The Running Bibliophile

Jessi's Secret Language (The Baby-Sitters Club, #16) by Ann M. Martin is about eleven year old Jessi Ramsey agreeing to babysit two days a week for the Braddock kids, nine year old Haley and seven year old Matt. There is one catch, Jessi has to learn sign language because Matt is deaf. On top of this responsibility, Jessi auditions for her dance school's ballet production of Coppelia and lands the lead part, which adds even more rehearsal time to her already busy schedule. There is a lot that I enjoyed about Jessi's Secret Language (The Baby-Sitter's Club, #16) because it teaches kids many life lessons that even some adults could benefit learning about. Namely being accepting and inclusive of people with special needs . . . in this case, learning sign language so that Matt could easily communicate and play with others. I thought the book was well thought out showing how two different families dealt with having a deaf child . . . the Braddocks went out of ...

The Mercandy mansion is said to be haunted because lights flicker in the windows at night, and the owners are never seen. Just ask anyone at Sweet Valley Middle School . . . they'll swear it is haunted. When Nora Mercandy moves into the house, rumors about her being a witch spread rapidly throughout the school. Elizabeth Wakefield sets out to solve the mystery of the Mercandy mansion and prove that Nora is just a normal girl. The major theme of The Haunted House (Sweet Valley Twins, # 3) created by Francine Pascal is bullying. Because of rumors about the Mercandy house, people jumped to conclusions about Nora and began picking on her. Lila was the ringleader of it all and was merciless. The underlying theme is to not jump to conclusions. The majority of the students at Sweet Valley Middle School made assumptions about the Mercandy family because of things they had seen and heard. Those assumptions were gossiped about and spread around. Everything was easily explained had ...

Identical twins Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield are auditioning for the lead role / solo in their dance recital. Elizabeth doesn't want to compete against her twin. Jessica knows she is the best dancer. The only problem is their ballet teacher never notices her because Elizabeth is teacher's pet. Who will land the lead role? Teacher's Pet (Sweet Valley Twins, #2) is told mainly from the view point of Jessica Wakefield, and we get to see her personality more in depth than we did in the first book of the series, Best Friends . Jessica's prominent personality trait is that she is selfish and that is carried throughout the entire series. With that being said, I totally empathized with her in the scenario of the book. Spoiler Alert:   Elizabeth lands the lead role in the dance recital even though she doesn't dance nearly as well as Jessica does. With that being said, Jessica was a prima donna in their first ballet class, and Madame Andre holds that against her. ...