have been a serious possibility...
*Shannon also tells Kristy to come out of the closet when they're on the phone and she's hiding in one, LOL
*Stacey scolds Kristy to eat her lunch instead of playing with it, which made me chuckle. I could definitely picture this.
*Why is Dawn always the one without a date any time they have a dance? She seems like a girl who would get asked to me...
*Logan flees the lunch table any time the conversation becomes "too girly"? Jeez, man up!
*Kristy gets so thrown off by her "admirer" that she forgets to call a BSC meeting to order for the first time.
*Stacey's more concerned about Kristy uninviting Bart to the dance than about her getting creepy notes, hahaha. Very in character.
*We're always being told how practical and level headed Mallory and Dawn are, but there have been many cases by now where Stacey has given the best advice and actually solved problems.
*At one point Kristy thinks a random psycho wants to kidnap her for ransom since Watson is rich.
*Watson and Elizabeth pay Kristy to take her younger siblings trick or treating. Those poor kids! Everyone hates Karen, but I'm telling you, she's just desperate for some attention!
*Claudia goes to the dance with Woody Jefferson, and Stacey goes with Kelsey Bauman.
*Cokie Mason is called Cokie Gray in this book, a pretty big error, especially since Alan Gray is mentioned several times in here.
*Kristy and Bart's first real date is the dance.
Books mentioned:
*The Cat Ate My Gymsuit, by Paula Danziger
*The Ransom of Red Chief, by O. Henry
My rating:
2 stars, a boring slog.
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