SS #4 Baby-sitters' Island Adventure

This book gets the prize

For ugliest cover of

All Super Specials.

Summary

Claudia and Dawn have been taking sailing lessons at the Stoneybrook Community Center. They have a race, but when it ends in a tie, they decide to have a rematch. Race #2 becomes quite the outing; Dawn recruits her brother, Jeff, and Haley Braddock as crew members, while Claudia agrees to take Becca Ramsey and Jamie Newton(!!!). The girls decide to race out to a nearby island, have a picnic and some playtime with the kids, and then sail home later. On their way to the island, though, a storm blows in. Dawn's boat sinks, so she, Jeff, and Haley all have to bail out, swim to Claudia's boat, and hold onto the edge (it's too small to actually hold all of them). They make it to land pretty quickly, but realize that it isn't the island they were shooting for. They're in pretty decent shape, though; they find shelter, and managed to rescue most of the food from the boats. Things are okay until the following day, when Jamie Newton gets sick. Claud and Dawn do the best they can to care for him, but luckily, they don't have to worry for long. That's because Jamie dies....no, I'm kidding. :) Claudia finds a piece of mirror in the woods and uses it to signal a passing plane. The pilots get a Coast Guard boat out to them, complete with a doctor for Jamie.

During their time on the island, Dawn kind of falls apart. Claudia is the one who takes charge, figures out how to collect rain water for them to drink, and finds the mirror that gets them home. Dawn feels bad about that, but realizes that by taking a back seat (whether intentionally or not), she helped Claudia to see how capable she can actually be.

Prior to the sailing accident, Mary Anne and Dawn have a fight. Dawn forgot to give Mary Anne a message from Logan, leading Mary Anne to think that Logan stood her up. Logan gets mad at her for thinking that, which in turn makes Mary Anne furious with Dawn. She tells Dawn that she wishes she'd get out of her life forever, and when Dawn goes missing, Mary Anne is a basket case. She thinks that it's her fault that the accident happened (because she just can't help but make everything all about HER...), and she's so distraught that she doesn't even help search.

Stacey is in New York when she finds out about what happened, and she wants to come home right away to help with the search. Her dad won't let her, though, because it would interfere with the weekend full of restaurants and shows that he has planned. Jerk...Stacey does finally get to leave a few hours earlier than planned, but her dad still manages to pout about it.

Kristy cancels a Krusher's practice and game to help search, which doesn't make Bart particularly happy. He basically turns into a junior version of Ed McGill; all Bart does when Kristy breaks the news to him is talk about how irresponsible she is and how she's going to be disappointing a lot of kids. He even goes so far as to accuse her of cancelling because her team isn't ready. Could he be any more insensitive? He apologizes eventually, and uses the excuse that he didn't know how serious the missing boaters situation was. Was he living in a cave? Supposedly, it was all over the news. I find it hard to believe that he wouldn't have seen any newscast at all. It would have been much more insensitive to just go ahead with the game as if one of the Krushers' players and one of their cheerleaders weren't missing.

Jessi's parents are away for the three day weekend, and they've left her in charge of Becca and Squirt. When Becca goes missing, Jessi calls her Aunt Cecelia for help. She's not fond of her aunt, and becomes even less so when Cecelia walks in the door and right away starts criticizing the Ramsey's decision to leave Jessi in charge. I call that "stating the obvious," but whatever.

Mallory is kind of a non-entity in this one; she and her family go out searching on boats a lot, and she cries a few times. That's about it.

Rating: 2.5

Thoughts and Things

• I'm pretty sure that this is my least favorite Super Special, but I'll withhold final judgement until I've made it through all of them again.

• Okay, the cover. Like I said in my haiku, it's ugly. Let's break it down further, shall we? Mallory couldn't look any dorkier if she tried. Actually, I think she looks a little bit..."special." Kristy has no neck, and Claudia's hair is kind of frizzy. Jessi (miracle of miracles, considering some of her covers) actually looks kinds of pretty, and Becca's not bad, either. Dawn is okay, but her hair isn't long enough or light enough. I guess I can forgive that, though, because it almost never is. :) Jeff looks a little cross-eyed, and Haley looks like an ugly man. Mary Anne is okay, too, but her shoes are hideous. I think she and Haley must have bought theirs at the same place. Last but not least, Stacey closely resembles Miss Bell, my preschool teacher circa 1985. It's actually kind of creepy....

• The illustrations on pages 216 and 217 were screwed up in some copies of this book. Page 216 is supposed to show the Jeff, Dawn, Claudia, Becca, and Haley crouched down, waiting for Jamie to run to them from page 217. Instead, the messed up copies show the group on page 217, facing to the right while Jamie runs up behind them. It's funny. :)

• Speaking of illustrations, let's discuss the one on 208. Who is the short girl shaking the mayor's hand??? I always thought it was Claudia (it would make sense if it was), but she really looks more like Kristy. If it is Claud, she must have shrunk or something during her time on the island; if you take a look at page 17, she and Dawn appear to be the same height.

• Last illustration comment; I promise! On pages 104-105, Mary Anne totally looks like Blossom, and Kristy looks like Jasmine Guy from A Different World.

• It's weird to think that the majority of this book takes place over 48 hours rather than a week or two, like most Super Specials.

• Do we ever hear about the girls sailing again? I don't think so....