The Baby-Sitters Club
Encyclopedia
The Baby-sitters Club is a series of novels written by Ann M. Martin and published by Scholastic between 1986 and 2000, that sold 17 milllon copies. Many of the novels were ghostwritten
, including 43 by Peter Lerangis
. However, Ann Martin wrote the first 35 novels.
The series is about a group of middle school students living in the fictional town of Stoneybrook, Connecticut. They run a business called the Baby-sitters Club that helps parents find babysitters from the club who are available for jobs by calling during their club meetings. The club starts out with four members (Kristy Thomas, Mary Anne Spier, Claudia Kishi, and Stacey McGill), eventually expanding to ten. Most of the main characters are thirteen years old. When the club was founded (in 1986), the four members were in the seventh grade, but ten novels later (1988), they are promoted to the eighth grade. From there, they are frozen in time until the very end of the series (2000), in which they graduate from middle school.
, the Baby-sitters Club series was out of print. However, in April 2010 the series was re-released with updated versions of certain volumes of the original series, as well as a newly written prequel.
Kristy is known for her great ideas, as well as her bossiness and a big mouth that can occasionally get her into trouble. The idea for the Baby-sitters Club came to Kristy when her mother has having trouble finding a babysitter for her younger brother David Michael. She felt sorry for David Michael, as well as her mother. In a "flash", as she calls it, Kristy had her "great idea"; to form the Baby-sitters Club. Kristy formed the club with herself, Claudia, Mary Anne, and Stacey as founding members. A tomboy
, Kristy usually wears jeans and a t-shirt (in the winter, a turtleneck and, if needed, a sweater), sneakers, and sometimes a baseball cap with a collie on it; in memory of the family dog, Louie, who was put to sleep in book #11, Kristy and the Snobs. She loves sports, and even coached a softball team for small children and called it Kristy's Krushers, which includes many of the club's sitting charges.
Claudia is Japanese-American. She is extremely creative in both her artistic things and her funky wardrobe
. Both generally take up more of her attention than her schoolwork; she is particularly horrible at spelling
. Her grades were so bad (with the exception of art), that she was briefly sent back to seventh grade. She stayed in the seventh grade until she brought up her grades, then she was allowed back into the eighth grade. Her parents are generally supportive of Claudia's artistic aspirations and creativity, despite her poor academic ability.
Mary Anne is the Baby-sitters Club secretary due to her exceptional organization skills and neat handwriting. She and Kristy initially looked similar until Mary Anne cut her hair and began wearing a little makeup in book #60, Mary Anne's Makeover. She also vowed never to get her ears pierced due to being traumatized by almost having her ears pierced by a fellow camper at Camp Mohawk. Author Ann M. Martin said that she based the character of Mary Anne on herself. Mary Anne and Kristy have been best friends since childhood and lived next to one another until Kristy's mother marries Watson Brewer.
A native New Yorker
, Stacey moved to Stoneybrook in the seventh grade when her dad's job transferred him. She quickly became friends with Claudia because of their love for fashion and boys. They are known to be the best dressers at Stoneybrook Middle School (Stacey is the more sophisticated dresser, while Claudia is more funky). Stacey dots her I's with hearts. One of Stacey's most notable traits is that she has diabetes, and has been hospitalized several times as a result. Stacey's position as the club's treasurer is because she is gifted in math, has a logical mind, and is in the Stoneybrook Middle School Mathlete Club.
Dawn originally lived in Palo City, California, a suburb of Anaheim, with her family, until her parents' divorce moved Dawn and her younger brother Jeff across the country to Stoneybrook, Connecticut, where her mother, Sharon, grew up. Jeff had a lot of trouble adjusting to the move (although he did make and stay friends with the Pike triplets throughout the series), and soon returned to California to live with their father and stepmother, Carol. Dawn joins Stoneybrook Middle School in the middle of the seventh grade, when the Baby-sitters club members were having a fight. She met Mary Anne and they instantly bonded. Kristy, as Mary Anne's best friend, is initially jealous, but gets over it and invites Dawn to become the fifth member of the club once the fight between the club members end.
At age eleven, Mallory is the oldest of eight children: Claire, age five; Margo, age seven; Nicholas "Nicky", age eight; Vanessa, age nine; and the identical triplets
, Adam, Byron, and Jordan, age ten. Mallory often refers to them as "stair step children" because they are all one after another in ages. They all have distinct personalities and problems. For example, Claire is known for her silliness (her mantra is "silly-billy-goo-goo"), Vanessa is an aspiring poet who will often speak in rhyme (which her brothers and sisters find annoying), Nicky wants to fit in more with the triplets, who often refuse to play with him, and Margo is on a "bossy" stage and gets sick very easily. The Pike family is one of the Baby-sitters Club's most frequent clients, because of all the children. Her family has a pet hamster named Frodo, named after Frodo Baggins
from The Lord of the Rings
. They used to have a cat named Sarge, which was mentioned by Mary Anne in book #1, Kristy's Great Idea. They also have a pet dog named Pow that they adopted from the three Barrett children.
Jessi moved to Stoneybrook from Oakely, New Jersey at the beginning of the sixth grade, coincidentally into Stacey's old house. She has an eight-year-old sister called Rebecca or "Becca," and a baby brother named John Phillip Ramsey Jr., better known as "Squirt." When Jessi and her family first moved to Stoneybrook, many people were racist toward them because they were black, but this improved toward the end of the first novel featuring Jessi, which was book #14, Hello, Mallory. In book #36, Jessi's Baby-sitter. Jessi's Aunt Cecelia moves in to Jessi's house. Jessi calls her "Aunt Dictator" and at first hates her, but at the end of the novel they become friends and she is part of the family for the rest of the series. It is also known that Jessi knows American sign language. This is mentioned in book #16, Jessi's Secret Language. Jessi uses this when she baby sits Haley and Matt Braddock, because Matt Braddock is deaf.
Logan moved from Louisville, Kentucky, before eighth grade. He participates in many sports, including baseball and track, and works as a busboy at the Rosebud Café. He was Mary Anne's steady boyfriend for a while. He also was an associate member of the club, which is a member who does not come to meetings, but takes jobs when no regular member is available. Logan lives with his mother Louise, father Lyman, sister Kerry, and brother Hunter.
Shannon is an overachiever who is involved in many extracurricular activities, and is the only member who doesn't attend Stoneybrook Middle School; she instead goes to Stoneybrook Day School, a private school
. She has two sisters, Tiffany and Maria, and is Kristy's first friend in her new neighborhood, although the two did not initially get along (they played many cruel tricks on each other). After the death of Kristy's beloved collie Louie, Shannon gave Kristy one of her dog Astrid's puppies, which Kristy's brother David Michael named after Shannon.
Abby first appeared in book #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 twin sister, Anna. Her father died in a car accident when she was nine years old, which was part of the reason for the move. Abby still misses him greatly, and does not like to talk about him. Abby and her family move into house on McLelland Road and spend the first night in the neighborhood sleeping over at Kristy's house due to some problems.
. It is the hometown of many of the characters in both The Baby-sitters Club series and the Baby-Sitters Little Sister
series as well.
The town is assumed to be near Stamford, Connecticut
. Several adults in the town commute to Stamford, and Jessi Ramsey takes her ballet classes there. They also often go shopping there.
Early in the series, new Baby-sitters Club clients move to town, such as Myriah, Gabbie, and Laura Perkins.
Stoneybrook's public schools include Stoneybrook Elementary, Stoneybrook Middle School, Kelsey Middle School, and Stoneybrook High. Private schools include Stoneybrook Academy (which Karen Brewer and several other charges attended) and Stoneybrook Day School, which is where associate member Shannon Kilbourne attends.
Karen Brewer's father and Kristy Thomas' stepfather Watson Brewer owns a mansion in an upscale subdivision of Stoneybrook. The families of Hannie Papadakis, Amanda and Max Delaney, and Shannon Kilbourne, among others, also live there.
Karen Brewer's mother and stepfather Seth reside in a regular middle class neighborhood, in which the family of Nancy Dawes also resides. The majority of the members of the Baby-sitter's Club also live in a middle class neighborhood. Mallory and Stacey live behind each other (their backyards touch). Bradford Court, where Claudia lives (and at the beginning of the series, Mary Anne and Kristy too), is within walking distance of almost all of their houses and of Stoneybrook Middle School. After Mary Anne's father Richard marries Dawn's mother Sharon, they move into Sharon and Dawn's house, which is on Burnt Hill Road.
novels were a series of novels for younger readers. It centered on Karen Brewer, the seven-year-old stepsister of Baby-sitters Club president Kristy Thomas. One hundred and twenty-two Baby-Sitters Little Sister novels and six Baby-Sitters Little Sister Super Special novels were published. The series ran from 1988 to 2000.
series and covered Karen Brewer's second grade classmates at Stoneybrook Academy, and their adventures in Ms. Coleman's classroom. Twelve of these were published. The series ran from 1995 to 1998. The titles are Teacher's Pet, Author Day, Class Play, Second Grade Baby, The Snow War, Twin Trouble, Science Fair, Summer School, Halloween Parade, Holiday Time, Spelling Bee, and Baby Animal Zoo.
series centered on Dawn Schafer and her friends after her return to California, and targeted a slightly older audience, with a darker feel. Fifteen novels were published focusing on the characters of Dawn, Ducky, Amalia, Maggie, and Sunny. Examples of subjects dealt with are anorexia
, sexual orientation
, and racism
, along with the characters' personal problems and family disputes.
version of the first Baby-sitters Club novel, Kristy's Great Idea. The novel is a contemporary yet faithful adaptation illustrated by Raina Telgemeier
, an Eisner Award
-nominated cartoonist. The series continued with the release of The Truth About Stacey, Mary Anne Saves the Day, and concluded with Claudia and Mean Janine. Currently, there are no other graphic novels in the series set to be published.
, and Nickelodeon
, and was later released to video
.
which starred Schuyler Fisk
, Rachael Leigh Cook
, Larisa Oleynik
, Bre Blair
, Tricia Joe, Zelda Harris
, and Stacy Linn Ramsower
.
Ghostwriter
A ghostwriter is a professional writer who is paid to write books, articles, stories, reports, or other texts that are officially credited to another person. Celebrities, executives, and political leaders often hire ghostwriters to draft or edit autobiographies, magazine articles, or other written...
, including 43 by Peter Lerangis
Peter Lerangis
Peter Lerangis is an author of children's and young-adult fiction.-Career:Lerangis's work includes The Viper's Nest and The Sword Thief, two titles in the New York Times–bestselling children's-book series The 39 Clues, the historical novel Smiler's Bones, the YA dark comedy-adventure novel wtf,...
. However, Ann Martin wrote the first 35 novels.
The series is about a group of middle school students living in the fictional town of Stoneybrook, Connecticut. They run a business called the Baby-sitters Club that helps parents find babysitters from the club who are available for jobs by calling during their club meetings. The club starts out with four members (Kristy Thomas, Mary Anne Spier, Claudia Kishi, and Stacey McGill), eventually expanding to ten. Most of the main characters are thirteen years old. When the club was founded (in 1986), the four members were in the seventh grade, but ten novels later (1988), they are promoted to the eighth grade. From there, they are frozen in time until the very end of the series (2000), in which they graduate from middle school.
, the Baby-sitters Club series was out of print. However, in April 2010 the series was re-released with updated versions of certain volumes of the original series, as well as a newly written prequel.
History of the series
The idea for The Baby-sitters Club series originated with Jean Feiwel, an editor at Scholastic who saw the popularity of a novel called Ginny's Babysitting Job and realized there was a market for novels about babysitting. She contacted Ann M. Martin, who took the general idea of a babysitter's club, and created the characters, plots, and settings for the series. It was initially planned as a four-book series, but after the first four novels were moderately successful, Scholastic ordered two more, followed by twelve more as the series grew in popularity. By the time the sixth novel was published, the first printing was up to 100,000 copies. When publishing ceased in 2000, there had been 213 novels published in the series. Of these, Martin estimates she herself wrote from 60 to 80 of the novels.Structure of the novels
With the exception of Super Specials and Super Mysteries, the novels are written and narrated from one character's point of view. The novels generally follow this format:- Chapter 1: Introduction to self; Beginning of plot
- Chapter 2: Description of club and members
- Chapters 14-15: Conclusion
Kristy Thomas
- Club position: President
- Appearance: Shoulder length brown hair usually worn in a ponytail, brown eyes and usual clothing is jeans, a turtleneck, a sweater and sneakers.
Kristy is known for her great ideas, as well as her bossiness and a big mouth that can occasionally get her into trouble. The idea for the Baby-sitters Club came to Kristy when her mother has having trouble finding a babysitter for her younger brother David Michael. She felt sorry for David Michael, as well as her mother. In a "flash", as she calls it, Kristy had her "great idea"; to form the Baby-sitters Club. Kristy formed the club with herself, Claudia, Mary Anne, and Stacey as founding members. A tomboy
Tomboy
A tomboy is a girl who exhibits characteristics or behaviors considered typical of the gender role of a boy, including the wearing of typically masculine-oriented clothes and engaging in games and activities that are often physical in nature, and which are considered in many cultures to be the...
, Kristy usually wears jeans and a t-shirt (in the winter, a turtleneck and, if needed, a sweater), sneakers, and sometimes a baseball cap with a collie on it; in memory of the family dog, Louie, who was put to sleep in book #11, Kristy and the Snobs. She loves sports, and even coached a softball team for small children and called it Kristy's Krushers, which includes many of the club's sitting charges.
Claudia Kishi
- Club position: Vice President
- Appearance: Long jet black hair, almond shaped dark brown eyes, creamy tumbleweed complexion
Claudia is Japanese-American. She is extremely creative in both her artistic things and her funky wardrobe
Wardrobe
A Wardrobe is a cabinet used for storing clothes.Wardrobe may also refer to:* Wardrobe , a full set of multiple clothing items* Wardrobe , part of royal administration in medieval England...
. Both generally take up more of her attention than her schoolwork; she is particularly horrible at spelling
Spelling
Spelling is the writing of one or more words with letters and diacritics. In addition, the term often, but not always, means an accepted standard spelling or the process of naming the letters...
. Her grades were so bad (with the exception of art), that she was briefly sent back to seventh grade. She stayed in the seventh grade until she brought up her grades, then she was allowed back into the eighth grade. Her parents are generally supportive of Claudia's artistic aspirations and creativity, despite her poor academic ability.
Mary Anne Spier
- Club position: Secretary
- Appearance: Long brown hair worn in braided pigtails until book #4, Mary Anne Saves the Day (she cuts it short in book #60, Mary Anne's Makeover), brown eyes, wears reading glasses
Mary Anne is the Baby-sitters Club secretary due to her exceptional organization skills and neat handwriting. She and Kristy initially looked similar until Mary Anne cut her hair and began wearing a little makeup in book #60, Mary Anne's Makeover. She also vowed never to get her ears pierced due to being traumatized by almost having her ears pierced by a fellow camper at Camp Mohawk. Author Ann M. Martin said that she based the character of Mary Anne on herself. Mary Anne and Kristy have been best friends since childhood and lived next to one another until Kristy's mother marries Watson Brewer.
Stacey McGill
- Club position: Treasurer
- Appearance: Honey-blonde hair, sometimes permed, dark blue eyes, medium height
A native New Yorker
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, Stacey moved to Stoneybrook in the seventh grade when her dad's job transferred him. She quickly became friends with Claudia because of their love for fashion and boys. They are known to be the best dressers at Stoneybrook Middle School (Stacey is the more sophisticated dresser, while Claudia is more funky). Stacey dots her I's with hearts. One of Stacey's most notable traits is that she has diabetes, and has been hospitalized several times as a result. Stacey's position as the club's treasurer is because she is gifted in math, has a logical mind, and is in the Stoneybrook Middle School Mathlete Club.
Dawn Schafer
- Club position: Alternate Officer #5-67 & 82-88, Honorary member #68-81 & #89-end
- Appearance: Light blond hair, blue eyes
Dawn originally lived in Palo City, California, a suburb of Anaheim, with her family, until her parents' divorce moved Dawn and her younger brother Jeff across the country to Stoneybrook, Connecticut, where her mother, Sharon, grew up. Jeff had a lot of trouble adjusting to the move (although he did make and stay friends with the Pike triplets throughout the series), and soon returned to California to live with their father and stepmother, Carol. Dawn joins Stoneybrook Middle School in the middle of the seventh grade, when the Baby-sitters club members were having a fight. She met Mary Anne and they instantly bonded. Kristy, as Mary Anne's best friend, is initially jealous, but gets over it and invites Dawn to become the fifth member of the club once the fight between the club members end.
Mallory Pike
- Club position: Junior Officer, Honorary member #69-74 & #126-end
- Appearance: Curly reddish brown hair, blue eyes, wears clear braces and glasses
At age eleven, Mallory is the oldest of eight children: Claire, age five; Margo, age seven; Nicholas "Nicky", age eight; Vanessa, age nine; and the identical triplets
Multiple birth
A multiple birth occurs when more than one fetus is carried to term in a single pregnancy. Different names for multiple births are used, depending on the number of offspring. Common multiples are two and three, known as twins and triplets...
, Adam, Byron, and Jordan, age ten. Mallory often refers to them as "stair step children" because they are all one after another in ages. They all have distinct personalities and problems. For example, Claire is known for her silliness (her mantra is "silly-billy-goo-goo"), Vanessa is an aspiring poet who will often speak in rhyme (which her brothers and sisters find annoying), Nicky wants to fit in more with the triplets, who often refuse to play with him, and Margo is on a "bossy" stage and gets sick very easily. The Pike family is one of the Baby-sitters Club's most frequent clients, because of all the children. Her family has a pet hamster named Frodo, named after Frodo Baggins
Frodo Baggins
Frodo Baggins is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium.He is the main protagonist of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. He was a hobbit of the Shire who inherited Sauron's Ring from Bilbo Baggins and undertook the quest to destroy it in the fires of Mount Doom...
from The Lord of the Rings
The Lord of the Rings
The Lord of the Rings is a high fantasy epic written by English philologist and University of Oxford professor J. R. R. Tolkien. The story began as a sequel to Tolkien's earlier, less complex children's fantasy novel The Hobbit , but eventually developed into a much larger work. It was written in...
. They used to have a cat named Sarge, which was mentioned by Mary Anne in book #1, Kristy's Great Idea. They also have a pet dog named Pow that they adopted from the three Barrett children.
Jessi Ramsey
- Club position: Junior Officer
- Appearance: Black hair, brown eyes, long eyelashes, tall and slender
Jessi moved to Stoneybrook from Oakely, New Jersey at the beginning of the sixth grade, coincidentally into Stacey's old house. She has an eight-year-old sister called Rebecca or "Becca," and a baby brother named John Phillip Ramsey Jr., better known as "Squirt." When Jessi and her family first moved to Stoneybrook, many people were racist toward them because they were black, but this improved toward the end of the first novel featuring Jessi, which was book #14, Hello, Mallory. In book #36, Jessi's Baby-sitter. Jessi's Aunt Cecelia moves in to Jessi's house. Jessi calls her "Aunt Dictator" and at first hates her, but at the end of the novel they become friends and she is part of the family for the rest of the series. It is also known that Jessi knows American sign language. This is mentioned in book #16, Jessi's Secret Language. Jessi uses this when she baby sits Haley and Matt Braddock, because Matt Braddock is deaf.
Logan Bruno
- Club position: Associate member
Logan moved from Louisville, Kentucky, before eighth grade. He participates in many sports, including baseball and track, and works as a busboy at the Rosebud Café. He was Mary Anne's steady boyfriend for a while. He also was an associate member of the club, which is a member who does not come to meetings, but takes jobs when no regular member is available. Logan lives with his mother Louise, father Lyman, sister Kerry, and brother Hunter.
Shannon Kilbourne
- Appearance: Wavy dark blonde hair, piercing blue eyes, high cheekbones
- Club position: Associate member, Alternate Officer #68-81
Shannon is an overachiever who is involved in many extracurricular activities, and is the only member who doesn't attend Stoneybrook Middle School; she instead goes to Stoneybrook Day School, a private school
Private school
Private schools, also known as independent schools or nonstate schools, are not administered by local, state or national governments; thus, they retain the right to select their students and are funded in whole or in part by charging their students' tuition, rather than relying on mandatory...
. She has two sisters, Tiffany and Maria, and is Kristy's first friend in her new neighborhood, although the two did not initially get along (they played many cruel tricks on each other). After the death of Kristy's beloved collie Louie, Shannon gave Kristy one of her dog Astrid's puppies, which Kristy's brother David Michael named after Shannon.
Abby Stevenson
Abigail "Abby" Stevenson- Club position: Alternate Officer: #90-98 & #100-end
- Appearance: Curly brown hair, brown eyes
- Birthday: October 15
Abby first appeared in book #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
Long Island
Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...
with her mother and twin sister, Anna. Her father died in a car accident when she was nine years old, which was part of the reason for the move. Abby still misses him greatly, and does not like to talk about him. Abby and her family move into house on McLelland Road and spend the first night in the neighborhood sleeping over at Kristy's house due to some problems.
Stoneybrook
Stoneybrook is a fictional suburban-like town in the state of ConnecticutConnecticut
Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...
. It is the hometown of many of the characters in both The Baby-sitters Club series and the Baby-Sitters Little Sister
Baby-Sitters Little Sister
Baby-Sitters Little Sister is a series spin-off of The Baby-sitters Club novel series. Written by Ann M. Martin, the series centered on seven-year-old Karen Brewer, the stepsister to Kristy Thomas of The Baby-sitters Club...
series as well.
The town is assumed to be near Stamford, Connecticut
Stamford, Connecticut
Stamford is a city in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. According to the 2010 census, the population of the city is 122,643, making it the fourth largest city in the state and the eighth largest city in New England...
. Several adults in the town commute to Stamford, and Jessi Ramsey takes her ballet classes there. They also often go shopping there.
Early in the series, new Baby-sitters Club clients move to town, such as Myriah, Gabbie, and Laura Perkins.
Stoneybrook's public schools include Stoneybrook Elementary, Stoneybrook Middle School, Kelsey Middle School, and Stoneybrook High. Private schools include Stoneybrook Academy (which Karen Brewer and several other charges attended) and Stoneybrook Day School, which is where associate member Shannon Kilbourne attends.
Karen Brewer's father and Kristy Thomas' stepfather Watson Brewer owns a mansion in an upscale subdivision of Stoneybrook. The families of Hannie Papadakis, Amanda and Max Delaney, and Shannon Kilbourne, among others, also live there.
Karen Brewer's mother and stepfather Seth reside in a regular middle class neighborhood, in which the family of Nancy Dawes also resides. The majority of the members of the Baby-sitter's Club also live in a middle class neighborhood. Mallory and Stacey live behind each other (their backyards touch). Bradford Court, where Claudia lives (and at the beginning of the series, Mary Anne and Kristy too), is within walking distance of almost all of their houses and of Stoneybrook Middle School. After Mary Anne's father Richard marries Dawn's mother Sharon, they move into Sharon and Dawn's house, which is on Burnt Hill Road.
Super Specials and Readers' Requests
- Super Specials: Super Specials were an extended version of the regular series, with several members of the Baby-sitters Club (plus at times, their friends and/or sitting charges) narrating (chapter-by-chapter changes of narrators). Super Specials centered on a larger-scale plot, usually with at least three subplots. For example, in The Baby-sitters Club Super Special #7, Snowbound, some members of the Baby-sitters Club are babysitting when a snowstorm hits Stoneybrook and the larger area, and the others are spread out. Dawn is stuck at the airport waiting for Jeff with her mother, and Kristy is stuck at home with Bart. The members narrate their experiences and usually, the next chapter would bring on an entirely different plot or an extension of the previous chapter, only with a different narrator.
- Readers' Requests: These were special novels featuring associate members Logan and Shannon, and their personal lives away from the Baby-sitters Club.
Mysteries and Super Mysteries
- Mysteries: These resemble the style of the regular novels (single narrator), only the plot of the novel mainly focuses on solving a mystery, with a small subplot.
- Super Mysteries: those resembled the style of Super Specials, with multiple narrators, only the plot of the novel was mainly focused on solving a mystery, with a few small subplots.
Portrait Collections (1994–1997)
- Portrait Collections: These are autobiographies of the Baby-sitters Club members (Stacey, Claudia, Dawn, Mary Anne, Kristy, and Abby). Mallory and Jessi were not included because the autobiographies were an eighth grade project only.
Baby-sitters Club: Friends Forever (1999–2000)
- Baby-sitters Club Friends Forever: These novels are an extension of the original series, which focused on the original four members (Kristy, Mary Anne, Claudia, and Stacey). They were set following the fire at Mary Anne's house, which drastically impacted the lives of the Baby-sitters Club members, and concluded with a final Super Special detailing the girls' graduation from Stoneybrook Middle School. The series contained twelve novels and two Super Specials, and was considered a spin-offSpin-off (media)In media, a spin-off is a radio program, television program, video game, or any narrative work, derived from one or more already existing works, that focuses, in particular, in more detail on one aspect of that original work...
.
Baby-sitters Club: Reissue and the Summer Before
- In 2010, Scholastic Inc. re-released the first two volumes of The Baby-sitters Club novels in an attempt to revive the series for a new generation of readers. Ann M. Martin also published a prequel to her series, called The Summer Before. It depicted the lives of the main characters the summer before the school year began (the setting in which the original series began).
Baby-Sitters Little Sister
The Baby-Sitters Little SisterBaby-Sitters Little Sister
Baby-Sitters Little Sister is a series spin-off of The Baby-sitters Club novel series. Written by Ann M. Martin, the series centered on seven-year-old Karen Brewer, the stepsister to Kristy Thomas of The Baby-sitters Club...
novels were a series of novels for younger readers. It centered on Karen Brewer, the seven-year-old stepsister of Baby-sitters Club president Kristy Thomas. One hundred and twenty-two Baby-Sitters Little Sister novels and six Baby-Sitters Little Sister Super Special novels were published. The series ran from 1988 to 2000.
The Kids in Ms. Coleman's Class
The Kids in Ms. Coleman's Class series was a spin-off of the Baby-Sitters Little SisterBaby-Sitters Little Sister
Baby-Sitters Little Sister is a series spin-off of The Baby-sitters Club novel series. Written by Ann M. Martin, the series centered on seven-year-old Karen Brewer, the stepsister to Kristy Thomas of The Baby-sitters Club...
series and covered Karen Brewer's second grade classmates at Stoneybrook Academy, and their adventures in Ms. Coleman's classroom. Twelve of these were published. The series ran from 1995 to 1998. The titles are Teacher's Pet, Author Day, Class Play, Second Grade Baby, The Snow War, Twin Trouble, Science Fair, Summer School, Halloween Parade, Holiday Time, Spelling Bee, and Baby Animal Zoo.
California Diaries
The California DiariesCalifornia Diaries
The California Diaries series is a spin-off of Ann M. Martin's The Baby-sitters Club. All fifteen novels are written as first-person journals...
series centered on Dawn Schafer and her friends after her return to California, and targeted a slightly older audience, with a darker feel. Fifteen novels were published focusing on the characters of Dawn, Ducky, Amalia, Maggie, and Sunny. Examples of subjects dealt with are anorexia
Anorexia nervosa
Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder characterized by refusal to maintain a healthy body weight and an obsessive fear of gaining weight. Although commonly called "anorexia", that term on its own denotes any symptomatic loss of appetite and is not strictly accurate...
, sexual orientation
Sexual orientation
Sexual orientation describes a pattern of emotional, romantic, or sexual attractions to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither, and the genders that accompany them. By the convention of organized researchers, these attractions are subsumed under heterosexuality, homosexuality,...
, and racism
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
, along with the characters' personal problems and family disputes.
Graphic novels
In 2006, Graphix, a division of Scholastic, released a graphic novelGraphic novel
A graphic novel is a narrative work in which the story is conveyed to the reader using sequential art in either an experimental design or in a traditional comics format...
version of the first Baby-sitters Club novel, Kristy's Great Idea. The novel is a contemporary yet faithful adaptation illustrated by Raina Telgemeier
Raina Telgemeier
Raina Telgemeier is an American cartoonist whose works include the autobiographic webcomic Smile , which was published by Scholastic Press's Graphix imprint as a full-color graphic novel in February, 2010....
, an Eisner Award
Eisner Award
The Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, commonly shortened to the Eisner Awards, and sometimes referred to as the Oscar Awards of the Comics Industry, are prizes given for creative achievement in American comic books. The Eisner Awards were first conferred in 1988, created in response to the...
-nominated cartoonist. The series continued with the release of The Truth About Stacey, Mary Anne Saves the Day, and concluded with Claudia and Mean Janine. Currently, there are no other graphic novels in the series set to be published.
TV series
In 1990, The Baby-Sitters Club spawned a thirteen episode TV series, that aired at various times on HBO, Disney ChannelDisney Channel
Disney Channel is an American basic cable and satellite television network, owned by the Disney-ABC Television Group division of The Walt Disney Company. It is under the direction of Disney-ABC Television Group President Anne Sweeney. The channel's headquarters is located on West Alameda Ave. in...
, and Nickelodeon
Nickelodeon (TV channel)
Nickelodeon, often simply called Nick and originally named Pinwheel, is an American children's channel owned by MTV Networks, a subsidiary of Viacom International. The channel is primarily aimed at children ages 7–17, with the exception of their weekday morning program block aimed at preschoolers...
, and was later released to video
Video
Video is the technology of electronically capturing, recording, processing, storing, transmitting, and reconstructing a sequence of still images representing scenes in motion.- History :...
.
Movie
A movie based on The Baby-sitters Club novels was released in 19951995 in film
-Top grossing films:-Events:* March 22 - The Dogme 95 movement is officially announced in Paris by Danish directors Lars von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg.* March 28 - Actress Julia Roberts and singer Lyle Lovett announce their plans for separation....
which starred Schuyler Fisk
Schuyler Fisk
Schuyler Elizabeth Fisk is an American actress and singer-songwriter.-Early life:Fisk was born in Los Angeles, California to actress Sissy Spacek and production designer Jack Fisk....
, Rachael Leigh Cook
Rachael Leigh Cook
Rachael Leigh Cook is an American actress, known for her role in the romantic comedy She's All That and her This is Your Brain on Drugs public service announcement.-Early life:...
, Larisa Oleynik
Larisa Oleynik
Larisa Romanovna Oleynik is an American actress. She came to fame in the mid-1990s, after starring in the title role of the popular television series, The Secret World of Alex Mack, and has also appeared in theatrical films, including The Baby-Sitters Club and 10 Things I Hate About You...
, Bre Blair
Bre Blair
Bre Blair , is a Canadian actress, who currently resides in Los Angeles, California. Her birth name is Sarah Brianne.Her first major role was portraying Stacey McGill in the 1995 movie The Baby-Sitters Club....
, Tricia Joe, Zelda Harris
Zelda Harris
Zelda Harris is an American actress.Harris was born in New York City, New York to Karen and Philip Harris. She has a sister, Kenya. She attended Princeton University, where she was a member of the Class of 2007.- Filmography :...
, and Stacy Linn Ramsower
Stacy Linn Ramsower
Stacy Linn Ramsower is a former American child actress.- Filmography :-External links:...
.