Abby and the Best Kid Ever

The Baby-Sitters Club #116

by Ann M. Martin

When Lou McNally was last in Stoneybrook, she was the Worst Kid Ever. Now she's back...and Abby is going to be her baby-sitter. She's prepared for the worst, but Lou is a perfect angel. Is the new Lou too good to be true?

Genres: Middle Grade, Fiction, Childrens, Young Adult, Contemporary, Juvenile, Realistic Fiction

160 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1998

About the author

Ann Matthews Martin was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane. After graduating from Smith College, Ann became a teacher and then an editor of children's books. She's now a full-time writer.

Ann gets the ideas for her books from many different places. Some are based on personal experiences, while others are based on childhood memories and feelings. Many are written about contemporary problems or events. All of Ann's characters, even the members of the Baby-sitters Club, are made up. But many of her characters are based on real people. Sometimes Ann names her characters after people she knows, and other times she simply chooses names that she likes.

Ann has always enjoyed writing. Even before she was old enough to write, she would dictate stories to her mother to write down for her. Some of her favorite authors at that time were Lewis Carroll, P. L. Travers, Hugh Lofting, Astrid Lindgren, and Roald Dahl. They inspired her to become a writer herself.

Since ending the BSC series in 2000, Ann’s writing has concentrated on single novels, many of which are set in the 1960s.

After living in New York City for many years, Ann moved to the Hudson Valley in upstate New York where she now lives with her dog, Sadie, and her cats, Gussie, Willy and Woody. Her hobbies are reading, sewing, and needlework. Her favorite thing to do is to make clothes for children.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/annmma...

Reviews

[Ciara · Rating 2 out of 5]

man, i sure am relieved that i only have like twenty books left to recap, because they are seriously going downhill.

this one is all about how lou mcnally, terror of kristy & the worst kid ever has moved back to stoneybrook with her brother & adoptive parents (an aunt & uncle). the mcnallys call the babysitters club for sitting help while they settle into their new house & complete renovations, & abby gets the first job. she's a little nervous, because the other babysitters have updated her on lou's well-deserved reputation, so she is surprised to find lou well-behaved, tidy, & helpful. in fact, she may be a little bit too helpful, trying to carry boxes that are too heavy for her & constantly being underfoot in an effort to make herself useful. abby tells the other sitters that lou has changed. she thinks maybe it's the positive influence of being reunited with her brother & having a loving home life.

meanwhile, abby is struggling a bit in school & has decided to do a black history day project to try to bring her grade up. she pitches a plan to do some kind of educational project with a bunch of sitting charges. her teacher is skeptical, because it sounds like abby is long on good intentions but short of actual ideas, but abby insists that she'll pull it off & it will be great. she has a brainstorming session with a bunch of kids, & nicky pike suggests a project about the underground railroad. abby likes this idea & invites all the kids to the library to help do research. i don't know why a) abby would want a bunch of kids to take care of when she's trying to research her extra-credit project, nor b) why the hell the kids are so pumped about the project. sounds pretty boring to me.

abby has a big stack of books ready to be checked out, & she asks lou to grab another one off a cart. unfortunately, in lou's zeal to be helpful, she knocks over the entire cart. abby instead dispatches lou to gather up the books abby chose so they'll be ready for check-out, but lou misunderstands & puts a bunch of them back on the shelves. abby knows lou didn't mean to be disruptive, but she is still a little frustrated by the fact that asking lou to help seems to be doing more harm than good. this is why you should just go to the library alone, abby.

finally abby decides that she will film a dramatization of some of stoneybrook's key roles during the underground railroad years, starring the kids. she writes up a script (lou accidentally erases a big chunk of it), assigns roles, & cobbles together props & costumes. while filming an outdoor scene, lou walks right through the frame, bearing a thermos of cider for abby. the scene is wrecked & abby kind of snaps at lou, telling her to stop trying to be so helpful all the time, & also to stop apologizing for every mistake she makes. abby tells lou to basically lighten the hell up.

so lou goes back to being a bad kid. she starts disrupting abby's movie on purpose with silly pranks & jokes. at one point, she leaps out from behind a door during filming & startles abby that she drops the camera. luckily, jay catches it, so everything is okay, but abby is really frustrated with lou & wants to get to the bottom of her behavior.

during another sitting job, lou accidentally drops a plate & it breaks. she completely loses her shit & can't stop crying. she finally confesses that she's afraid that if she isn't perfect & helpful all the time, her aunt & uncle will send her back to foster care. jay tells her that they would never do that, they legally adopted both him & lou, & he would never let them do that anyway. abby is just kind of sitting there, not knowing what to do, when mr. & mrs. mcnally get home. they are quick to comfort lou & assure her that they would never give her up, no matter what happened. this magically works, erasing all the trauma of being abandoned by her mother, her father dying, being shipped off into foster care, being separated from her brother, etc, & she starts acting like a normal kid again.

abby turns in her movie & gets an A.

in the B-plot, the addisons are moving to seattle so mrs. addisons can accept a job offer. claudia takes it surprisingly hard, i guess because we're supposed to think that she & corrie have really bonded about being artists. all the babysitters are like, "we'll miss corrie so much!...oh yeah, & sean." the addisons hire the club a lot of sit while they pack up the house, & while corrie is as good as gold, sean acts out & is a big jerk. he finally confronts mary anne & accuses her & all the other babysitters of hating him. hey, sean? if you think someone might hate you, one way to definitely make them hate you for sure is to be a total dick about it. mary anne denies hating sean, but he doesn't believe it. the babysitters decide to convince sean they don't hate him by making him "king for an hour". really? an hour? hey, sean, you're right, they hate you. they take him sledding & he has a great time...right up until the end when stacey says, "whew, i'm glad that's over." sean takes that as confirmation that they all hate him.

the babysitters have a going-away party for the addisons, & sean spends the whole party moping in a corner. finally he starts crying & admits that he'll miss the babysitters. they tell him they'll miss him too & i guess it's all good. but i'm sure they won't be sad to see the back of his library-book-burning, tantrum-throwing, running-away, mentally unstable self. they wonder what he'll be like when he gets older. one word: columbine.

incidentally, jay mcnally is eleven years old, & the mcnallys still hire the club to babysit for him. he should form a support group with tiffany kilbourne & ben hobart.

[FIND ME ON STORYGRAPH · Rating 1 out of 5]

this is my first time reading this book.

in this book by ghostwriter Nola Thacker, two new families are moving to town with kids that are bsc client ages: the nichollses (whose father seems abusive, foreshadowing Claudia and the Terrible Truth) and the mcnallys. does that name seem familiar? yes, lou mcnally from Kristy and the Worst Kid Ever is BACK, and now she’s trying to be the best kid ever and failing miserably. she keeps overdoing it while trying to help and accidentally making things worse -- like when someone comes to a party at your house and insists on helping you clean up even though you tell them you can handle the cleanup and then they use a scouring pad on your nonstick pan and then your nonstick pan is irretrievably damaged (not like I’m speaking from personal experience or anything…). abby has decided to include the bsc kids in her black history month extra credit project, which gives lou even more chances to ruin things for abby with her good intentions.

abby has no focus and no idea what she wants to do for her project, and eventually after kristy sideeyes her a couple times for her lack of organization she decides to focus on stories about white saviors helping black enslaved people escape through the underground railroad. because black history month is obviously about white people, right? eventually lou cracks and makes it clear that she’s scared her adoptive parents (her aunt and uncle) will give her up. they tell her they love her unconditionally. so that’s resolved. the subplot is that sean addison from Mary Anne and the Library Mystery and Claudia, Queen of the Seventh Grade freaks out because he thinks that the bsc won’t miss him when the addisons move away. because he is one of those kids who pours salt on snails and will grow up to do worse things, possibly because he has some of the most neglectful parents in the entire bsc universe (see Claudia and the Sad Goodbye).

highlights:
-soapbox feminist abby, on presidents day and mlk day: "where is a day for the women? why don't we have susan b. anthony day? or sojourner truth day?"

lowlights/nitpicks:
-abby suggests that since philadelphia is the city of brotherly love, there should be a city named philasororia for city of sisterly love. but that would be combining greek and latin roots. the greek word for city of sisterly love would ALSO be philadelphia, because adelphi means sibling (and in actuality philadelphia means the city of siblingly love). can you tell I’m married to a classicist?
-abby says "easy as pie" and stacey says "pi? r squared?" but that's nonsense. pi r squared is the function for solving the area of a circle, but a true math nerd wouldn't have brought that function up out of nowhere and would instead have said, "3.1415926?" or "archimedes' constant?" or something. can you tell I'm a math nerd?
-lou knocks over a cart when trying to take a book from it. sounds like that library has flimsy carts. a lawsuit waiting to happen, cause a kid is DEFINITELY gonna get injured by it. it’s not lou’s fault at all.
-like the simpsons episode where the whole black history month project is about lisa trying to convince people that her family were white saviors, i.e. making bhm about white people, abby portrays all of the white people saving the black enslaved people in her 60 minute video project. I guess you can’t portray the actual enslaved people when you live in a town as white as stoneybrook, but still...smdh
-abby claims her movie is a documentary, which it's clearly not. or I guess one aspect of it is the making of the movie itself, which I guess could be a documentary, but that's only one part of the movie

outfits
claudia outfit:
-"She had on a red tunic with an orange-red braided belt (that she had made herself, naturally). Her leggings were a rose-pink color, and she had on black shiny flats with tiny rosettes on the toe. She'd pulled her hair back with a large red silk scarf that matched the tunic. Her earrings were silver snowflakes, also homemade."

stacey outfit:
-"Stacey was wearing a cropped sweater in dark blue-green that looked good with her blue eyes. She also had on a short skirt (black faux suede), pale blue tights, and very cool-looking black suede boots that came to just above her knees. Tiny gold knot earrings completed her ensemble."

snacks in claudia’s room:
-m&ms (n.s.)
-chocolate trail mix (n.s.)
-garlic nugget pretzels (n.s.)

[Sally · Rating 2 out of 5]

Lou was more fun when she was naughty, and Abby's not a real baby-sitter anyway.

[Kara · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh. Abby's annoying.

[Nancy · Rating 1 out of 5]

In which, once again, no real sympathy is shown for a kid who was in foster care. And STFU, Abby.

[Sayo -bibliotequeish-]

As a kid my best friends sister had the whole BSC series on a book shelf in her room. I thought she was so grown up. And I envied this bookshelf. And would often poke my head into that room just to look at it.
And when I read BSC, I felt like such a grown up.
And while I might have still been a little too young to understand some of the issues dealt with in these books, I do appreciated that Ann M. Martin tackled age appropriate issues, some being deeper than others, but still important.

[Tonia Christle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really REALLY loved this book...I just wish the subplot wasn't so subpar. (I can't give these stories about Lou 5 stars like I want to because of the dang subplots.) I just really enjoy Lou McNally and all the sides to her. Her portrayal was really layered and I enjoyed seeing her post-adoption AND that it's not necessarily a happily ever after scenario, because she's still struggling to feel secure.

[Liesl Miller]

I cannot think of a single scenario where a middle-schooler would recruit elementary schoolers to help with a class project where the elementary-schoolers would be not only willing, but EXCITED about it. Where were these helpful kids when I was in school??
Also, I will admit to remembering nothing about Lou McNally apart from the fact that she was the titular "worst kid ever" in a previous BSC book, but I'm glad she got a happy ending!

[Devon · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book honestly just made me feel relieved that it's Abby and not Dawn in books like this. I realize that's kind of mean, but at least Abby handled her need for extra credit somewhat gracefully (not without anxiety, but who wouldn't be anxious?) I loved that this book actually revolved around babysitting in both the A and B storylines, too. If feels like it's been a while, and it's so refreshing--especially seeing so many of the neighborhood kids involved in the project.

[Cassandra Doon · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I was 10 I joined a readers club/group where we got a new book every week. I chose The babysitters club.
The books are fantastic! So enjoyable. I loved getting the book every week. They are super quick reads and I was able to read it in one day.
Highly recommend for young teenagers to read or even younger if they are able too read well.

[Samantha · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was so boring I was falling asleep reading it, which is horrible. It was just completely dull, and I could care less about Lou moving back or the Addisons and their book burning sociopath child moving away. It was just awful.

[Lianna Kendig · Rating 3 out of 5]

(LL)
This one was kind of boring, despite the return of Lou and her incredibly sad story. The main plot of Lou and her being “too perfect” and the subplot of Abby’s big project constantly were taking over each other, so neither plot got the attention it needed to make it that interesting.

[Maeve · Rating 2 out of 5]

Abby is working on a huge school project while also babysitting for Lou, who has bma reputation as the worst kid ever. But Lou is acting like a whole new kid. Abby gets to the bottom of the strange behavior. Meanwhile, Mary Anne must figure out another charge's strange behavior.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

No strong feelings about this one; it's actually kind of boring tbh. But I do appreciate that Abby is an average student (without it being the end of the world) and that she has no initial idea or focus for her project. A baby-sitter after my own procrastinating heart.

[Tamara Spady · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing

Super duper good If you liked Kristy and the Worst Kid Ever you will love Abby and the Best Kid Ever!

[Jennifer Baratta · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review on www.audible.com please listen to this book very important for children who move around and they're emotions.

[Christina]

Read my recap at A Year with the BSC via Stoneybrook Forever: www.livethemovies.com/bsc-blog/abby-a...

[Jade · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one felt complicated. I still liked it. A nice chaser for a bad day.

[Jaclyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Odd seeing Lou so well-behaved, and super sad to understand her reasons why. Glad things worked out eventually.

[Aaliyah · Rating 4 out of 5]

The reason Lou was acting the way she was acting made sense for me I loved this book

[Pearline]

Read and left this in Danang. Lou’s trauma and insecurities about being abandoned are suddenly cured by a good chat!

[Leigh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh Abby. After losing hope in the literal death throes of this series the last few books are getting not better but at least more entertaining. In this one the so called worst kid ever Lou returns. Only now she's different and tries to act perfect and becomes more like Jackie Rodowsky as a result. Abby gets the first job taking care of her and her brother Jay. She's also trying to find a project for black history month. In typical Abby fashion she tries to do too much and it gets out off hand, but as this is the BSC of course it all works out. Abby decides to do a 60 minutes style show that shows how the underground railroad worked. Lou messes up things knocking over books, ruining the shot by bringing Abby a drink among other things. Abby snaps and Lou goes back to being a bad kid. It comes out that she's acting as she is because she's afraid her new family will give her up. The b plot involves the Addisons wonderful artist Corrie and arsonist Sean are moving to Seattle and Sean is convinced that the BSC hate him. There's also foreshadowing to the next book where Claudia deals with child abuse. This was at least entertaining and I so glad Abby joined the club she's awesome.

[April · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic books for young girls getting into reading!! Great stories about friendship and life lessons. The characters deal with all sorts of situations and often find responsible solutions to problems.

I loved this series growing up and wanted to start my own babysitting business with friends. Great lessons in entrepreneurship for tweens.

The books may be dated with out references to modern technology but the story stands and lessons are still relevant.

Awesome books that girls will love! And the series grows with them! Terrific Author!

[Tanya · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ah, the BSC. I think it was a mistake to add Abby to the series. Don't get me wrong, I like the character, but she's too written to please too many people. TONS of characteristics, to the point that you end up with contradictions, or things that just don't fit. Bad asthma and allergies, star athlete, slacker, great student, twin, wild hair, Jewish, practical joker/funny, loves Elvis and R&B, damaged due to the death of her dad. It's just too much.

Meh.

[Marian · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't remember ever having read this one before, which isn't all that surprising since I'd pretty much outgrown the BSC by the time Abby appeared.

It takes Abby entirely too long to figure out what's wrong with Lou, and I found myself interested more in Sean Addison's attitude problems anyway.

[Maria Elmvang · Rating 2 out of 5]

Really not a fan of Abby, but I liked the plotlines where she wasn't the main focus.