The Spring of Their Discontent! Best Babysitters Ever: Miss Impossible by Caroline Cala

"Ahh-lo! How can I help you?" said the girl at the door.

"We're here for the babysitting," said Bree.

"Je suis la baby-sitter," said the girl, emphatically. There was something about this girl. She had a certain... je ne sais quoi.

"Don't worry, Genevieve," said Mrs. Gregory, rushing to the door. "I'll take care of this," she said with a pained smile. "I'm so sorry, girls. I must have blanked on calling you to cancel." she said. "That's our new au pair, Genevieve. She's going to be watching the kids from now on, helping them learn valuable language skills." The sound of children singing a French song drifted softly from the living room, like little cherubs forming a chorus in the clouds.

Bree, Malia, and Dot thought they had totally wrested the babysitting turf from Malia's evil teen sister's rival corporation, Seaside Sitters, and had the market in Playa del Mar completely cornered. Now they find their old customers favoring the three tres chic French sisters. The only sitting job left is with the three demonic Morris boys, more hostile than Tasmanian devils and known occasional biters.

It seems the Morris boys are the only game in town for the three baby sitters, but the three five-year-olds (yes, that is biologically possible) trick them into believing there are three abandoned and adorable black kittens under their deck, and the Best Baby Sitters get literally skunked!

After tomato juice baths and other noxious chemical cleansers, the stench abates, and the Best Baby Sitters get an another odd gig, sitting with their obnoxious, arch-enemy classmate Zelda, who lures them into a session dressing in her mother's lavish wardrobe and arranging for her mother to appear suddenly, resulting in an enraged dismissal by Zelda's clotheshorse mother.

Out of clients and still bit smelly, the three meet at the park to brainstorm re-branding their business, when they notice dozens of tiny salamanders skittering across the busy road. Immediately, they feel that it is their destiny to rescue the migrating salamanders from decimation by motorists. They form a new club and a new cause: SAVE THE SALAMANDERS!

It seems a Mission Impossible, but in the effervescent way of the Best Babysitters Ever, they use their creativity to scale up their organization to city-wide SAVE THE SALAMANDERS fund raisers. But Sacre Bleu! Zelda strikes again, faking a salamander footprint in her pain au chocolat at the French sisters' family shop, Jolie Patisserie, and appearing on the nightly news, shedding a well-placed tear to plead the cause of the remaining unsquashed salamanders in Playa de Mar.

"Since when did Zelda love salamanders?" Bree exclaims.

And in what world does Zelda shed tears? Still, it's free TV advertising in prime time and the three friends go with the flow and stage the biggest fundraiser ever for salamanders survival, in Caroline Cala's third book, Best Babysitters Ever book, Miss Impossible (Best Babysitters Ever) (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2020).

Cala's latest brings back all the humorous complications of the first books, Bree's bad-tempered hairless cat, Malia's clandestine crush on Connor Kelly and her rivalrous teenaged sister, Chelsea, and the Terrible Trio of Morris kids, (see reviews here,) and is just as outrageously hilarious as ever in this story of successful seventh-grade conservationists and philanthropists, nee capitalists. This is a light-hearted middle school comedic novel which even Ann M. Martin, author of the Babysitters Club series, must be looking forward to reading!

Scaling Up! Best Babysitters Ever: The Good, The Bad, and the Bossy by Caroline Cala

There's such a thing as too much of a good thing.  Best Babysitters, Inc., is a success: their treasury is well on its way to affording their primary goal for a birthday extravaganza- three tickets for the VERONICA CONCERT. Malia loves sitting for the Hoovers, strategically located for her primary pasttime, with super-cute Connor Kelly sightings right next door. Unknown to her nature-crazy mother, Dot has funded a secret hoard of contraband cosmetics and junk food, and Bree at last has her very own (albeit extremely cantankerous) cat which she names Veronica.

But success has its downside: the three in-demand babysitters find themselves in a time crunch: Malia's evil older stepsister signs her up for a "junior internship" for a Cruella de Ville-type boss; the science fair is growing nigh and Dot has not had time to think up a winning project yet; and Bree's cat has destroyed everything in her glitter-filled room, pooped inside the grand piano, scratched her fiercely, and she hasn't a clue how to bond with her demonic feline.

So the next board meeting of Best Babysitters is a glum session. The business is expanding exponentially, but the sitters' time is not. Their customers are happy but the girls are stressed and exhausted. It's a textbook case of business burnout.

"I have an idea," said Malia, pausing for maximum effect. "We hire satellite babysitters."

"You mean like employees?" asked Dot.

"But... we actually like babysitting," said Bree. "If we give our jobs away, won't that be sad?"

"That's why this plan seems like the best of both worlds," said Malia, campaigning hard for her proposal. "We can take the jobs we want, earn money... AND have time for everything else we have going on!"

What could possibly go wrong?

In the second book in Caroline Cala's comic middle-school series, The Good, the Bad, and the Bossy (Best Babysitters Ever) (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019), the babysitting tyros discover that scaling up a business model requires some, er, modifications in operations, and perhaps even a strategic RIF (reduction in force). Their new recruits--Pigeon de Palma, Brodford Smitherington III, a.k.a. Brody, and Sage Andrews--turn out to be gifted, virtual doppelgangers of themselves, and perhaps too good at babysitting, endearing themselves to their clients too much and, in Bree's case, Brody practically moves in with her own family  Malia proposes a new management scheme.

"It was time to say goodbye to the satellite sitters. It was time to take back their babysitting business and their lives."

Perhaps it's just time to return to their boutique business model, in author Cala's delightful follow-up to her first book, Best Babysitters Ever. (review here). In a believable and upbeat look at middle-school angst, this new title offers a deepening of the characterization of the main characters and some intriguing new characters in a light and lively, truly funny look at making it through seventh grade with friends and self esteem intact. And who doesn't want that?

Be sure to watch for the third book in this series, Miss Impossible (Best Babysitters Ever), forthcoming February 4, 2020.

Ready, Set, Babysit! Best Babysitters Ever by Caroline Cala

The epiphany came during the worst week ever.

It was only October and so far, seventh grade was turning out to be all kinds of meh.

Malia's malaise was distracted by a box outside the public library with a sign that said FREE STUFF.

Malia noticed a little yellow corner peeking out of the jumble. She pulled it loose to reveal an ancient paperback. Its cover was wrinkled and worn. The Babysitters' Club was spelled out in red-lettered alphabet blocks, followed by the title Kristy's Great Idea.

Four Friends and baby-sitting--what could be more fun? read the tagline.

Malia mentally yawned, wondering if middle-schoolers back in the '90s really thought minding gross little preschoolers was fun. She and her best friends, Bree and Dot, had their minds on their upcoming joint birthday party, which just had to be something special to compete with their peers turning-teen birthday shindigs--with posh bat mitzvahs and real elephant rides. But as she speed-read the first chapter, Malia had an idea. Could she and her friends make use of Kristy's idea and make enough cash to throw a memorable bash--one exciting enough to impress her snooty big sister Chelsea and the most perfect boy in seventh grade, Connor Kelly? Oh, and maybe then Malia can get everyone to remember to call her Alia (the M is silent).

Her two friends jump on her idea for their own reasons. Dot's hippy-ish nature-advocate mother bans anything with sugar, glutin or "chemicals," and Dot needs junk food and real deodorant that works instead of dried twig snacks and mineral rocks to apply to her underarms. Bree's needs are more simple; she wants clothes like her older stepsister Ariana and a cat of her own, and she absolutely must meet Taylor Swift. A quick survey of their little beach town reveals a desperate market for occasional babysitters. All three friends agree--it's time they join the gig economy and fund their own wishes.

What could possibly go wrong?

Well, everything. The first sitting jobs go well, with all three girls reporting for duty. Their e-mail blasts keep them busy for the first week. And when they learn that trendy blue-haired singer VERONICA herself is doing a concert in their little beach town of Playa del Mar, the three think big, planning their joint birthday party at Marvelous Ray's arcade, after which they and guests would all go to the concert. Perfect!

But then Malia posts a lame website for their services, with their initials in a giant font across the top, using her favored name Alia:

B ree  A lia D ot

Babysitters!

Dot blinked three times. "This is may be the worst business acronym ever."

And then Malia/Alia's older sister Chelsea takes over their idea, calling her babysitting agency the Seaside Sitters, and stealing their best clients by under-bidding their prices. Bree and Malia and Dot try to undercut Chelsea's clique's pricing and foolishly book themselves to oversee thirty-three kids at a swanky do at an immaculate and lavishly furnished mansion on a bluff scarily overlooking the Pacific Ocean. What can happen? Anything that can go wrong goes wrong!

Is their money-making Babysitters Club II a bust? Will the three Best Friends Forever suffer a big breakup?

Never! In the best tradition of best friends books, they make up instead of break up, and a triple birthday bash comes off after all, in Caroline Cala's hilarious take-off on Ann M. Martin's smash Babysitters Club series, Best Babysitters Ever (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019) With the same lighthearted look at middle-school angst and diverse characters that made Martin's venerable series memorable, Cala's treatment of early adolescence, spot-on with all the sudden self-consciousness and the usual sibling friction, parental foibles, first crushes, and classmate rivalries, is refreshingly upbeat and humorously hopeful, a novel which will even make middle readers laugh a little at themselves. Says the Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, "Even readers who have never had the pleasure of hanging out with the BC girls of yore will find Malia, Bree, and Dot all likable in their distinct ways, and they’ll appreciate the book’s mix of snark and heart."

D-O-N-'T GOOOOO! Penguin Misses Mom by Michael Dahl

"I MISS MY MOM," SAYS PENGUIN.

Mom has announced that she is going out.

Penguin instantly feels bereft!

Mom picks up her bag and announces that someone has come to stay and play with Penguin until she comes back. She waves cheerily from the door.

" BE GOOD! HAVE FUN!"

Penguin is not exactly feeling the fun. He hugs his comfort cushion and sheds a few tears, but when Mrs. Duck puts her wing around him and reads him a story book, he listens quietly and sadly.

Still morose, he colors with her, but when she shows him how to build a tower of blocks, he begins to get into the spirit of the fun.

And when Mrs. Duck puts out quite a spread for their snack, Penguin perks up. Yummy!

And then Mom comes through that door with a big smile and open arms.

"DID YOU MISS ME?"

But Penguin is too busy snacking on his goldfish crackers to stop right away for the big hug.

It's a good guess that Mrs. Duck will be making a return engagement as the sitter with the mostest, in Michael Dahl's forthcoming Penguin Misses Mom (Hello Genius) (Picture Window/Capstone Books, 2016). Oriol Vidal's artwork pictures an adorable little penguin coping pretty well with his mom's day out. With bright page backgrounds and simple illustrations in contrasting flat color that pop off the page, these Little Genius board books are charming introductions to the experiences with which young kids must cope. Pair this one with Anna Dewdney's popular hit, Llama Llama Misses Mama.

Other books in the Hello Genius series are Dahl's Little Tiger Picks Up (Hello Genius), Little Lion Shares (Hello Genius), and Little Monkey Calms Down (Hello Genius).