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The Baby-Sitters Club Mysteries #23
Abby and the Secret Society
While helping restore an abandoned country club, Abby and the Baby-sitters Club become involved in a decades-old murder mystery involving a secret blackmailing ring that was once based there. Original.
145 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1996
14 people are currently reading
363 people want to read
About the author
Ann M. Martin
1,112 books3,055 followersAnn 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...
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...
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
April 12, 2011
abby has a case of the february blahs. the craptastic weather makes it too cold for summer sports, but too warm for winter sports, & the babysitters club is experiencing a lull, so she doesn't even have jobs to take her mind off things. she decides to find a new project, so she goes to, i don't know, the grocery store or something, & looks at the bulletin advertising various odd jobs. there's a new country club opening in stoneybrook. it's called greenbrooke & its owners are looking for folks to help clean the place up & get it ready for its grand opening. mysteriously, even though this sounds like the worst job outside of being a coal miner, abby thinks it's just the ticket & she even convinces the other members of the babysitters club to join her. they meet the new owner, nikki stanton-cha, & she is pleased to welcome them aboard. she also recruits a few other stoneybrook middle school students, including alan gray, cary retlin, & cokie mason. (cokie admits that she's just pitching in so she'll have an "in" when the club opens--she aspires to be hired as a "hostess"...yeah, i know).
nikki has a seven-year-old son named stephen. abby notices that stephen has unusual features. nikki explains that her husband is korean american & stephen is mixed race. & thus begins the worst B-plot ever. stephen is mixed race & has somehow gotten the idea that other kids don't like him because of it. there's not any clear indication that he has experienced any racism as a result of his ethnicity...though perhaps he has. (i like to make up backstory for the babysitters club characters.) i am a tiny bit disturbed that this kid is so angsty over being mixed race. i mean, he is like borderline clinically depressed. what the fuck are his parents telling him that is making him so insecure. nikki wastes no time at all explaining that the country club used to be owned by her father. it was called dark woods then, & it was very exclusive (read: racist, classist, all your usual stereotypes about country clubs.) nikki tells a big story about how she brought a jewish friend to the club once to go swimming, & all the buffys that were members got all sniffy & told nikki that "those people" weren't allowed at the club. she also explains that she has not spoken to her father (or, more specifically, he has not spoken to her) since she told him she was marrying a korean american man. & she says this right in front of stephen. which i'm sure makes stephen feel just GREAT about being mixed race. not that she should be hiding the realities of racism from him, but...it's all just a little bit on the heavy-handed side.
also, this B-plot is peppered with numerous characters saying dumbass things like, "stephen is both korean & american! isn't that cool?" word to the wise: "american" is not synonymous with "white". i will note that the only character in the book who uses the word "white" to describe a racial category is stephen himself. he is literally the only person in the entire book that isn't engaged in some kind of weird race fail. so i guess that makes his depression & isolation a lot more explicable.
anyway, when nikki explains the history of dark woods to the babysitters club, she drops some hints about "bad things" that happened at the club. i think she is referring to the racism, but abby gets the feeling that there is something even more sinister afoot. this is confirmed on the very first day of work when sergeant johnson mysteriously shows up at the club. abby is all like, "hey, why are you here?" & he sits her & some other club members down & explains that his childhood best friend grew up to be a journalist. he was investigating allegations of extortion & blackmail by members of the dark woods country club. before he could publish his findings, he was in a mysterious car accident. sergeant johnson thinks the country club inner circle got wind of his investigation & snuffed him out, but sergeant johnson has never been able to prove this. when he heard the club was re-opening with a new name & new management, he decided to come snoop around & see if he could find any clues. because telling a bunch of 13-year-olds that the most influential old men in stoneybrook may be mixed up with murder is totally appropriate, right? jeebus.
abby is intrigued & starts tallying up the mysteries at the club. there is an old gardener (asian & inscrutable, naturally) that never speaks, & he is very protective of this weird hedge maze. some of the girls notice a white limo cruising around the grounds, & they realize it belongs to mr. stanton, nikki's father. there's some other crap too, but the mystery blows wide open when kristy trips on a rug & pulls it back to find "1954 (D.F.)" scrawled on the hardwood floor in some kind of purplish lettering. D.F. are the initials of sergeant johnson's dead journalist friend.
the girls mull on it for a while & eventually realize that the note was written with wine. they creep into the club wine cellar & find the 1954 bottle, which contains another note. this one says "open WWII". kristy starts researching world war 2, while abby prowls around the club, looking for something that has something to do with world war 2. finally they hit upon the golf trophy case in the clubhouse. there's only one trophy from the world war 2 years, & it has a false bottom. inside is a set of keys & a note that says, "shelter favorite foods". the girls have no idea what this means. abby decides to consult with sergeant johnson. together, they concoct a plan to send mr. armstrong, who was mayor of stoneybrook during world war 2 & a member of the dark woods country club "secret brotherhood", an anonymous note, with the hopes that he will lead them to the "shelter favorite foods".
they bring nikki into the loop as well, who invites mr. armstrong to come tour the club. he readily accepts because he's eager for a chance to follow up on the anonymous note. she gives him a tour, with the babysitters club & sergeant johnson creeping along unseen behind her. she leaves mr. armstrong "alone" 9with everyone spying from behind a couch) in the gold clubhouse. he goes straight to the trophy & finds the weird shelter note inside. he thinks for a minute & then books it to the hedge maze. the gardener tries to bar his entry, but mr. armstrong knocks him aside. everyone starts to follow mr. armstrong into the maze (he still doesn't know he's being tailed), but then stacey runs up & says stephen is missing. abby decides that she & sergeant johnson will follow mr. armstrong while everyone else looks for stephen. but of course abby & sergeant johnson get lost in the maze. the gardener comes up & is like, "follw me." abby is like, "you can talk!" & the gardener is like, "when it is important, i can speak." very profound, mr. miyagi. god, this character is such a weirdly offensive stereotype. anyway, he leads them to the center of the maze, where mr. armstrong is scrabbling in the dirt. abby realizes he is uncovering a secret trapdoor. just then, stephen emerges from the hedges. & then sergeant johnson is like, "freeze! you're under arrest!" or something. mr. armstrong grabs stephen & is all, "back off or something may happen to the boy!" abby just about passes out, but suddenly old mr. stanton struts into the center of the maze & is all, "unhand my grandson!" sergeant johnson uses mr. armstrong's surprise to his advantage & cuffs mr. armstrong to an apple tree. (WTF?) mr. stanton is all, "mr armstrong was a bad man, & i did nothing to stop him. he wanted me to join his secret society, but i wouldn't. but i also never told the cops about all the extortion & blackmail they were doing...& maybe worse. then i saw stephen, my grandson, & realized what a terrible mistake i'd been making by being such a virulent racist for the last sixty years." basically it makes no sense.
abby & sergeant johnson are like, "cool speech, bro, but we have a trapdoor to check out." they bust it open (everyone else has shown up by now to watch) & go inside. they keys unlock big steel doors until they are standing in a huge bomb shelter. the gardener speculates that the secret society built it without his knowledge one summer when he was laid up with a broken leg. sergeant johnson goes straight for the ovaltine, which was his best friend's favorite beverage as a child. inside is his reporter's notebook & all his notes about the evils of the secret society, as well as a note for sergeant johnson that is all, "sorry i had to make my secret notes so hard to find, but no one could know what i was up to. i knew you were the only one who could crack the code." (well, him & a bunch of 13-year-olds, plus the evil old mayor, right?)
mr. armstrong is arrested. he admits to tampering with the journalist's brakes, which is what caused the fatal accident, but he says he didn't want to kill him. he just wanted to scare him away from his investigation. sergeant johnson explains that he will be charged with assault, thought the charges probably won't stick after so many years. um...WHAT? mr. armstrong KILLED that journalist dude. & there is no statute of limitations on murder, even if it was supposedly "accidental". sergeant johnson is all, "the important thing is that his nefarious deeds have been uncovered & will never happen again." HUH? what about GETTING JUSTICE FOR YOUR MURDERED BEST FRIEND? WHAT THE FUCK, BOOK?
anyway, greenbrooke opens, without any racist/classist exclusionary rules about membership. stephen makes friends with local children. nikki & mr. stanton renew their relationship. mysteriously, no charges are filed against mr. stanton for colluding in the cover-up of the secret society's blackmail & extortion schemes. i will also note that extortion (in some states) is a class A felony, for which there is no statute of limitations. i don't know. this book was idiotic.
nikki has a seven-year-old son named stephen. abby notices that stephen has unusual features. nikki explains that her husband is korean american & stephen is mixed race. & thus begins the worst B-plot ever. stephen is mixed race & has somehow gotten the idea that other kids don't like him because of it. there's not any clear indication that he has experienced any racism as a result of his ethnicity...though perhaps he has. (i like to make up backstory for the babysitters club characters.) i am a tiny bit disturbed that this kid is so angsty over being mixed race. i mean, he is like borderline clinically depressed. what the fuck are his parents telling him that is making him so insecure. nikki wastes no time at all explaining that the country club used to be owned by her father. it was called dark woods then, & it was very exclusive (read: racist, classist, all your usual stereotypes about country clubs.) nikki tells a big story about how she brought a jewish friend to the club once to go swimming, & all the buffys that were members got all sniffy & told nikki that "those people" weren't allowed at the club. she also explains that she has not spoken to her father (or, more specifically, he has not spoken to her) since she told him she was marrying a korean american man. & she says this right in front of stephen. which i'm sure makes stephen feel just GREAT about being mixed race. not that she should be hiding the realities of racism from him, but...it's all just a little bit on the heavy-handed side.
also, this B-plot is peppered with numerous characters saying dumbass things like, "stephen is both korean & american! isn't that cool?" word to the wise: "american" is not synonymous with "white". i will note that the only character in the book who uses the word "white" to describe a racial category is stephen himself. he is literally the only person in the entire book that isn't engaged in some kind of weird race fail. so i guess that makes his depression & isolation a lot more explicable.
anyway, when nikki explains the history of dark woods to the babysitters club, she drops some hints about "bad things" that happened at the club. i think she is referring to the racism, but abby gets the feeling that there is something even more sinister afoot. this is confirmed on the very first day of work when sergeant johnson mysteriously shows up at the club. abby is all like, "hey, why are you here?" & he sits her & some other club members down & explains that his childhood best friend grew up to be a journalist. he was investigating allegations of extortion & blackmail by members of the dark woods country club. before he could publish his findings, he was in a mysterious car accident. sergeant johnson thinks the country club inner circle got wind of his investigation & snuffed him out, but sergeant johnson has never been able to prove this. when he heard the club was re-opening with a new name & new management, he decided to come snoop around & see if he could find any clues. because telling a bunch of 13-year-olds that the most influential old men in stoneybrook may be mixed up with murder is totally appropriate, right? jeebus.
abby is intrigued & starts tallying up the mysteries at the club. there is an old gardener (asian & inscrutable, naturally) that never speaks, & he is very protective of this weird hedge maze. some of the girls notice a white limo cruising around the grounds, & they realize it belongs to mr. stanton, nikki's father. there's some other crap too, but the mystery blows wide open when kristy trips on a rug & pulls it back to find "1954 (D.F.)" scrawled on the hardwood floor in some kind of purplish lettering. D.F. are the initials of sergeant johnson's dead journalist friend.
the girls mull on it for a while & eventually realize that the note was written with wine. they creep into the club wine cellar & find the 1954 bottle, which contains another note. this one says "open WWII". kristy starts researching world war 2, while abby prowls around the club, looking for something that has something to do with world war 2. finally they hit upon the golf trophy case in the clubhouse. there's only one trophy from the world war 2 years, & it has a false bottom. inside is a set of keys & a note that says, "shelter favorite foods". the girls have no idea what this means. abby decides to consult with sergeant johnson. together, they concoct a plan to send mr. armstrong, who was mayor of stoneybrook during world war 2 & a member of the dark woods country club "secret brotherhood", an anonymous note, with the hopes that he will lead them to the "shelter favorite foods".
they bring nikki into the loop as well, who invites mr. armstrong to come tour the club. he readily accepts because he's eager for a chance to follow up on the anonymous note. she gives him a tour, with the babysitters club & sergeant johnson creeping along unseen behind her. she leaves mr. armstrong "alone" 9with everyone spying from behind a couch) in the gold clubhouse. he goes straight to the trophy & finds the weird shelter note inside. he thinks for a minute & then books it to the hedge maze. the gardener tries to bar his entry, but mr. armstrong knocks him aside. everyone starts to follow mr. armstrong into the maze (he still doesn't know he's being tailed), but then stacey runs up & says stephen is missing. abby decides that she & sergeant johnson will follow mr. armstrong while everyone else looks for stephen. but of course abby & sergeant johnson get lost in the maze. the gardener comes up & is like, "follw me." abby is like, "you can talk!" & the gardener is like, "when it is important, i can speak." very profound, mr. miyagi. god, this character is such a weirdly offensive stereotype. anyway, he leads them to the center of the maze, where mr. armstrong is scrabbling in the dirt. abby realizes he is uncovering a secret trapdoor. just then, stephen emerges from the hedges. & then sergeant johnson is like, "freeze! you're under arrest!" or something. mr. armstrong grabs stephen & is all, "back off or something may happen to the boy!" abby just about passes out, but suddenly old mr. stanton struts into the center of the maze & is all, "unhand my grandson!" sergeant johnson uses mr. armstrong's surprise to his advantage & cuffs mr. armstrong to an apple tree. (WTF?) mr. stanton is all, "mr armstrong was a bad man, & i did nothing to stop him. he wanted me to join his secret society, but i wouldn't. but i also never told the cops about all the extortion & blackmail they were doing...& maybe worse. then i saw stephen, my grandson, & realized what a terrible mistake i'd been making by being such a virulent racist for the last sixty years." basically it makes no sense.
abby & sergeant johnson are like, "cool speech, bro, but we have a trapdoor to check out." they bust it open (everyone else has shown up by now to watch) & go inside. they keys unlock big steel doors until they are standing in a huge bomb shelter. the gardener speculates that the secret society built it without his knowledge one summer when he was laid up with a broken leg. sergeant johnson goes straight for the ovaltine, which was his best friend's favorite beverage as a child. inside is his reporter's notebook & all his notes about the evils of the secret society, as well as a note for sergeant johnson that is all, "sorry i had to make my secret notes so hard to find, but no one could know what i was up to. i knew you were the only one who could crack the code." (well, him & a bunch of 13-year-olds, plus the evil old mayor, right?)
mr. armstrong is arrested. he admits to tampering with the journalist's brakes, which is what caused the fatal accident, but he says he didn't want to kill him. he just wanted to scare him away from his investigation. sergeant johnson explains that he will be charged with assault, thought the charges probably won't stick after so many years. um...WHAT? mr. armstrong KILLED that journalist dude. & there is no statute of limitations on murder, even if it was supposedly "accidental". sergeant johnson is all, "the important thing is that his nefarious deeds have been uncovered & will never happen again." HUH? what about GETTING JUSTICE FOR YOUR MURDERED BEST FRIEND? WHAT THE FUCK, BOOK?
anyway, greenbrooke opens, without any racist/classist exclusionary rules about membership. stephen makes friends with local children. nikki & mr. stanton renew their relationship. mysteriously, no charges are filed against mr. stanton for colluding in the cover-up of the secret society's blackmail & extortion schemes. i will also note that extortion (in some states) is a class A felony, for which there is no statute of limitations. i don't know. this book was idiotic.
July 7, 2020
While I actually started reading around age 3 (thank you, my Granny's Dick and Jane books!), this series is what I remember most about loving to read during my childhood. My sister and I drank these books up like they were oxygen. I truly think we owned just about every single one from every one of the series. We even got the privilege of meeting Ann M. Martin at a book signing, but of course little starstruck me froze and could not speak a word to my biggest hero at that time. Once in awhile if I come across these at a yard sale, I will pick them up for a couple hour trip down memory lane, and I declare nearly nothing centers and relaxes me more!
March 24, 2018
this is my first time reading this book!
okay, I’m finally starting to agree with most bsc fans: ghostwriter Ellen Miles needs to be stopped. this book is almost as much a piece of work as Stacey and the Mystery at the Mall. the bsc is having a babysitting lull, so they decide to work part time helping to restore the greenbrook club, a new community center-y country club that’s opening in the space where a true old school melvil dewey style country club used to be (now do you understand why in the dewey decimal system christianity takes up like all of the 200s but other religions combined only get the 290s? sorry, librarianing out for a bit). nikki, the new owner of the greenbrook club, is the child of someone who was a member of dark woods (the exclusive club), and she was upset with its exclusivity, so she decided to buy greenbrook and make it inclusive in part because her husband is korean and she has a half-korean, half-white kid named stephen. her dad won’t even see her since she married a korean man, and he has no relationship with stephen. on the grounds of the club is a garden maze, and the caretaker mr. kawaja (who never speaks) is very protective of it and never lets anyone into it. someone in a white car keeps hanging around and following stephen. at one point sergeant johnson (who is essentially a member of the baby-sitters club now, considering he appears in all of these mysteries and seems to be bff with them) tells the bsc that his friend growing up, david follman, was a reporter investigating dark woods and its possible ties to an evil secret society (because being racist and anti-semitic isn’t evil enough, they have to also masturbate in coffins or something to seem evil to these people). but his investigation was mysteriously cut short when he died in a tragic car accident. sgt johnson seems to think that it wasn’t an accident and that david knew too much, so the secret society silenced him. the clue he gives the bsc on behalf of long-since-dead david is “watch your step.” they take this to mean looking at the ground, where they find the first clue in a scavenger hunt that leads to the reveal: yes, there was a secret society, and mr. armstrong, who was the mayor decades ago, was involved: buying votes, buying laws, sketchy sketchy stuff. all of david’s notes were hidden in the secret bomb shelter inside the hedge maze. mr. kawaja didn’t know about it, but was overprotective of the maze because HE THOUGHT ALL THESE KIDS WOULD MESS IT UP. that’s a little bit too much of a coincidence, but we’re told to believe it, so whatever. the guy in the white car is stephen’s grandfather who has decided to not be racist anymore (and by that I mean he’s probably like panama jackson’s mom: he loves his half-POC blood relative, but he still voted for trump and is still therefore the devil). there is a kind of powerful scene where mr. armstrong threatens stephen and stephen’s grandfather basically says that he’ll come clean about the secret society if armstrong doesn’t let go of stephen. so maybe he HAS learned: his grandson’s half-korean life is still more worth protecting than the reputation of a jerk he knew decades ago. okay, that was sarcastic, because SERIOUSLY WE HAVE LOW STANDARDS FOR WHITE MEN. in a subplot, stephen doesn’t think he’s going to fit in anywhere because he’s too korean for white town and too much of a white kid for korean town. the pikes make their own version of the country club and don’t want stephen in it, but it’s not because he’s half-korean, it’s because he’s the new kid. he tries to start a club with claire pike and jenny prezzioso (both not allowed in the pike club because they’re too young) but eventually the clubs get merged at greenbrook. oh, and armstrong DID tamper with david’s brakes which led to him crashing his car and dying, but he didn’t MEAN to KILL him, just to scare the living daylights of him. this armstrong’s really not that bad a guy, when you think about it. (yes, more sarcasm).
highlights:
-abby and mary anne start singing girl group songs while pruning in the garden at greenbrook, adding choreography (mary anne is okay doing it because no one is around). I love abby and her influence on the ol’ bsc fuddy duddies.
-stephen has no friends since he just moved, but he doesn't feel like he fits in anywhere because he is mixed race. I think he doesn't fit in anywhere because he has a rat tail and it’s 1996.
-okay but for real I appreciate that they attempted to tackle the internal conflict that mixed race kids experience. some kids ask him "what are you?" this is pretty real and brutal.
-cary retlin leaves the bsc a note that they think is part of the scavenger hunt but really just to mess with them. it's about penguins so they waste a whole day looking everywhere for penguins. ah, cary retlin. what a perfect troll for the bsc.
-jordan pike's sportscaster narration for the triplets: "pike pivots, takes the layup--but pike blocks the basket. pike passes to pike..."
lowlights/nitpicks:
-anna says something about how she's shy around a guy she likes and abby clarifies that she likes him just as a friend. then why is she shy around him?
-steven has a rat tail. I just think these ghostwriters don't follow hair trends. rat tails just weren't cool anymore in 1996.
-everyone seems surprised that dark woods had had a policy of exclusion of jews, poc, etc. abby is particularly offended and surprised. but, like, really? do you not know about country clubs? also, do you not remember that this is the town of the people who are awful to jessi in Hello, Mallory and jessi and claudia in Keep Out, Claudia!? or the town that talked about how european settlers “civilized” the native population in Claudia and the First Thanksgiving?
-one time nikki brought a friend to dark woods and everyone gave them weird looks because the friend was jewish. how did they know she was jewish? the whole gentleman’s agreement thing hinges on the fact that jews can pass as gentiles and gentiles can pass as jews. I’m sure her female friend didn’t have a kippah and peyis and tzitzit.
-abby narrates that the nastiest thing cokie ever did was to try to steal logan from mary anne. uh, I'm pretty sure logan and mary anne had broken up and logan was the one who agreed to date cokie (while working on a group project together with mary anne -- see Mary Anne Misses Logan for more about how logan was a total jerk)
-when did all this dark woods stuff happen? sgt. johnson doesn’t seem that old (he has dark hair that is not described as salt and pepper and he is never described as wrinkly -- in bsc books, older people are always described as having a crinkle in their eyes or something), so david wasn’t that old. but ovaltine was his favorite food, which means he was a child in the 1940 or 1950s, because nobody after that would say ovaltine was their favorite food. so david was born in the 30s or 40s, so sgt johnson should be in his 50s or 60s? that makes sense timeline-wise, but they act like he’s younger and hipper and not really a dad figure to the bsc.
the steps of the scavenger hunt:
-watch your step: they find a stain under a loose carpet piece made with wine that says 1954
-1954 in wine: means that the next clue is in the 1954 bottle of wine in their wine cellar. it's a golf tee that says “open wwii”
-open wwii: means the dark woods open (golf tournament) that happened during WWII. incidentally, armstrong won that year. inside the trophy they find the last note with keys. the note says "shelter favorite food."
-shelter favorite food: in the secret bomb shelter inside the garden maze, the investigation notes are hidden in an ovaltine can (ovaltine being david’s favorite food).
snacks in claudia’s room:
-pringles (n.s.)
-hershey's hugs (n.s.)
-twizzlers under the mystery notebook on her desk
-pretzels in her desk drawer
okay, I’m finally starting to agree with most bsc fans: ghostwriter Ellen Miles needs to be stopped. this book is almost as much a piece of work as Stacey and the Mystery at the Mall. the bsc is having a babysitting lull, so they decide to work part time helping to restore the greenbrook club, a new community center-y country club that’s opening in the space where a true old school melvil dewey style country club used to be (now do you understand why in the dewey decimal system christianity takes up like all of the 200s but other religions combined only get the 290s? sorry, librarianing out for a bit). nikki, the new owner of the greenbrook club, is the child of someone who was a member of dark woods (the exclusive club), and she was upset with its exclusivity, so she decided to buy greenbrook and make it inclusive in part because her husband is korean and she has a half-korean, half-white kid named stephen. her dad won’t even see her since she married a korean man, and he has no relationship with stephen. on the grounds of the club is a garden maze, and the caretaker mr. kawaja (who never speaks) is very protective of it and never lets anyone into it. someone in a white car keeps hanging around and following stephen. at one point sergeant johnson (who is essentially a member of the baby-sitters club now, considering he appears in all of these mysteries and seems to be bff with them) tells the bsc that his friend growing up, david follman, was a reporter investigating dark woods and its possible ties to an evil secret society (because being racist and anti-semitic isn’t evil enough, they have to also masturbate in coffins or something to seem evil to these people). but his investigation was mysteriously cut short when he died in a tragic car accident. sgt johnson seems to think that it wasn’t an accident and that david knew too much, so the secret society silenced him. the clue he gives the bsc on behalf of long-since-dead david is “watch your step.” they take this to mean looking at the ground, where they find the first clue in a scavenger hunt that leads to the reveal: yes, there was a secret society, and mr. armstrong, who was the mayor decades ago, was involved: buying votes, buying laws, sketchy sketchy stuff. all of david’s notes were hidden in the secret bomb shelter inside the hedge maze. mr. kawaja didn’t know about it, but was overprotective of the maze because HE THOUGHT ALL THESE KIDS WOULD MESS IT UP. that’s a little bit too much of a coincidence, but we’re told to believe it, so whatever. the guy in the white car is stephen’s grandfather who has decided to not be racist anymore (and by that I mean he’s probably like panama jackson’s mom: he loves his half-POC blood relative, but he still voted for trump and is still therefore the devil). there is a kind of powerful scene where mr. armstrong threatens stephen and stephen’s grandfather basically says that he’ll come clean about the secret society if armstrong doesn’t let go of stephen. so maybe he HAS learned: his grandson’s half-korean life is still more worth protecting than the reputation of a jerk he knew decades ago. okay, that was sarcastic, because SERIOUSLY WE HAVE LOW STANDARDS FOR WHITE MEN. in a subplot, stephen doesn’t think he’s going to fit in anywhere because he’s too korean for white town and too much of a white kid for korean town. the pikes make their own version of the country club and don’t want stephen in it, but it’s not because he’s half-korean, it’s because he’s the new kid. he tries to start a club with claire pike and jenny prezzioso (both not allowed in the pike club because they’re too young) but eventually the clubs get merged at greenbrook. oh, and armstrong DID tamper with david’s brakes which led to him crashing his car and dying, but he didn’t MEAN to KILL him, just to scare the living daylights of him. this armstrong’s really not that bad a guy, when you think about it. (yes, more sarcasm).
highlights:
-abby and mary anne start singing girl group songs while pruning in the garden at greenbrook, adding choreography (mary anne is okay doing it because no one is around). I love abby and her influence on the ol’ bsc fuddy duddies.
-stephen has no friends since he just moved, but he doesn't feel like he fits in anywhere because he is mixed race. I think he doesn't fit in anywhere because he has a rat tail and it’s 1996.
-okay but for real I appreciate that they attempted to tackle the internal conflict that mixed race kids experience. some kids ask him "what are you?" this is pretty real and brutal.
-cary retlin leaves the bsc a note that they think is part of the scavenger hunt but really just to mess with them. it's about penguins so they waste a whole day looking everywhere for penguins. ah, cary retlin. what a perfect troll for the bsc.
-jordan pike's sportscaster narration for the triplets: "pike pivots, takes the layup--but pike blocks the basket. pike passes to pike..."
lowlights/nitpicks:
-anna says something about how she's shy around a guy she likes and abby clarifies that she likes him just as a friend. then why is she shy around him?
-steven has a rat tail. I just think these ghostwriters don't follow hair trends. rat tails just weren't cool anymore in 1996.
-everyone seems surprised that dark woods had had a policy of exclusion of jews, poc, etc. abby is particularly offended and surprised. but, like, really? do you not know about country clubs? also, do you not remember that this is the town of the people who are awful to jessi in Hello, Mallory and jessi and claudia in Keep Out, Claudia!? or the town that talked about how european settlers “civilized” the native population in Claudia and the First Thanksgiving?
-one time nikki brought a friend to dark woods and everyone gave them weird looks because the friend was jewish. how did they know she was jewish? the whole gentleman’s agreement thing hinges on the fact that jews can pass as gentiles and gentiles can pass as jews. I’m sure her female friend didn’t have a kippah and peyis and tzitzit.
-abby narrates that the nastiest thing cokie ever did was to try to steal logan from mary anne. uh, I'm pretty sure logan and mary anne had broken up and logan was the one who agreed to date cokie (while working on a group project together with mary anne -- see Mary Anne Misses Logan for more about how logan was a total jerk)
-when did all this dark woods stuff happen? sgt. johnson doesn’t seem that old (he has dark hair that is not described as salt and pepper and he is never described as wrinkly -- in bsc books, older people are always described as having a crinkle in their eyes or something), so david wasn’t that old. but ovaltine was his favorite food, which means he was a child in the 1940 or 1950s, because nobody after that would say ovaltine was their favorite food. so david was born in the 30s or 40s, so sgt johnson should be in his 50s or 60s? that makes sense timeline-wise, but they act like he’s younger and hipper and not really a dad figure to the bsc.
the steps of the scavenger hunt:
-watch your step: they find a stain under a loose carpet piece made with wine that says 1954
-1954 in wine: means that the next clue is in the 1954 bottle of wine in their wine cellar. it's a golf tee that says “open wwii”
-open wwii: means the dark woods open (golf tournament) that happened during WWII. incidentally, armstrong won that year. inside the trophy they find the last note with keys. the note says "shelter favorite food."
-shelter favorite food: in the secret bomb shelter inside the garden maze, the investigation notes are hidden in an ovaltine can (ovaltine being david’s favorite food).
snacks in claudia’s room:
-pringles (n.s.)
-hershey's hugs (n.s.)
-twizzlers under the mystery notebook on her desk
-pretzels in her desk drawer
January 15, 2022
I love mysterys and this book is so good it was a mystery where the baby sitters club was trying to find out what the secret society was they found clues to the mystery with help from a police officer who the baby sitters club helped him solve a mystery before he also was best friends with David who was a reporter trying to solve the mystery before, but he got in a car crash before he could tell anybody the truth of the secret society
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 6, 2024
Ehhh, this one pulled its punches. I understand WHY, but it's still kind of a downer. Don't set up a plotline you can't follow through on, you know?
April 30, 2022
This book was okay enough, but the mystery is so contrived that it's kind of stupid. Like, why didn't Sergeant Johnson's friend - David, was it? DF. - why didn't he just give Sergeant Johnson the notebook, instead of setting up a treasure hunt leading to it? It just seemed so unnecessary.
And speaking of unnecessary, I know I said Mystery 7 is where the Mystery series jumped the shark, but it super jumped it around this point. Doesn't Sergeant Johnson have any friends? Any adults he can talk to? Why is he unloading his past onto these teenage girls? I think this book marks the point where he starts really relying on the Club, and that's just weird.
And speaking of unnecessary, I know I said Mystery 7 is where the Mystery series jumped the shark, but it super jumped it around this point. Doesn't Sergeant Johnson have any friends? Any adults he can talk to? Why is he unloading his past onto these teenage girls? I think this book marks the point where he starts really relying on the Club, and that's just weird.
December 28, 2020
It could have been the fact that I was just tired when I was reading this book, but I was REALLY confused. For the example when it was over I was like, what is happening? There were too many subplots and I wasn’t even clear what the main idea was. This seemed more like a super special because of all the little plots. I liked one of the plots where the kids make their own country club but after the 1 chapter it was mentioned in I honestly don’t think they ever made it a thing again.
It was kind of an up and down book: some parts I liked/disliked, some parts I understood/got confused about. I would recommend reading this when your full attention is on the book. I would also recommend this to slightly older readers (ages 10-12) because it does have some mature topics. It’s not my favorite book but it is still interesting.
It was kind of an up and down book: some parts I liked/disliked, some parts I understood/got confused about. I would recommend reading this when your full attention is on the book. I would also recommend this to slightly older readers (ages 10-12) because it does have some mature topics. It’s not my favorite book but it is still interesting.
November 9, 2020
I read this series obsessively when I was a tween, utterly loving them. I even had a significant part of the series sitting on my bookshelf for a number of years. I recall this one being one of my favorites, loving the historical aspect of the mystery.
Looking at it with the eyes of an adult, I think it holds up still as a pretty good read for a tween, with the mystery and also the lessons against prejudice and excluding people who are 'different'. As an adult, I would have loved more details of just what exactly the information on the bad guys *was* that was discovered at the climax of the story, but given the target age for the book, I think it strikes the right balance.
Looking at it with the eyes of an adult, I think it holds up still as a pretty good read for a tween, with the mystery and also the lessons against prejudice and excluding people who are 'different'. As an adult, I would have loved more details of just what exactly the information on the bad guys *was* that was discovered at the climax of the story, but given the target age for the book, I think it strikes the right balance.
November 18, 2022
So I really like Abby but this book was all over the place. The mystery was weak, as was the plot about middle schoolers being paid “good money” to help restore an old country club. The racist and anti-Semitic secret society was somehow tied to the country club, but was it really a secret at all? At one point I think they accidentally used the Dawn handwriting font, not sure why since she was not in this book.
October 17, 2023
Actually an entertaining mystery.
The bit about the Stoneybrook kids randomly forming clubs was kinda weird, but I guess they wanted to make it fit thematically.
I also don't really get the big expose. What did the journalist actually discover that was so dangerous? The former members of the club were blackmailing people? That part felt a bit random, coz like the main point was how racist and classist these members are, so I'd figure the big secret would have had to do with that.
The bit about the Stoneybrook kids randomly forming clubs was kinda weird, but I guess they wanted to make it fit thematically.
I also don't really get the big expose. What did the journalist actually discover that was so dangerous? The former members of the club were blackmailing people? That part felt a bit random, coz like the main point was how racist and classist these members are, so I'd figure the big secret would have had to do with that.
January 23, 2024
Okay, so I LOVED Abby's "voice" in this one. It didn't feel like a complete rehash of the background of the BSC and the way every character looks, and it seemed like a different kind of explanation.
The mystery? WHAT mystery? I don't even know what they solved. I know it's nuts to think that the police guy would just randomly let them in to help, and I don't even know how he got there to begin with. These mysteries are REALLY rough reads.
The mystery? WHAT mystery? I don't even know what they solved. I know it's nuts to think that the police guy would just randomly let them in to help, and I don't even know how he got there to begin with. These mysteries are REALLY rough reads.
November 14, 2017
Oh man. These "mysteries" just got sillier and sillier as time went on. I'm not sure how they came up with this many ridiculous plots, I really just can't fathom it. This one was especially eye-roll inducing, right to the end.
July 26, 2022
This one is weird because the mystery they're investigating is very serious, but this is a BSC book so they refuse to go into any of the details of the significance once it is solved. I love Abby, though, so overall I enjoyed it in spite of the complete lack of substance that is the plot.
November 20, 2017
I still really like these books
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December 9, 2020Read my recap at A Year with the BSC via Stoneybrook Forever: https://www.livethemovies.com/bsc-blo...
January 22, 2021
Typical BSC adventure
October 13, 2021
I think this is my first BSC mystery with Abby as the main character. I like it very much especially how they tackle racism back then.
October 20, 2023
Can't believe the BSC has gone from finding a misplaced ring to solving a whole-ass murder, but I love it!
June 11, 2024
Another dull mystery that could've been so much better. Abby recruits the club to help clean up an old country club that once had racist leanings as sadly most did back then. They discover blackmail and murder plots involving possibly even the mayor from years ago. I could barely pay attention until the end when it actually got exciting. The b plot involves the club's new owner's son Stephen trying to fit in with the kids in Stoneybrook and has the kids forming competing club's also a bore. Not my favourite mystery. Sad because Abby books are usually pretty good.
June 24, 2011
One of the better Mystery books, even if still ridiculously unrealistic. A police officer accepting a trap set by kids and involving a forged letter? Suuuuuuure...
May 6, 2021
Loved these books as a child
May 10, 2015
23/25
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December 11, 2018it was a interesting book
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