The Baby-Sitters Club
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The Baby-Sitters Club was a series of children’s books published by Scholastic between 1986 and 2000. The books are credited to Ann M. Martin, though many were apparently ghostwritten. Spin-offs from the series include a number of other books, a TV show, a movie, board games and dolls.
The books follow the adventures of a group of middle-school students in the fictional town of Stoneybrook, Connecticut, who run the title business on a part-time basis. Clients are invited to call during the club's regular meetings, with sitters assigned based on schedule and other factors. All of the members charge the same fee, paying part back to the group as weekly dues; they also share notes on particular jobs and children for future reference.
The club started out with four members, eventually expanding to nine. All of the main characters are about the same age, with the exception of junior members Mallory and Jessi, who are two years younger. The older characters were in the seventh grade when the club was founded and advanced to the eighth grade; after that, the characters remained static in age until the final book, in which they finish middle school.
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Structure of the books
In the regular and Mystery series, each book focuses on and is narrated by one member of the club. Some chapters begin with an entry from the club’s notebook, in which members are required to take notes on each of their baby-sitting jobs.
The regular books are generally 120 to 150 pages long, with 15 chapters. To aid readers who may be starting mid-series, each book begins with the narrator explaining a bit about the club’s history and introducing the main characters.
Titles
Main characters
Kristy Thomas
- Club position: President, founder
- First appearance: #1, Kristy’s Great Idea
Kristy's passions are sports and her large family, which expanded when her mother married Watson Brewer, a millionaire, and includes her older brothers Charlie and Sam, her younger brother David Michael, her adopted sister Emily Michelle, and her stepsiblings Karen and Andrew. Kristy is known for her ease in conceiving ideas (including that of The Baby-Sitters Club) and for organizing plans to make them work, as well as for being bossy at times.
Claudia Kishi
- Club position: Vice president
- First appearance: #1, Kristy’s Great Idea
Claudia is Japanese-American and her main focus is art; schoolwork comes second. At one point she is told that she must repeat the seventh grade. This is especially hard for her because her older sister is a genius, and while she loves her conservative, scholarly family, she often feels that she does not belong with them, especially after her grandmother Mimi dies. Claudia is the only member with a private phone line, so her room is the club’s official meeting place; it is liberally stocked with hidden junk food and Nancy Drew books, which Claudia loves but her parents disapprove of.
Mary Anne Spier
- Club position: Secretary
- First appearance: #1, Kristy’s Great Idea
Known for her extreme sensitivity, Mary Anne is Kristy’s best friend; the two lived next door to each other until the summer before eighth grade, when Kristy moved across town to Watson’s mansion. Mary Anne’s mother died when she was a baby, and has a very strict upbringing until she finally confronts her father. She was the first of the baby-sitters to have a steady boyfriend (Logan Bruno).
Stacey McGill
- Club position: Treasurer
- First appearance: #1, Kristy’s Great Idea
Stacey, a native of New York City, moved to Stoneybrook in the seventh grade and quickly became friends with Claudia; the two share a love for fashion. Stacey is a diabetic, and health problems figure prominently in some of her books. She enjoys her job as treasurer because of her love and talent for math.
Dawn Schafer
- Club position: Alternate officer
- First appearance: #5, Dawn and the Impossible Three
Dawn moves from California to Stoneybrook during the seventh grade. She first meets Mary Anne, then the rest of the club. She becomes another best friend to Mary Anne, and later the two discover that their parents dated in high school, and work to get them to rekindle their affections.
Mallory Pike
- Club position: Junior member
- First appearance: #4, Mary Anne Saves the Day (as client)
Mallory is the oldest of eight children, and her family is one of the Baby-Sitters Club’s most frequent clients. Though the club's members are initially reluctant to let her in and force her to undergo various difficult tests, she becomes a junior member at the age of 11. Mallory, who plans to become a writer of children’s books, wears glasses and braces and is often insecure about her appearance. During the later books, she faces intense social problems, leading to her decision to attend boarding school in Massachusetts.
Jessi Ramsey
- Club position: Junior member
- First appearance: #14, Hello, Mallory
Around the time Mallory is trying to get into The Baby-Sitters Club, sixth-grader Jessi moves into Stacey's old house from New Jersey. Mallory and Jessi share a love of reading (especially horse stories) and become best friends, ultimately joining the club at the same time. Jessi, who is black, lives with her parents, her eight-year-old sister Becca, and her infant brother Squirt. She is a talented ballet dancer and her efforts to learn sign language have helped her forge a special bond with Matt Braddock, a deaf client.
Logan Bruno
- Club position: Associate member
- First appearance: #10, Logan Likes Mary Anne!
Logan moved from Kentucky before eighth grade. He participates in many sports, including track. He is Mary Anne's boyfriend in addition to being an associate member of the club (a member who does not come to meetings but takes jobs when no regular member is available). Logan lives with his parents, sister and brother.
Shannon Kilbourne
- Club position: Associate member
- First appearance: #11, Kristy and the Snobs
Shannon is an overachiever who is always involved in extracurricular activities, as well as the only Baby-Sitters Club member who doesn’t attend Stoneybrook Middle School. She has two sisters, and is Kristy's first friend in her new neighborhood, although the two do not initially get along. Shannon also gave Kristy one of her dog’s puppies, which Kristy named for her.
Abby Stevenson
- Club position: Alternate officer (replacing Dawn)
- First appearance: #89, Kristy and the Dirty Diapers
Shortly after Dawn moves back to California to live with her father, Abby moves to Stoneybrook from Long Island with her mother and her twin sister, Anna; her father died when she was nine. Abby's love for sports and bold personality often put her at odds with Kristy. She and Shannon Kilbourne are the only other Baby-Sitters Club members who live in Kristy's neighborhood.
Spin-offs
Related book series
The series’ popularity led to the introduction of expanded Super Special books, which center on a larger-scale plot involving multiple baby-sitters and clients and switch narrators on a chapter-by-chapter basis. (For example, one is about the baby-sitters becoming counselors-in-training at a camp attended by many of their clients; in another, the club is enlisted to care for the Pikes’ eight children during a cruise trip.) Also part of the regular series are the Special Edition Readers’ Request books, which feature associate members Logan and Shannon.
The Baby-Sitters Club Mystery books, published between 1991 and 1998, are similar in style to the regular series, but each book focuses more on a particular mystery the featured character is trying to solve. Super Special books were also part of this series.
The Baby-Sitters Little Sister series, which ran from 1988 to 2000, is geared toward younger readers, with a focus on Karen, the 7-year-old sister of Baby-Sitters Club president Kristy; it also included Super Special books.
The Portrait Collection — six books published between 1994 and 1997 — is in the format of biographies each character has been assigned to write for a class project.
Baby-Sitters Club Friends Forever, which ran from 1999 to 2000, comes after the original series, focusing more on the lives of the original four characters: Kristy, Claudia, Mary Anne and Stacey.
Two other Ann M. Martin series are loosely related to the original Baby-Sitters Club books: California Diaries, about Dawn and her friends after her return to California, and The Kids in Mrs. Coleman’s Class, about Karen’s second-grade classmates.
TV show
In 1990, The Baby-Sitters Club spawned a 13-episode TV series. At various times, the show aired on HBO and the Disney Channel; the episodes were also released to video.
Episodes
- Mary Anne and the Brunettes
- Dawn and the Haunted House
- Stacey's Big Break
- Kristy and the Great Campaign
- The Baby-Sitters Club's Special Christmas
- Claudia and the Missing Jewels
- Dawn and the Dream Boy
- Claudia and the Secret Passage
- Jessie and the Mystery of the Stolen Secrets
- The Baby-Sitters and the Boy Sitters
- Dawn Saves the Trees
- Stacey Takes a Stand
- The Baby-Sitters Remember
Movie
A movie based on the Baby-Sitters Club books was released in 1995.
- See also: The Baby-Sitters Club (movie)
External links
- Scholastic site (http://www.scholastic.com/annmartin/bsc/)
- Merrill's Companion to The Baby-Sitters Club (http://members.aol.com/jonmerrill/bsctitle.htm), with information on the original series, spinoffs, memorabilia and the movie
- Baby-sitters Club@LiveJournal (http://www.livejournal.com/~babysittersclub/)pl:Klub Baby-Sitters