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Post by virgoscorpio on Jan 4, 2016 16:57:29 GMT -5
An alternate title for this book could have been Stacey and the Big Garage Sale, haha. Like candykane, I also googled Stacey's address and was surprised to see it's basically in Central Park (which I don't think was mentioned) so I guess they didn't give it as much thought as we did. I'm sure this book would have been more depressing not knowing that Stacey will eventually return and even get a book set in NYC! In fact, I enjoy Stacey's Mistake so perhaps it was a decent trade off, haha.
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mallorypike
Sitting For The Papadakis's
If I were thirteen instead of eleven, life would be a picnic...
Posts: 1,636
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Post by mallorypike on Jan 4, 2016 17:21:44 GMT -5
lol, this book is mainly about the garage sale, haha. I looked up the address of Stacey's apartment and viewed it on Google Maps. It's practically ON Central Park! Well, more like across the street. It seems very nice. And expensive. It's over $14 million! is Ed and Maureen rich?!
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Post by greer on Jan 7, 2016 0:31:58 GMT -5
lol, this book is mainly about the garage sale, haha. I looked up the address of Stacey's apartment and viewed it on Google Maps. It's practically ON Central Park! Well, more like across the street. It seems very nice. And expensive. It's over $14 million! is Ed and Maureen rich?! Manhattan real estate wasn't quite so inflated as it is now, but yes, Ed and Maureen were rich. I'm not sure why only Watson was viewed as rich when it's clear that pretty much everyone was from a well-off family. Mr. Kishi was an investment banker, Mr. Spier a lawyer, the McGills lived a lavish life in general--Stacey went to an NYC private school and their best friends lived in the Dakota--the Pikes provided for eight children comfortably, the Stevensons' house was as big as Kristy's, Jessi's family bought Stacey's house... No one was even really solidly middle class in these books. Except for Kristy's family at the very beginning. I think Ann has led a sheltered life. Princeton is a very ritzy town.
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Post by virgoscorpio on Jan 7, 2016 10:21:54 GMT -5
The only people I think weren't considered rich were Mal's family and that is only because of the shear number of them. I think that if there were only one or two kids their lifestyle would obviously be different.
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Post by booboobrewer on Jan 7, 2016 12:24:12 GMT -5
Reading Claudia's handwriting for 13 pages would give me a headache, ha. I also like Ann's use of real places for NYC scenes. I looked up the Dakota to see how far it is from Stacey's apartment. It's a ten-minute walk. I had thought of the scene in #28 where Stacey ran over to see Laine when she heard her parents fighting, and wondered if it was realistic that she could get there so fast. Stacey and Laine had it made living in that area. And Ann, too. Lol! Though she is in her country house these days. I love walking around that part of the city, near the park and museums
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inge
Junior Sitter
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Post by inge on Jan 7, 2016 14:03:35 GMT -5
^Definitely jealous of Stacey's living arrangements in NYC. Never be able to afford that now! And lol@ calling this book Stacey and the big garage sale. Very true, but I like garage sales etc so I really enjoyed that. Wish all of them were as succesful though! Also, I guess, what else were they going to focus on? A book of the girls sitting around moping that Stacey was leaving would have been to depressing. As it is, I like this book, but I've never read it without knowing that Stacey comes back soon enough - I might have been really upset reading it knowing she wouldn't, even though she is my least favorite out of the original five. I like the layout of the later books where the babysitting chapters are more alternated with 'regular plot' chapters though. There were what, 4,5 babysitting chapters in a row here? Kind of distracted from the story. I liked the party with the kids though (not having read this one for a long time) I was kind of shocked there was no BSC only pizza party or something, afterwards. That might have been nice. But instead the others came to see Stace off, which was lovely as well! Great outfit for Dawn at the end of the book by the way. Very un-later-Dawn though. The chapter with Morbida Destiny was good. Darn you Ann for making me feel sad for the lonely witch lady next door. Though, what on earth did she get her broom out for? Maybe she was just playing the whole thing for a laugh. In which case she is now my favorite side character.
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Post by virgoscorpio on Jan 7, 2016 14:45:14 GMT -5
I kind of wished the part of going back to Mrs. Porter's for lemonade wasn't included as I like the mystery about her. Kind of makes all the future ones seem unwarranted... because you know she's a little old lady who just wants company and makes lemonade from frozen cans.
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mallorypike
Sitting For The Papadakis's
If I were thirteen instead of eleven, life would be a picnic...
Posts: 1,636
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Post by mallorypike on Jan 8, 2016 6:29:49 GMT -5
lol, this book is mainly about the garage sale, haha. I looked up the address of Stacey's apartment and viewed it on Google Maps. It's practically ON Central Park! Well, more like across the street. It seems very nice. And expensive. It's over $14 million! is Ed and Maureen rich?! Manhattan real estate wasn't quite so inflated as it is now, but yes, Ed and Maureen were rich. I'm not sure why only Watson was viewed as rich when it's clear that pretty much everyone was from a well-off family. Mr. Kishi was an investment banker, Mr. Spier a lawyer, the McGills lived a lavish life in general--Stacey went to an NYC private school and their best friends lived in the Dakota--the Pikes provided for eight children comfortably, the Stevensons' house was as big as Kristy's, Jessi's family bought Stacey's house... No one was even really solidly middle class in these books. Except for Kristy's family at the very beginning. I think Ann has led a sheltered life. Princeton is a very ritzy town. Yep. I agree with you. I read a bunch of posts from your blog stoneybrookite and I loved one post titled "Mr. McGill, Secretly Super Rich?" Or something like that. Everyone is very well-off except for maybe the Pikes considering the large amount of kids; though, they really seemed average money wise in Poor Mallory when Mr. Pike loses his job. Before they lived comfortably; they must be upper middle class.
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Post by wistfuldreamer86 on Sept 14, 2018 17:35:22 GMT -5
I actually really liked this one. There were a lot of bittersweet moments with Stacey, her friends, and the kids. I really liked the party with the kids and the drawing they did for her was sweet. I also liked the whole garage sale plotline. And the stuff with Charlotte, that was a nice throwback to Stacey's first book.
And about Dawn saying no one in CA has them, maybe she's just generalizing based on her experience. She may not know anyone whose had them but that doesn't mean no one does. Maybe her family and friends just weren't into that sort of thing. I wasn't much into them when I was younger even though my mom was.
I also liked how they introduced the idea of Mallory joining the club. They had built up to this point beforehand and it was cool to see how it came to fruition.
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cnj
Sitting For The Papadakis's
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Post by cnj on Sept 15, 2018 14:56:53 GMT -5
lol, this book is mainly about the garage sale, haha. I looked up the address of Stacey's apartment and viewed it on Google Maps. It's practically ON Central Park! Well, more like across the street. It seems very nice. And expensive. It's over $14 million! is Ed and Maureen rich?! Manhattan real estate wasn't quite so inflated as it is now, but yes, Ed and Maureen were rich. I'm not sure why only Watson was viewed as rich when it's clear that pretty much everyone was from a well-off family. Mr. Kishi was an investment banker, Mr. Spier a lawyer, the McGills lived a lavish life in general--Stacey went to an NYC private school and their best friends lived in the Dakota--the Pikes provided for eight children comfortably, the Stevensons' house was as big as Kristy's, Jessi's family bought Stacey's house...no one was even really solidly middle class in these books. Except for Kristy's family at the very beginning. I think Ann has led a sheltered life. Princeton is a very ritzy town. I don't think Ann grew up too sheltered. I do agree that most of the BSC families were rather well-to-do, especially since many of them had two incomes, but they were not ultra-rich and they were not pampered or spoiled. Despite the above-average incomes of most of the parents, the BSC girls were down-to-Earth...even the Thomas-Brewer and Stevenson families. I think the parents were great about keeping things 'middle-class,' so to speak. Note that the families didn't have servants or maids cooking and cleaning up after them and they were not in any ritzy country clubs either. I think the Stevensons had an occasional cleaning woman, but Rachel Stevenson was great about raising her daughters in a real, down-to-Earth fashion, so they would not grow up spoiled or self-centered or snobbish. And not all of Princeton is ritzy...I've been there. It's a large, beautiful university town, yet most of it is middle-income and lots of it is down-to-Earth. Ann herself did not grow up having maids and servants waiting on her and her family was not part of any snooty country club. If you read her biography, Ann didn't grow up in any mansion...her childhood home was quite small, in fact. I think because most of Stoneybrook's parents keep things real for their kids and don't use high incomes as an excuse to be wasteful or snobby, the BSC members are resourceful, good problem-solvers, and are so down-to-Earth. Stoneybrook is not the 'high-class,' country-club-ruled, snobbish Sweet Valley and the BSC is NOT either Sweet Valley Middle School's spoiled 'Unicorn' Club or SVH's snobby, classist Pi Beta clique. If anyone here ever read the BSC's Little Sister book, Karen's Stepmother, you'd see that even though the Brewer-Thomas family is rather well-off, they are all required to do mundane chores...there are no maids, butlers or servants cleaning up after them, taking out their garbage or cooking their meals for them. So, we can say that the BSC grew up mostly 'middle-class.' I think that's why it's such a pleasure to read about these girls.
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Post by sparklymouse on Mar 25, 2022 14:13:34 GMT -5
That could be Maureen. She is extremely freckly.
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Post by m0drnmoonlight on Mar 29, 2022 9:30:52 GMT -5
Why does Stacey look like Mallory in the French one?
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Post by sparklymouse on Apr 11, 2022 18:03:36 GMT -5
Charlotte is not amused by that succulent. Stacey's enormous gym bag cracks me up. I love her loud sweatshirt/loud jacket combination. The girl in the top left looks like she just popped in from next door to see what was going on. Translations aren't interesting: Goodbye, Stace, bye (this seems sarcastic? Bye) Goodbye Petra Goodbye Susan. Goodbye, Lucy! Sophie’s Departure Good Way, Stacey! (?) Stacey returns to New York (true)
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Post by oldmeanie on Jun 28, 2022 13:40:55 GMT -5
EDIT: forgot to say, Dawn says in this book that "People in California don't have yard sales." Wtf Dawn? I live in California and there are yard sales everywhere every weekend day. Also, they SUCK to set up and run, especially in the heat. Even as a kid I thought this quote was pretty funny.
I haven't read this one in so long, probably close to 20 years. To be honest, upon re-read, it's not a favorite. It's still good don't get me wrong, I just hate yard sales (they are SO much work and you often don't get much out of it) and the baby-sitting chapters weren't as good. I thought the going away party was pretty sweet, though. It's not something I would go to (it's my personal nightmare), but it's fitting for the club.
I don't think this book is necessarily boring, it's just not up my alley. I just couldn't relate to their excitement about the sale lol. I think I also wanted to see more scenes in SMS and reactions to her move by the other students. It felt like Stacey's non-BSC friends were swept under the rug (although I guess this is normal for the series haha).
In AMM's note at the end, she said she wanted to write about a friend who moved away. Which I get, but it seems early in the series. I guess Stacey is the most logical one to move out of the group, but still, I would've waited. I think this plot point is actually overused for the series. Kristy moves across town (although I think this one is handled the best), Stacey moves back to New York, then back to Stoneybrook, then Dawn stays in CA for six months, back to Stoneybrook for like five minutes, back to CA permanently, Jessi considers moving to New York, then Mal moves to Riverbend. That's actually too much imo. Also, whenever a club member moves away (aside from Mal, but the series was winding down by that point. Oh, and aside from Dawn's temporary stay in CA), there's conveniently a new girl who's an experienced baby-sitter who's willing to join. Wtf? How unlikely is that?
They also seem so ready to accept Mal into the club, but in the next book, they're awful to Mal. Weird. About to read that next. I actually really liked most of Mallory's books back in the day. I'm very dorky so I can relate to her lol.
I think this would be more heart-wrenching if I didn't know that Stacey was coming back. All in all, I just wasn't a big fan of this one. I did like the Charlotte moments though and thought they were really sweet. I liked Claudia's confession of Stacey being her first best friend and that she'd always be her BEST best friend (I'm a sucker for things like this), and I actually love Stacey's full name and have no idea why she finds it embarrassing. Anastasia actually DOES sound sophisticated to me, ngl (I also love the animated movie of the same name). Also, her middle name is my first name so I'm biased.
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Post by wistfuldreamer86 on Jul 2, 2022 14:56:09 GMT -5
I think I read somewhere that Stacey wasn't supposed to come back to Stoneybrook but it was the fans who wanted her back.
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