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situationnormal's review against another edition
2.0
I remember being sad when Dawn left in the series (sorry, spoiler alerts...) but I'm starting to understand why it happened. The past few Dawn books have been so awful I can't imagine her character being very popular around this point in time. It's fine to not be crazy about animals but...Dawn is pretty awful in this book, even if she does change her tune a bit by the end it's for selfish reasons.
The secondary arc in this book was very, very pinned on and barely noticeable as well.
That said, I did like that it was an actual mystery that needed to be solved this time (sorry, Mystery at Claudia's House).
The secondary arc in this book was very, very pinned on and barely noticeable as well.
That said, I did like that it was an actual mystery that needed to be solved this time (sorry, Mystery at Claudia's House).
impybelle's review
3.0
This is one of those BSC books where if you loathe Dawn, you'll use it as an example of how annoying she can be. For me, it's one of those books where I remember 90% of what's going to happen and the rest is a bit of a surprise. I didn't remember Dawn's "animal people are weird" stance and it kind of grates.
jamietherebelliousreader's review
3.0
3 stars. This wasn’t that interesting and the mystery of the disappearing dogs wasn’t that big but it was cute. Dawn books are always fun in that I just love Dawn’s character so much. She’s great. While this was nothing that great it was a cute way to pass the time.
lberestecki's review
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
finesilkflower's review
1.0
A dognapper is loose in Stoneybrook.
While pet-sitting for the Mancusis - the pet-crazy family from [b:Jessi Ramsey, Pet-sitter|233749|Jessi Ramsey, Pet-sitter (The Baby-Sitters Club, #22)|Ann M. Martin|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1387734857s/233749.jpg|3057704] - Dawn loses their Great Dane, Cheryl. (She ties up Cheryl in the yard while she deals with other animals inside, and the dog goes missing.) Other dogs begin to go missing in the neighborhood, including Kristy's family dog, Shannon, who disappears in much the same way.
Meanwhile, Kristy and Bart form an all-star Krushers/Bashers team, called the Krashers, to face off against a team from a neighboring town.
Mystery Solution:
The idiocy of this mystery & its solution cannot be overstated. This guy sells dogs, IN STONEYBROOK, that he steals from families, IN STONEYBROOK. Does he think that dog owners cannot identify their own dogs? Even Dawn and Mary Anne were able to identify Cheryl at fifty paces, and they barely know her.
Don't get me started on the way police procedure is portrayed. The police officer brushes Dawn off at first - realistic! - but then ends up running the license plate number she wrote down and telling her who owns the car anyway. WHY? What annoys me most is that this suspension of disbelief is not even needed, because there are OTHER WAYS to have your characters find out who drives a particular car, like SEEING THE DRIVER.
There is no reason for this to be a Dawn book. In fact, there are good reasons for it not to be: she has no connection to the pets and, as she acknowledges right up from in the first paragraph, she doesn't even particularly like animals. This starts her off on an incredibly unsympathetic foot, and it doesn't improve from there. It would have been easy enough to write her as an animal lover, especially with her being vegetarian. But this book goes out of its ways to explain that her vegetarianism isn't about liking animals at all, but simply because she dislikes the taste of meat. As a person who started out being vegetarian because of a dislike for meat, even I found this off-putting. Also off-putting: the way she keeps feeling alienated and confused by other humans' love for animals. IS SHE EVEN A PERSON.
There are plenty of club members who do like animals, including Kristy, the person whose actual dog was stolen in this very book; Jessi, who has a connection to the Mancusis; and Mary Anne, who dotes on her kitten and who has a natural reason to haunt the pet store. Why was this not one of their books?
Actually, this definitely should have been Kristy's book because not only is she the emotional center of the main plot, but the side plot as well. I just reimagined it as Kristy's book and, while it's still dumb, it has real emotions in it! MULTIPLE!! Kristy's anxiety about the missing dog, sadness for David Michael who is most emotionally bonded to the puppy, nervousness about melding the two baseball teams, care in guiding a saddened David Michael to Krashers victory, etc. Very little of this is actually in the book as it is from Dawn's boring, emotionally disconnected POV. Dawn, you ruin everything.
While pet-sitting for the Mancusis - the pet-crazy family from [b:Jessi Ramsey, Pet-sitter|233749|Jessi Ramsey, Pet-sitter (The Baby-Sitters Club, #22)|Ann M. Martin|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1387734857s/233749.jpg|3057704] - Dawn loses their Great Dane, Cheryl. (She ties up Cheryl in the yard while she deals with other animals inside, and the dog goes missing.) Other dogs begin to go missing in the neighborhood, including Kristy's family dog, Shannon, who disappears in much the same way.
Meanwhile, Kristy and Bart form an all-star Krushers/Bashers team, called the Krashers, to face off against a team from a neighboring town.
Mystery Solution:
Spoiler
Dawn quickly decides that the thief must be whoever owns a green car she saw near both thefts. She is correct! There are no red herrings in this book. Through a series of unsupported hunches, Dawn figures out that this is a scam running through the new pet store. When people request purebred dogs, instead of finding them from breeders and acting as a middleman, this dude simply goes out into the town and steals them from families.The idiocy of this mystery & its solution cannot be overstated. This guy sells dogs, IN STONEYBROOK, that he steals from families, IN STONEYBROOK. Does he think that dog owners cannot identify their own dogs? Even Dawn and Mary Anne were able to identify Cheryl at fifty paces, and they barely know her.
Don't get me started on the way police procedure is portrayed. The police officer brushes Dawn off at first - realistic! - but then ends up running the license plate number she wrote down and telling her who owns the car anyway. WHY? What annoys me most is that this suspension of disbelief is not even needed, because there are OTHER WAYS to have your characters find out who drives a particular car, like SEEING THE DRIVER.
There is no reason for this to be a Dawn book. In fact, there are good reasons for it not to be: she has no connection to the pets and, as she acknowledges right up from in the first paragraph, she doesn't even particularly like animals. This starts her off on an incredibly unsympathetic foot, and it doesn't improve from there. It would have been easy enough to write her as an animal lover, especially with her being vegetarian. But this book goes out of its ways to explain that her vegetarianism isn't about liking animals at all, but simply because she dislikes the taste of meat. As a person who started out being vegetarian because of a dislike for meat, even I found this off-putting. Also off-putting: the way she keeps feeling alienated and confused by other humans' love for animals. IS SHE EVEN A PERSON.
There are plenty of club members who do like animals, including Kristy, the person whose actual dog was stolen in this very book; Jessi, who has a connection to the Mancusis; and Mary Anne, who dotes on her kitten and who has a natural reason to haunt the pet store. Why was this not one of their books?
Actually, this definitely should have been Kristy's book because not only is she the emotional center of the main plot, but the side plot as well. I just reimagined it as Kristy's book and, while it's still dumb, it has real emotions in it! MULTIPLE!! Kristy's anxiety about the missing dog, sadness for David Michael who is most emotionally bonded to the puppy, nervousness about melding the two baseball teams, care in guiding a saddened David Michael to Krashers victory, etc. Very little of this is actually in the book as it is from Dawn's boring, emotionally disconnected POV. Dawn, you ruin everything.
lemonflower's review
hopeful
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
sammah's review
3.0
I didn't read a ton of the mystery books when I was a kid, just a few. This was one I hadn't read, and I'm glad I didn't. I'd have probably written a little kiddish mean letter to Ann M. Martin about what a freaking sadist Dawn is.
First off, this chick is always up everyone's butt about saving the environment and being healthy and all this jazz. Yet she claims she doesn't really like animals all that much and doesn't eat meat just because she doesn't like the taste. Not, you know, because she really cares about the cow. Excuse me, but what? I was vegan for a pretty big stretch of time, and a vegetarian for even longer. I stopped because I went through a phase of life where the idea of eating a helpless animal really got to me, and I couldn't do it. There are still a LOT of things I won't eat, and it's because I'm a healthy person. I'm totally not, I'm fat and I like junk food and I know it's a horrible lifestyle, but still. This made NO SENSE TO ME ON A FUNDAMENTAL LEVEL AND I HATE DAWN.
Anyway. The book.
She's sitting for the people from Jessie Ramsey, Pet Sitter who have the 50000 animals in their house. Dawn is derpy about all of this, and doesn't just walk the dogs when she arrives and makes the poor creatures wait. She tethers out a Great Dane named Cheryl, who gets stolen. Later on Shannon (not on Dawn's watch, alas) also gets stolen. It turns out one of the most rich guys in town is in some money troubles, and is stealing dogs and having them resold through a local pet store.
What if the owner of the stole dog wanted to "replace it" (some people ARE assholes like that), went to the store, asked for another Great Dane or whatever, and got their own dog back? Also I hated the entire B-plot with the Krushers and Bashers and how that basically only took place to give Dawn 2 pages of writing to clear up the mystery. I really do not like the little kid softball books at all, so having that in this one was obnoxious. At least this ones off the list!
First off, this chick is always up everyone's butt about saving the environment and being healthy and all this jazz. Yet she claims she doesn't really like animals all that much and doesn't eat meat just because she doesn't like the taste. Not, you know, because she really cares about the cow. Excuse me, but what? I was vegan for a pretty big stretch of time, and a vegetarian for even longer. I stopped because I went through a phase of life where the idea of eating a helpless animal really got to me, and I couldn't do it. There are still a LOT of things I won't eat, and it's because I'm a healthy person. I'm totally not, I'm fat and I like junk food and I know it's a horrible lifestyle, but still. This made NO SENSE TO ME ON A FUNDAMENTAL LEVEL AND I HATE DAWN.
Anyway. The book.
She's sitting for the people from Jessie Ramsey, Pet Sitter who have the 50000 animals in their house. Dawn is derpy about all of this, and doesn't just walk the dogs when she arrives and makes the poor creatures wait. She tethers out a Great Dane named Cheryl, who gets stolen. Later on Shannon (not on Dawn's watch, alas) also gets stolen. It turns out one of the most rich guys in town is in some money troubles, and is stealing dogs and having them resold through a local pet store.
What if the owner of the stole dog wanted to "replace it" (some people ARE assholes like that), went to the store, asked for another Great Dane or whatever, and got their own dog back? Also I hated the entire B-plot with the Krushers and Bashers and how that basically only took place to give Dawn 2 pages of writing to clear up the mystery. I really do not like the little kid softball books at all, so having that in this one was obnoxious. At least this ones off the list!
xtinamorse's review
Read my recap at A Year with the BSC via Stoneybrook Forever: https://www.livethemovies.com/bsc-blog/dawn-and-the-disappearing-dogs
ssshira's review
1.0
this is my first time reading this book!
in this paragon of flawed logic by ghostwriter [a:Ellen Miles|286072|Ellen Miles|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] one of the mancusis' (from [b:Jessi Ramsey, Pet-sitter|233749|Jessi Ramsey, Pet-sitter (The Baby-Sitters Club, #22)|Ann M. Martin|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1387734857s/233749.jpg|3057704]) dogs and shannon the puppy disappear, both while clipped to outdoor chains. news reports come in about many other dogs getting dognapped in similar situations as well. meanwhile, the krushers and the bashers (kristy and bart's softball teams) create an all-star team, the krashers (how clever!) to face off against a softball team from the nearby town of new hope.
highlights:
-two of the nearby towns where dogs have been reported missing are new hope, ct and lawrenceville, ct. I like to think that ellen named these towns for new hope, pa and the semi-nearby lawrenceville, nj (or maybe even mistakenly named for new hope's neighboring town, lambertville, nj).
-dawn and co go to the police station to report the license plate number of a green car they've seen driving around (that dawn thinks is probably the car of the dognapper). the cop DOES NOT CARE. he even says something condescending along the lines of, "let the big boys solve the crime. go home to your homework, little girls." YES. I like this because it is realistic. it is so annoying to think that the bsc are just these flawless model citizens and everyone in the town thinks so. no. in real life people would be like, "who are these nosy irritating teenagers that keep harassing me?"
-the guy who actually did it is one of the richest guys in town. I appreciate that, because I find it really irritating earlier in the book when the cop is like, "no, that license plate belongs to a rich guy, and we have no reason to suspect rich guys of committing crimes..." the one problem is that it's explained that he isn't rich anymore and that's why he's doing this -- selling the dogs to people who want purebred dogs and making money that way. but I wish he was still rich and either evil schemes are how he got rich in the first place, OR he just has some mental health stuff and really likes to kidnap dogs, OR to practice chaotic evil roleplay or something.
lowlights/nitpicks:
-dawn says she doesn't really care for animals and is bewildered by people who kiss or talk to their pets. she says she's a vegetarian because she doesn't like the taste of meat. UGHHHHHH. I think I might hate dawn, guys.
-the mancusi dogs want to pee the second dawn gets to their house. why does dawn wait until after she's fed and cleaned the cages of all the other animals to let the dogs out? I think the guinea pigs can wait 20 minutes to have their cage cleaned. if she had been a good pet caretaker, walking the dogs FIRST, then she wouldn't have had to clip cheryl the great dane outside to pee, and then cheryl wouldn't have gotten taken in the first place.
-dawn (and the mancusis) only feed barney the snake insects and worms -- huh? snakes need to eat mammals to survive, don't they?
-jessi theorizes that the rich guy steals dogs for some psychological reason and dawn thinks that's far-fetched. "what kind of psychological reason could there be to steal dogs?" uh, kleptomania? sociopathy? some sort of manic episode had by an animal liberationist that makes them want to free all tied-up animals?
-mary anne is concerned about the legality of following mr. tate, the rich guy. kristy says, "there's nothing illegal about looking at someone." -- uh, yeah, that's stalking. which is illegal.
-WHY IS EVERYONE IN THIS TOWN BUYING DOGS? WHERE ARE THE ANIMAL SHELTERS?
-the core premise is flawed. dude steals dogs from the town and then sells them back to the people of the town AT A PET STORE. not even black market. seriously? what if someone was like, "aww, my great dane was stolen, so now I want a new one." do you think they wouldn't recognize their stolen dog? this is a pretty small town, so I don't see how this scheme could have worked even as long as it did.
claudia outfit:
-"She was still wearing her school clothes: a blue minidress with white polka dots, white leggings, and earrings that looked like big white polka dots."
jackie disaster:
-picks up more baseball equipment than he can carry and drops it all over the place
snack in claudia's room:
-doritos under a pile of sweaters
in this paragon of flawed logic by ghostwriter [a:Ellen Miles|286072|Ellen Miles|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] one of the mancusis' (from [b:Jessi Ramsey, Pet-sitter|233749|Jessi Ramsey, Pet-sitter (The Baby-Sitters Club, #22)|Ann M. Martin|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1387734857s/233749.jpg|3057704]) dogs and shannon the puppy disappear, both while clipped to outdoor chains. news reports come in about many other dogs getting dognapped in similar situations as well. meanwhile, the krushers and the bashers (kristy and bart's softball teams) create an all-star team, the krashers (how clever!) to face off against a softball team from the nearby town of new hope.
highlights:
-two of the nearby towns where dogs have been reported missing are new hope, ct and lawrenceville, ct. I like to think that ellen named these towns for new hope, pa and the semi-nearby lawrenceville, nj (or maybe even mistakenly named for new hope's neighboring town, lambertville, nj).
-dawn and co go to the police station to report the license plate number of a green car they've seen driving around (that dawn thinks is probably the car of the dognapper). the cop DOES NOT CARE. he even says something condescending along the lines of, "let the big boys solve the crime. go home to your homework, little girls." YES. I like this because it is realistic. it is so annoying to think that the bsc are just these flawless model citizens and everyone in the town thinks so. no. in real life people would be like, "who are these nosy irritating teenagers that keep harassing me?"
-the guy who actually did it is one of the richest guys in town. I appreciate that, because I find it really irritating earlier in the book when the cop is like, "no, that license plate belongs to a rich guy, and we have no reason to suspect rich guys of committing crimes..." the one problem is that it's explained that he isn't rich anymore and that's why he's doing this -- selling the dogs to people who want purebred dogs and making money that way. but I wish he was still rich and either evil schemes are how he got rich in the first place, OR he just has some mental health stuff and really likes to kidnap dogs, OR to practice chaotic evil roleplay or something.
lowlights/nitpicks:
-dawn says she doesn't really care for animals and is bewildered by people who kiss or talk to their pets. she says she's a vegetarian because she doesn't like the taste of meat. UGHHHHHH. I think I might hate dawn, guys.
-the mancusi dogs want to pee the second dawn gets to their house. why does dawn wait until after she's fed and cleaned the cages of all the other animals to let the dogs out? I think the guinea pigs can wait 20 minutes to have their cage cleaned. if she had been a good pet caretaker, walking the dogs FIRST, then she wouldn't have had to clip cheryl the great dane outside to pee, and then cheryl wouldn't have gotten taken in the first place.
-dawn (and the mancusis) only feed barney the snake insects and worms -- huh? snakes need to eat mammals to survive, don't they?
-jessi theorizes that the rich guy steals dogs for some psychological reason and dawn thinks that's far-fetched. "what kind of psychological reason could there be to steal dogs?" uh, kleptomania? sociopathy? some sort of manic episode had by an animal liberationist that makes them want to free all tied-up animals?
-mary anne is concerned about the legality of following mr. tate, the rich guy. kristy says, "there's nothing illegal about looking at someone." -- uh, yeah, that's stalking. which is illegal.
-WHY IS EVERYONE IN THIS TOWN BUYING DOGS? WHERE ARE THE ANIMAL SHELTERS?
-the core premise is flawed. dude steals dogs from the town and then sells them back to the people of the town AT A PET STORE. not even black market. seriously? what if someone was like, "aww, my great dane was stolen, so now I want a new one." do you think they wouldn't recognize their stolen dog? this is a pretty small town, so I don't see how this scheme could have worked even as long as it did.
claudia outfit:
-"She was still wearing her school clothes: a blue minidress with white polka dots, white leggings, and earrings that looked like big white polka dots."
jackie disaster:
-picks up more baseball equipment than he can carry and drops it all over the place
snack in claudia's room:
-doritos under a pile of sweaters