Posted on by TracyC

My Crazy Cousin Courtney Returns Again

CousinCourtneyReturnsMy Crazy Cousin Courtney Returns Again by Judi Miller, 1995.

Courtney is back in New York with her cousin Cathy and living her dream of becoming an actress!  Courtney has landed a part in a movie called The Laundry Bag Murder (see the first book in the series for that explanation).  With Courtney’s new professional responsibilities, Cathy hopes that this visit will be quieter than their last ones, but no such luck.  Excitement follows Courtney wherever she goes, and if things aren’t exciting enough to suit her, she knows how to stir them up!

When Cathy and Courtney go to the Central Park Zoo to try out Courtney’s new video camera, Courtney ends up turning the expedition into a vampire hunt that ends up catching a criminal.  When they go to see a friend’s rock band perform at a bar, Courtney turns a barroom brawl into a hug-in.

Courtney is also giving Cathy relationship advice.  Cathy and Frank are boyfriend and girlfriend now, but both of them are pretty shy.  Too shy to even go on a real date.  Courtney says that maybe Cathy should act a little helpless to bring out Frank’s protective instincts and to get his attention.  She says that Cathy should tell Frank that she thinks someone might be following her around (it’s not a lie if Cathy isn’t sure).  That way, Frank will want to spend more time with her to look after her.

With some reservations, Cathy does tell Frank someone may be following her, which does get Frank’s attention.  Then, to Cathy’s surprise, she actually does notice someone following her around.  At first, she suspects that Courtney got another actress to follow her for awhile to make her story to Frank true, but it turns out, that’s not the case at all.  Who is that mysterious woman in the sunglasses and what does she want?

There is another book in the series which I don’t have and haven’t read called My Crazy Cousin Courtney Gets Crazier.  Courtney ends up going to school in New York with Cathy because she lands a role in another movie which will be shooting there during the fall.

Posted on by TracyC

My Crazy Cousin Courtney Comes Back

CousinCourtneyBackMy Crazy Cousin Courtney Comes Back by Judi Miller, 1994.

The title is a little deceptive because Courtney hasn’t come back to New York to visit Cathy.  This time, Cathy has flown to Beverly Hills to spend Christmas with Courtney.  Courtney’s parents are now divorced, and Courtney’s adjusting to it, but she’s still as wild and unpredictable as she ever was.

Almost as soon as Cathy arrives, Courtney wakes her in the middle of the night to tell her that she needs her help to rescue an old man who’s being held against his will and maybe bring him cans of soup and sauerkraut.  Courtney’s heart is always in the right place, but as usual, she has the wrong idea.  In the best Courtney tradition, things work out amazingly well in the end.

In between spotting movie stars and getting into trouble, the girls manage to find time to get their nails done and visit with their friend Frank, who they met last summer in New York.  Cathy had fallen in love with Frank until she realized that he was more interested in being Courtney’s boyfriend.  Seeing him again over Christmas has brought back Cathy’s awkward feelings.  She still likes Frank, but the last thing she wants to do is to take a guy away from her lovable, if crazy, cousin.  But, if there’s one thing that Courtney specializes in, it’s happy endings.

This book isn’t as introspective as the first one in the series was, although Courtney and Cathy still help each other with their opposite personalities.  Cathy’s common sense and restraint can’t stop Courtney in her wild escapades, but she does inspire Courtney to be more thoughtful.  Courtney also helps Cathy to get out of shell, speak up for herself, have a little excitement, and see the possibilities that life has to offer.

Posted on by TracyC

My Crazy Cousin Courtney

CousinCourtneyMy Crazy Cousin Courtney by Judi Miller, 1993.

Cathy Bushwick usually spends the summer at camp, but this summer, her mother is having her stay in the city because her cousin Courtney is coming to visit them in New York.  Cathy and Courtney are actually second cousins because their mothers are first cousins.  They’re the same age (thirteen) and met once when they were five, but neither of them remembers it.  All that Cathy really knows about Courtney before she arrives is that she’s somewhat neurotic (Courtney is troubled by anxiety and panic attacks) and that the reason she’s coming to visit is that her parents are thinking of getting a divorce and need time alone to discuss it.

Cathy understands what it’s like to live with a single parent.  Her parents are divorced, and her father went to California years ago to become an actor.  She hasn’t heard from him since.  Her mother used to be an actress, but with Cathy to take care of, she became a theatrical agent for animals instead (she finds animals for people to use in commercials).  So, when Cathy hears that Courtney will be visiting from Beverly Hills, she’s very excited.  At first, she hopes that she and Courtney will be like sisters and that Courtney might have even heard of her father in California.

Cathy’s illusions are shattered almost immediately.  Courtney not only hasn’t heard of her father but she’s nothing like Cathy imagined.  When she and her mother go to meet her at the airport, she’s wearing heart-shaped sunglasses and a hot pink shirt that says, “KISS ME QUICK,” and she has a pile of luggage.  She’s used to having money and getting the best of everything, and she’s immediately disappointed with the modest apartment where Cathy and her mother live.  When she learns that they don’t even have a pool, she gets upset and wants to go home.  But, it’s no use.  She’s stuck there for the summer.  And, they’re stuck with her.

But, things don’t turn out to be as bad as Cathy fears they’re going to be.  In some ways, they’re worse.  Once Courtney reconciles herself to spending the summer in New York, she has some very specific ideas about things that she’d like to do, and a lot of them end up getting the girls in trouble.  Shy, sensible Cathy finds herself getting locked in Tiffany’s after closing time because Courtney thought she saw a spy stealing their designs, rescuing Courtney from the dolphin pool at the aquarium, and lots of other things that she never thought she’d find herself doing.  Then, one day, the girls think they’ve witnessed a murder.  What are they going to do?  Is Cathy going to survive the summer with her crazy cousin Courtney?

This book is the first in a series about Cathy and Courtney.  Courtney may be a bit wild, but she’s not as crazy as Cathy thinks.  Over the course of the summer, the two become friends, and they learn quite a few things about each other and about themselves.  By the time Courtney has to go home, a little of each of them has rubbed off on the other, and neither will be quite the same again.

The book is available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

ChittyChitty Chitty Bang Bang by Ian Fleming, 1964.

Not everyone is aware that the creator of James Bond wrote a children’s book, although the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is a children’s classic.  However, the movie differs greatly from the original book, which doesn’t have anything to do with a toy-obsessed baron who has forbidden children in his kingdom, and there is no Truly Scrumptious (sorry).

Commander Caractacus Pott, retired, is an explorer and inventor who lives in a little house in the countryside with his wife Mimsie and their children, a set of eight-year-old twins named Jeremy and Jemima.  Some of the locals call Commander Pott, “Crackpott” because of his strange inventions, which never earn him very much money until one of this inventions pays off when he sells the candy whistles he creates to Lord Skrumshus’s candy company.

With the money he earns, Pott decides to buy something that his family has wanted for a while: their own car.  But, they don’t want just any boring car like everyone else.  They want something special.  They find it when they spot a former racing car that’s due for the scrap heap.  No one wants it because it would take a lot of time and money to fix.  The Pott family falls in love with it immediately, and Jemima thinks it might even be magical because the license plate says “GEN 11”, which looks like “genii” (or “genie”).  The garage man is relieved to find a buyer who appreciates the car’s history and potential and says that she’s sure to reward them for saving her from being scrap.

After Pott spends a great deal of time fixing up the car (which they name “Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang” because of the sounds it makes) and adding some additional inventions of his own, he begins to suspect that both Jemima and the garage man are right: the car is magical and does want to repay them for saving her life.  He starts to notice changes that the car makes to herself overnight, adding extra buttons and features that he knows he didn’t put there.  He’s not sure what they’re for until the family gets stuck in traffic the first time they decide to take the car out for a picnic. Messages on the car’s dashboard light up, telling Pott to pull some of the car’s mysterious levers.  When he does, the car sprouts wings and flies over the other cars in front of them, over towns and beaches, and even over the English Channel!

ChittyPic2

Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang takes the Pott family to a sandbar so they can have a private beach all to themselves.  But, that’s only the beginning of their adventure!  Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang can also turn into a hovercraft, and the family decides to take it on a special holiday to France.  When they reach the coast of France, they find a cave and start to explore it.  Someone has set up various devices inside to scare people away, but that only makes the Pott family more curious and determined to find out why.

It turns out that the cave is a hideout for a band of smugglers, and when the Pott family destroys it, they want revenge!

ChittyPic1

At the end of the book, there is a recipe for “Monsieur Bon-Bon’s Secret ‘Fooj'” (they mean ‘fudge’, Monsieur Bon-Bon is a character in the story).

Having known the movie version since I was a kid, I really prefer the movie to the book.  With a magical car at their disposal, the more fairy-tale story about the castle and tyrannical, toy-obsessed baron seems more fitting than the story about smugglers.  But, that being said, the book is still a lot of fun.

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

The Night Crossing

NightCrossingThe Night Crossing by Karen Ackerman, 1994.

It’s 1938 in Austria, and Clara’s parents have decided that their family needs to leave before things get worse.  Already, Jewish families like theirs are being rounded up by the Nazis, and Clara and her sister Marta were chased through the streets by other children, shouting insults.

Their family has been through things like this before.  Clara’s grandmother tells her about when she had to flee Russia as a little girl to escape the pogroms.  She brought her dolls Gittel and Lotte with her as her family hiked through the Carpathian Mountains.  Now, Clara will carry them with her as their family leaves Austria for Switzerland.

It’s a hard journey with lots of walking and little food.  The family can carry very little with them, and some of what they have they are forced to trade for food, a place to rest, and for not being turned over to the Nazis.  Finally, at the border crossing, Clara’s parents are afraid that they will have to get rid of the candlesticks that have been in their family for generations because they might be discovered by the border guards.  Then, Clara comes up with a plan to hide them in her dolls.  Will it work?

NightCrossingPicThis is a pretty short chapter book.  Although the subject matter is serious, and parts might be frightening to young children (the part where Clara and Marta are chased and perhaps some of the parts where the family is hiding), there are only vague references to more dark subjects like concentration camps (people who already know what they are and what happened there would understand, but children who haven’t heard about them wouldn’t get the full picture from the brief mentions).  The book would be a good, short introduction to the topic of the Holocaust by putting it in terms of the way it changed the lives of ordinary people who had to flee from it.  Actually, it wouldn’t be a bad way to start a discussion of the Syrian refugees in Europe by putting it into the context of ordinary people fleeing the violence of war.

This book is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

Eleven Kids, One Summer

ElevenKids

Eleven Kids, One Summer by Ann M. Martin, 1991.

People who recognize the name Ann M. Martin probably know it from the Baby-sitters Club series, although she has written more than just that.  This book is the sequel to Ten Kids, No Pets, which introduces the Rosso family.  I’ve read the book, although I don’t currently own a copy.  Mrs. Rosso has a system for everything (which is important in a family with so many kids, especially since Mr. Rosso is absent-minded), and one of the first systems she invented was the system for naming her children.  She chose their names from a book of baby names in alphabetical order, giving the first A name under the girls’ section to her first child (Abigail), the second name under B in the boys’ section to her second child (Bainbridge) and so on.  It was an efficient system, but many of the children have strange names now, which fits their eccentric family life.  Fortunately, the children assert their own personalities and give themselves nicknames, which also is part of their family life.  In the first book, the Rosso children decide that they really want a pet, something they’re forbidden to have because their parents think it will be too much to handle with their big, busy family.  By the end of the book, they do succeed in getting a pet, and their mother gives birth to her eleventh child.

In Eleven Kids, One Summer, the entire Rosso family (including the cat Zsa-Zsa) is spending the summer in a rented house on Fire Island.  Like the first book, the second is series of short stories, one about each child in the family and how they spend the summer.  Because the children are all part of the same family, the stories all connect, but splitting them up gives some focus to each of the children and allows readers to see events from different perspectives (which is important to really get the full story of some of the things that happen over the summer).  The special things about summer vacation are the possibilities for adventure and the experiences that may change you by summer’s end.

Abigail and the Train-Trip Disaster — Abigail, the oldest child in the family and the most responsible, introduces her family for the benefit of new readers and talks about their chaotic trip to the island where they will be spending the summer.  Even though traveling with such a large family can be a hassle, it gives her the chance to meet a movie star and make some new friends.

Calandra and the Mystery Next Door — Calandra (called Candy) is the dreamy, imaginative child in the family.  She becomes convinced that the old house next to her family’s beach house is haunted.  There’s just something odd about the place, and it’s starting to give her nightmares.

Faustine and the Great Fish Protest — Faustine has always loved animals.  When she watches some fishermen on the island and sees the way fish flop around before they die, she gets angry and decides to become an animal rights activist.  From this point on, she refuses to eat meat or wear anything made of animal products.  But, the hardest part of having a cause that you care deeply about is accepting that not everyone else will feel the same way.

Hannah and the Ghosts — Hannah feels like the odd child out in her family.  None of the other children really share her interests, and she doesn’t have a close, special friend.  That’s why she plays practical jokes on the others.  She’s bored, and feels the need to liven things up and get attention.  Some of her jokes are mean, though.  Hannah knows that Candy thinks the house next door is haunted, so she’s decided to convince her that it’s true.  At least, until Hannah finds the friend she really needs.

Ira and the Hospital Adventure — Ira catches Lyme disease when he is bitten by ticks and has to go to the hospital.  At first, he’s very scared, but everyone does their best to cheer him up.

Janthina and the Beauty Treatment — Jan feels bad sometimes because she used to be the baby of the family, and since Keegan was born, she doesn’t get as much attention.  When her grandparents come to visit, she hopes for some extra attention and maybe that special pink Puffin’ Pal doll that she wants. Instead, her grandparents bring along her aunt and uncle and younger cousins.  What can Jan do to get some attention?

Dagwood and the Million-Dollar Idea — Dagwood (called Woody) is looking for ways to earn extra money.  There are just so many things he wants to buy!  One of his brothers, Eberhard (called Hardy), gives him the idea of going into business, and when he spots some young children getting money for drawing things on seashells, he realizes that he can do the same thing.  In fact, he can do better by making animals out of seashells.  If only some of the other boys on the island would just leave him alone.

Gardenia and the Movie on the Beach — Ever since Abbie met the teenage movie star and learned about the movie that they’re making on the island, various members of the Rosso family have spent time talking with the movie people and their friends and watching the filming.  Now, all the Rosso kids get a chance to be extras in a crowd scene on the beach.  But, that’s not enough for Gardenia.  She wants to be a star!

Bainbridge and the Case of the Curious Kidnapping — Bainbridge (he’s never found a good short form for his name) is fourteen years old and interested in girls.  Things are going well with the girl he’s just made friends with, but their time is cut short when she has to leave the island suddenly due to do a family emergency.  With nothing better to do than do help Woody sell his seashell creations, Bainbridge thinks his last days on the island are going to be dull.  Then, he meets Blaire, a pretty girl with a name almost as strange as his own (so she says).  But, while he’s talking to her, his baby brother Keegan disappears!

Eberhard and the House of the Cursed — Hardy wants to be a detective and loves opportunities to practice his skills.  His sleuthing senses are on high alert after Hannah runs off with Keegan while Bainbridge is talking to a pretty girl and is found following Keegan’s stroller as it seems to roll by itself down the boardwalk.  Hardy knows Hannah’s tricks and figures that she’s up to something.  Then, Candy asks him to help her clear up something that’s been bothering her all summer: the mystery of the haunted house next door.  Although everyone has told Candy that it’s not really haunted, that it’s just her imagination and some mean tricks of Hannah’s, Candy is still convinced that there’s something mysterious about the place.  She thinks that the ghosts there might have even influenced Hannah to do the things she’s done. Detective Hardy is on the case!

Keegan and the End of Summer — As a baby, Keegan doesn’t understand a lot, but he loves his family, and he listens as Abigail explains to him that summer is over, and it’s time for them to go home.

This book is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC · 1 Comment

Basil of Baker Street

BasilBakerStreetBasil of Baker Street by Eve Titus, 1958.

Some people may recognize the title character from Disney’s The Great Mouse Detective.  This is the original book that the Disney movie was based on, although the movie was very different from the original book.

The part that is the same is that Basil is a mouse who lives in the house of Sherlock Holmes at 221 B Baker Street. He and some other mice have built a little town they call Holmestead in the cellar.  Although Sherlock Holmes is unaware of Basil’s presence, Basil studies his methods and copies them, becoming “the Sherlock Holmes of the Mouse World.”  Like Sherlock Holmes, Basil also has a narrator for his stories, his best friend and fellow mouse Dr. Dawson, and they solve cases for their fellow mice in trouble.

BasilBakerStreetPicIn this book, Basil’s skills are put to the test when he is hired by his mouse neighbors to find their two missing daughters, a pair of twins named Angela and Agatha.  The twins have been kidnapped, and soon, a note arrives, saying that all the mice in Baker Street have only 48 hours to evacuate their home if they ever want to see the twins again.  A gang called The Terrible Three want to use Holmestead as their headquarters.  With only two days to solve the case, Basil and Dr. Dawson set out to find the gang and rescue the twins so that they can keep their wonderful home!

Basil of Baker Street is actually the first book in a series about Basil’s cases, and I think it’s really the best book in the series.  It is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

The Mystery Hideout

MysteryHideoutThe Mystery Hideout by Ken Follett, 1976.

The first time Mick Williams meets Randall Izard (called “Izzie”) is when the news dealer Mick works for asks him to train the new boy on his paper route, and Mick learns that Izzie will also be going to his school. Mick doesn’t like Izzie much at first. The new boy speaks with a posh accent and is riding an expensive bike that he says was a present from his father, who makes television ads for a living. Mick doesn’t have a father, and he stole the bike that he rides for his paper route.

Mick guesses that Izzie’s family used to have more money but have fallen on hard times, which is why Izzie needs the paper route.  Mick is worried about his own future.  Someone is building a new hotel on the street where he lives by knocking down the old film studios, and his mother says that they’re going to demolish all the old apartment buildings around it.  That means that they’ll have to find a apartment, which isn’t easy because they don’t have much money, and not everyone wants to rent to a lone woman with a child.

Mick kind of envies the criminal gangs that he reads about in the paper, like the Disguise Gang.  They stage daring raids on banks while wearing clever disguises so that no one knows that they really look like.  They fool everyone and get away with tons of money.  Mick wishes that he was that clever!  If he was, his mother would never have to worry about money again.

MysteryHideoutPicBut, Izzie turns out to be a good friend for Mick.  They both love to play soccer, and Izzie tells Mick that his father used to work in the old studio buildings that they’re tearing down to build the new hotel. In fact, Izzie even knows a secret way in, so the boys sneak in to explore a little.  They’re goofing off with some of the props when they make the startling discovery that the prop guns are loaded with real bullets! Then, the boys have to make a run for it because there are other people sneaking around the old studios. What is going on there?

This book actually takes place in London. I don’t think they actually say the name of the city in the story, but they do mention the Thames, the money is all in pounds, and there are children playing cricket.  But, it’s the kind of story that could take place anywhere.  Mick and Izzie are realistic characters.  Both of them are worried about their families’ hard times.  Mick in particular wants to be the man of the house and to help his mother in her struggles to provide for them.  His inner debate about which side of the law he should be on is also feels real, and it’s satisfying what he chooses when he realizes what criminals are really like and the danger they pose to people he cares about.

Posted on by TracyC · 1 Comment

The Adventures of the Red Tape Gang

RedTapeGangThe Adventures of the Red Tape Gang by Joan Lowery Nixon, 1974.

Hardcover editions of this book are called The Mysterious Red Tape Gang.

Mike’s father loves to read the newspaper every morning and rant about the stories that make him angry.  It annoys him how little gets accomplished because there’s so much “red tape” involved.  Take the case of their neighbor, Mr. Hartwell.  He has a large bush that’s dangerously close to the corner of their street and has caused several accidents. The city wants him to cut it, but he refuses to do so out of meanness and stubbornness.  Now, the city has to go through all kinds of red tape to make it happen.

His father’s rants give Mike an idea.  Why not put the new clubhouse he and his friends are working on to good use and form a club to right the wrongs of their neighborhood and make all of that red tape unnecessary?  Besides, cutting the Hartwells’ bush in the middle of the night would be a great joke on Mr. Hartwell’s nosy daughter, Linda Jean, who’s always hanging around, getting in the way of Mike and his friends.

Mike’s friends love the idea of being secret neighborhood heroes, but of course, it turns out to be harder than they expected.  After trimming the Hartwells’ bush as best they can, they decide that instead of just cutting the bush, it would be better to move it to a completely different spot so there will be no need to cut it again when it grows out.  But, Mr. Hartwell almost catches them in their midnight landscaping, and when Linda Jean finds Mike’s shears, they’re forced to let her into their club.

Their next project, boarding up the doors and windows of an abandoned house so that curious children won’t wander in and get hurt, also comes with complications.  It seems that the house wasn’t quite as abandoned as everyone thought.  Still, the Red Tape Gang accomplishes something even greater than just keeping kids out of the house and successfully keeps their identities secret.  But while they’re congratulating themselves on the wonderful job they’ve been doing, they discover that their neighborhood contains far more serious problems than they originally thought. Their activities are also starting to come to the attention of the wrong people.  And, for one member of the group, these problems hit dangerously close to home.

This was one of my favorite books when I was a kid.  The descriptions of the kids’ midnight excursions are hilarious and make you want to cheer them on!

This book is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

Our Teacher Is Missing

TeacherMissingOur Teacher Is Missing by Mary Frances Shura, 1992.

Eliza is a quiet girl, and she likes to be that way.  Too many of her teachers try to make her be more “outgoing” or “lively.”  Mostly, Eliza wishes that they would just leave her alone.  That’s why she likes her new teacher, Miss Dixon.  Miss Dixon is quiet and soft-spoken, like Eliza.  Ben, the class bully, calls Miss Dixon “Mouse,” but in spite of that, Miss Dixon has no trouble controlling her class.

Then, one day, Miss Dixon doesn’t show up to class.  The kids wait around for her, goofing off, but Eliza is really worried.  She knows that it’s not like Miss Dixon to simply not show up.  Soon, other kids also start becoming concerned, and other faculty members realize that Miss Dixon is missing.  The principal arranges for a substitute teacher while they are looking for Miss Dixon, and the children continue wondering what could have happened to her. The students consider every possibility behind their teacher’s disappearance, from secret mafia connections and entry into the Witness Protection Program to alien abduction.

But, for Eliza, all these wild speculations, stupid jokes about their “Mouse” teacher being eaten by a cat, and the adults’ constant reassurances that they’re sure that there is a reasonable explanation and that no one should be “unduly concerned” are just not enough.  Whatever happened to Miss Dixon, Eliza is sure that she would have come to school or at least called if she could.  Eliza thinks that something terrible must have happened and that Miss Dixon needs help fast.  If the adults won’t do anything about Miss Dixon’s disappearance, then she will!

This book is currently available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

My Reaction and Spoilers:

I love this book because I identified with the main character from the time I first read it as a child. One of the themes of this book is about people’s perceptions of different personality types. Eliza’s teachers and even her parents underestimate her because of her quiet nature.  Eliza is an introvert, and she is under constant pressure from most adults to be more of an extrovert.  Eliza resents their attempts to reshape her into a more outgoing, forceful person, not recognizing that her real strengths are her intelligence, perceptiveness, and quiet determination to do the right thing.  Being a loud person isn’t the same as being a competent person, although some people have that perception.  However, the people around her come to understand her better in the end.  Eliza also finds some unexpected sympathy from friends who understand her impatience with the shallow immaturity of other kids and who also are content to not be completely understood by other people as long as they have the freedom to quietly be themselves.

Eliza succeeds in this mystery where the adults fail because she is perceptive and has insights into her teacher’s personality that other lack.  Although Eliza’s friends Robin, Stephen, and Chris are worried about getting into trouble by playing detective, when they see how determined Eliza is, they agree to help.  Soon, they realize that Eliza is right to be worried.  Miss Dixon intended to be home over the weekend, but something happened to keep her from coming home.  The more the children talk about what they really know about their teacher, the more they begin to put the clues together.  Finally, they realize where Miss Dixon was right before she vanished, but the situation is serious.  Miss Dixon is being held captive because she accidentally stumbled upon criminal activity.  When one of their classmates is also in danger, Eliza shows everyone that even a quiet person can have the bravery and determination to do what needs to be done.