Thoughts before reading:
Never read this one before, and it's a babysitting plot, so I'm feeling pretty blah about it now. We've also already had a lot of Jenny P in the past, so this is probably going to be a rehashing of old plots. I'd rather have something new and different.
Second Mary Anne book in a row, too! If you read by publication order, that is. I'm still baffled by how they decided the rotation of narrators.
The basics:
Mrs. Prezzioso calls the BSC needing a sitter for Jenny every weekday afternoon, indefinitely. The girls usually don't take on jobs of this magnitude, but Mary Anne agrees to do it 3 days a week, if the others fill in the remaining days with whoever's free. Kristy agrees to the arrangement.
When Mary Anne arrives for her first job, she discovers that Jenny is back to dressing up fancy and being really fussy about her appearance. She's also obsessively washing her hands now. Mrs. P doesn't mention anything being amiss, and breezes out with baby Andrea without saying where she's going.
The Pike triplets are organizing a neighborhood kickball team. (They now think they are too old for babysitters and want to be in charge of something.) Mary Anne encourages Jenny to ask them if she can join, thinking it will be good for her. It turns out that none of the kids want her on the team though, because they say she's afraid of dirt.
Mary Anne's worried about how extreme Jenny's behavior has gotten, and decides to look for help in her dad's psychology books. She learns that her abnormal behavior is likely an indication of an obsessive personality, which can happen due to emotional trauma. This discovery doesn't help her much until she finally learns that Mrs. P has been taking Andrea on auditions every afternoon. Jenny finally begs to go along, so her and Mary Anne both end up going. The whole time, everyone fusses over how perfect Andrea is, and Mary Anne realizes Jenny's jealous and trying to act perfect too so she can get attention.
Mrs. P then calls Mary Anne to tell her than Jenny now wants to be a model, and to ask her to take her to get her head shots done. Andrea has a callback, so she can't go herself. Mary Anne agrees, but the outing is rough. Jenny struggles through the long photo shoot, getting tired and having trouble with the poses.
A week later, Jenny gets an audition at a department store. It's basically a disaster though: she can't act at all, or even remember her lines. To make matters worse, Andrea gets a callback. Jenny feels terrible. From there on, Andrea continues to get jobs, while Jenny doesn't. The situation causes Jenny to stop trying to be perfect and become a slob instead.
The BSC advises Mary Anne to talk to Mrs. P. She's really nervous to do so, but Mrs. P ends up bringing it up herself after she comes home to a big mess Jenny made. She tells Mary Anne she doesn't know what to do about Jenny's acting out.
Jenny finally gets a job doing a catalog. The shoot goes great, and after it's over, Jenny wants to join the neighborhood kickball game. She even wears play clothes. After this success, when she gets turned down for more jobs she doesn't care because she's happy playing kickball. It seems that what mattered to her all along was just getting a job and showing she could do it.
Timeline:
It's early spring, winter is just ending.
Misc. thoughts:
*Ghostwritten by Jahnna Beecham and Malcolm Hillgartner.
*Nicky Pike is now 9? This must be an error, because none of the other Pikes have aged a year.
*Now the books say Dawn, Sharon, and Jeff are just "practically vegetarian", because they just don't eat red meat.
*Mal's feeling better now, but is frustrated because her parents don't believe her.
*Mrs. P is a terrible mother, both for creating this situation and for not seeing what is going on with her own child, who now has a serious problem and needs help. Yet like always, it takes a teenage babysitter to make this clear.
*Mal's parents still won't let her do anything because she's sick, yet they have her babysitting at home almost every day, more than she even did while she was in the club! Also so much that she says she feels like the Pike family nanny instead of a daughter. I HATE these people! She literally has to make a schedule of all the sitting she's doing and show it to her parents for them to agree to let her re-join the BSC.
*I wonder how old Mrs. P is? It was odd to me that she confided her problems about now knowing how to handle Jenny to her babysitter, like they were two friends the same age discussing their problems. I also found it weird how she asked Mary Anne to take Jenny to get the head shots done. Doesn't she have any friends or family to ask for help or parenting advice? Mary Anne is just a kid herself.
Books mentioned:
None
My rating:
2 stars. This was really pointless and a bit odd to me. This book presented a kid with a serious mental health issue, but never offered any solutions, solved any problems, or had anything change. She mostly just got over it or got used to it. We aren't even sure, since we never hear much about it from Jenny herself.
The kickball team and the triplets suddenly not wanting babysitters anymore was all a big yawn. Between this and the main Jenny plot, this book was also non-stop babysitting.
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