Thoughts before reading:
I'm pretty sure I read this once, but I don't remember much about it. This time around, I'm really dreading it though. They really couldn't even have one Mary Anne book after her break-up with Logan before she takes him back? #41 was so well done, and I'd even go as far as to say it's an important read for young girls. Now this book will likely undo all of that, already. We should have at least seen Mary Anne on her own for a bit, thriving and not needing a boyfriend. This is even more true since she's with Logan for the whole rest of the series now. I really don't think this was a good plot choice, and I'm hoping at the very least he's made some big changes.
This is a cute cover and a nice friendship moment, in theory, but it never actually happens. There's no roller skating scene in this book, and I don't think in any others either.
The basics:
Mary Anne is brooding over missing Logan, while also worrying about an English assignment she has coming up, because it's a group project. In groups of four, all the 8th graders will be studying an assigned living author. Mary Anne thinks the project sounds interesting, but she's worried about being paired with kids she doesn't know. When the day finally arrives, she's assigned to study Megan Rinehart with Pete Black, Miranda Shillaber, and Logan Bruno. Predictably, Mary Anne freaks out over being with Logan and cries. Things get even worse when her enemy Cokie Mason is added to their group, in Miranda's place. Cokie's a terrible English student, and she lies to the teacher that Megan Rinehart is the only author she's interested in so that she can be in Logan's group (she's had a long standing crush on him).
The study sessions go terribly from the beginning. Only Mary Anne and Pete Black appear to be working, while Cokie hits on Logan the whole time and whines about having to read. Cokie and Logan start hanging out a lot, going to the movies and out to games. Pete and Mary Anne feel like they're doing the whole project themselves, while Cokie doesn't even read the four books the group picked out, and constantly brags about her time with Logan.
Towards the end of the project, it's announced that three of the authors will be coming in person to SMS. The school will hold an Author's Day event, and the groups studying those three authors will present their projects orally. One of the authors coming is Megan Rinehart, so Mary Anne starts to freak out even more. Logan then asks Mary Anne to work more on the project with him: it turns out he did do his part after all, he just wants her help making sure it's good enough to present.
The Author's Day event goes well, except for Cokie's part. She didn't do any of work, and tries to cover it up by reading the summary from the book jacket. Logan asks Mary Anne out to dinner after, as a thank you for helping him. She accepts, of course. They both admit to missing each other, and agree to go on a real date. He also tells her Cokie was just fun to hang out with, but he never liked her romantically. (After this MA and Logan are already effectively back together in all following books.)
Oh, and there's a weird side plot in here with the Korman kids. The Delany family has moved away, and the Kormans now live in their old house. Their kids are afraid of a toilet monster, because the toilet growls after flushing. They try to run to the safety of their rooms before it's done flushing, so the monster doesn't get them. Several BSC members try to get them over the fear, without success.
Timeline:
Cold, rainy weather.
My thoughts:
This had some problems for sure, but it wasn't as bad as I'd feared. Mary Anne and Logan were both on some of their better behavior, and I did enjoy reading about the English project. Plot devices like that are a great way to introduce kids to reading new authors and books. My main issues were things like Mary Anne now acting like she didn't break up with Logan. Now she's saying they had a misunderstanding, or she waited too long to tell him she wanted to stay together? That isn't what happened. In Mary Anne vs. Logan, she finally came to a firm decision that she needed to break up with Logan because he had changed and was controlling her whole life. Now in here, it's like the author is trying to retcon the only good decision Mary Anne has ever made since around book #4. Why even bother having had #41? What's even worse, Mary Anne now says Logan was patient and never tried to change her! Before the breakup she said the exact opposite, and we also saw it for ourselves.
The side plot in here is really annoying too. I know the point of having these fearful kids is to parallel Mary Anne's fears, and possibly to show that they are equally baseless. There's just so much time spent on the toilet monster over various babysitting jobs, as well as a few other silly household monsters. By the end the kids are still scared of the toilet, so it doesn't go anywhere anyway.
I was also really annoyed with Logan for hanging out with Cokie in this book. He supposedly only views her as a friend, and is having fun with her because she loves going out and doing things. Mary Anne is much more introverted, and more of a homebody. I can totally understand that, but he has to know how Mary Anne would feel about him hanging around Cokie, her enemy. He was there, dating Mary Anne, through several of the mean pranks she played on her (see the bad luck mystery...). If he wants to change and get Mary Anne back, this is not the way to do it. He should already be considering her feelings, whether he's already gotten her back or not, if he truly loved her. Certainly they would be more important than having fun? It already makes it seem like his better behavior is an act.
Misc:
*I remember the Delany family moving away and the Korman family moving in as a plot from the Little Sister books. It was actually in one of my favorite ones. Reading those in publication order with the BSC books would be the ultimate in continuity, but it's just too much with 200+ BSC books alone. I'll read at least some of them next.
*Mary Anne says she's not allowed to wear "really cool" things like cowboy boots? How random are her father's rules now??
*Apparently Dawn once won a beautiful baby contest.
*Mary Anne thinks VIP means "very important person", LOL
*Jessi's telling jokes again, which she hasn't done since her introduction. Just give up this character trait already! It's too rarely used to make any sense.
*Claudia suggests Danielle Steele or Stephen King as possible authors that might be assigned...I find it VERY hard to believe she's read either. I also really hope she hasn't! I read a Danielle Steele book of my mother's when I was a kid, and it scarred me for life. I never touched one again.
*Mary Anne wants the same thing to drink as Logan, gag me.
*I was also obsessively worried about group projects and oral presentations my whole childhood. Nowadays, I wish that was all I had to worry about.
*A book advertised in the back that never happened: Mystery #2, Dawn and the Mysterious Mr. X. This of course becomes Beware Dawn.
*My memory was right: the scene from the cover doesn't happen. There's no friend hangouts in here at all, it's mostly all about the English project.
*Cokie has apparently only ever read four books, when she was ten, and they were Peter Rabbit picture books. Wow.
Books mentioned:
This will be a doozy, thanks to all the books and author promoting in here, which is definitely a good thing.
*James and the Giant Peach, by Roald Dahl
*Lois Lowry
*Madeleine L'Engle
*Paula Danziger
*Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
*Robert Cormier
*Paul Zindel
*Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott
Megan Rinehart, Roger L. Willis, and T. J. Langston are all fictional, which is disappointing.
My rating:
3 stars, ended up being pretty average.
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