Karen's Lemonade Stand

Baby-Sitters Little Sister #64

by Ann M. Martin

Karen tries to raise money for her school team, the Stoneybrook Krushers. Selling lemonade in a heat wave seems like a great idea at first, but soon Karen is spending more time selling and less time practicing and playing.

Genres: Childrens, Fiction, Juvenile, Middle Grade

96 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

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

[Andrew Dittmar · Rating 3 out of 5]

Karen Lemonade Stands by Ann M. Martin

According to the spreadsheet where I track my BSC reading, this is the 236th BSC and BSC-adjacent book I've read since 2021. One day, I will finish them all. Even if I find Karen quite annoying.

This book is a parable about capitalism versus mutual aid activism: Karen and her friends are lured into the capitalist system (despite Karen's insistence that money doesn't matter to her), until a storm makes them realize that, in fact, they need one another and their local community networks in order to thrive.

Maybe.


Reading history:
Normally I keep this in my private notes section, but I'm moving it. Yay!

Reading history was not added on Goodreads, but was instead kept on a post-it note with the book.


Started December 3oth, 2025.
Finished December 30th, 2025.


December 30th, 2025: read entire book via Libby ebook.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've only read most of this series once, and that was 15+ years ago, so rereading these is like reading them for the first time. Most of these books, I've remembered a little bit here and there, but I didn't remember anything about this one - and it was a good one! We got an appearance from Dawn, Karen noted how happy Kristy looked when Bart talked to her (heehee), and it was just a fun story, seeing Karen and her family deal with a heatwave.

[Em's Adventures · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wait a minute, if it was too hot to play outside, even in the shade, how the heck were they playing full games of baseball???

[Jaclyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun story about Karen and her friends setting up stalls to sell stuff during a summer heat wave.

[Teresa Granado-Law · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jump Rope songs in this one "Cinderella dressed in yellow" and "Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, turn around."

[Laura]

Hmm. I had anticipated--nay, looked forward to--a big blowup at Karen's house regarding who is using all the lemonade powder, cups, napkins, etc. . . maybe even the pitcher could be lost, if Karen thought she saw Derek Masters across the street and returned from a mad autograph dash to an empty lemonade stand! (It would doubtless be revealed that Hannie and Nancy took the pitcher because they were jealous of Karen's mega-earnings, and all the spider rings and fancy yo-yos she was able to buy and flaunt at school.) Perhaps those could even be Nannie's special napkins that she was saving for a nice party with all of the Brewer-Thomas children, but the party had to be canceled because of Karen's selfish actions, and everyone was mad or VERY DISAPPOINTED, and then she made it up to them by writing and singing a special song about lemonade (to the strains of Natalie Springer's violin), while the entire Baby-Sitters Club served gallons of the stuff that they spent treasury funds to procure. . .

Sadly, none of this occurs. The book is actually somewhat like what might happen on Earth during a few hot summer weeks, and in a stunning plot twist, Kristy's behavior is slightly worse than Karen's! Maybe the ghostwriter who penned this one hadn't read the rest of the series.

[Luna · Rating 4 out of 5]

At the precocious age of seven, Karen decides to get a job in the customer service industry. She quits her beloved hobby of playing softball and sets up a lemonade stand. But what's this? All her former softball buddies want to do the same thing! Kristy's Krushers have a big game coming up, but who will play when everyone is selling lemonade, cookies and trail mix?

As far as these Karen books go, this is probably the most realistic. Not a young child setting up a booming business, but a young child getting a new, more interesting hobby. Kids fall in and out of interests all the time, so Karen turning her interest elsewhere (and finding it too difficult and boring after a little while) is realistic. Classmates also following suit is also possible. Peer-pressure and what else.

At least I can now saw there's a Karen book I like, hah!

[Melenia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved these books as a child