Karen's Big Top

Baby-Sitters Little Sister #51

by Ann M. Martin

Karen's dreams come true when she gets to attend circus camp and to practice everything from costume making to animal training and even tightrope walking! She becomes friends with the daughter of the circus owner and learns how hard traveling around the country really is.

Genres: Childrens, Middle Grade, Chapter Books, Fiction, Juvenile

112 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

Ann Matthews Martin was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane. After graduating from Smith College, Ann became a teacher and then an editor of children's books. She's now a full-time writer.

Ann gets the ideas for her books from many different places. Some are based on personal experiences, while others are based on childhood memories and feelings. Many are written about contemporary problems or events. All of Ann's characters, even the members of the Baby-sitters Club, are made up. But many of her characters are based on real people. Sometimes Ann names her characters after people she knows, and other times she simply chooses names that she likes.

Ann has always enjoyed writing. Even before she was old enough to write, she would dictate stories to her mother to write down for her. Some of her favorite authors at that time were Lewis Carroll, P. L. Travers, Hugh Lofting, Astrid Lindgren, and Roald Dahl. They inspired her to become a writer herself.

Since ending the BSC series in 2000, Ann’s writing has concentrated on single novels, many of which are set in the 1960s.

After living in New York City for many years, Ann moved to the Hudson Valley in upstate New York where she now lives with her dog, Sadie, and her cats, Gussie, Willy and Woody. Her hobbies are reading, sewing, and needlework. Her favorite thing to do is to make clothes for children.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/annmma...

Reviews

[V. Arrow · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was my favorite of the Karen books as a kid, but on my reread, I'm not sure why. Maybe I just related to wanting to be the star of a show in a sparkly tutu.

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was fun to learn about various aspects of the circus. Campers were divided into small groups to learn about the circus activities. Karen was glad that Ricky, her pretend husband, was assigned to the same group as her because "[i]t is good for married people to do interesting things together." It annoyed me that Karen refused to pick one thing to be (i.e., juggler, acrobat, clown, etc.) during the circus at the end of camp and was rewarded with a special job. I am surprised the book was not called 'Karen's Circus' because Karen is running the show.

[Jaclyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun peek into circus camp. LOL at the showcase. What else could Karen be BUT ring master?

Only downside of this is that I read the BSC book where the club puts on their own (low-budget) circus camp, and Karen and her fellow circus camp alum get all snobby coz it's not "real" circus camp. That makes me wish the circus camp had made them spend more time cleaning elephant poop or something.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another instance where I wish the one-off characters would make more appearances, I liked Jillian! And I really liked the side plot with Nannie's surprise party, it was a sweet interaction between Karen and Nannie.

[Em's Adventures · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was fun and surprising. I liked how Karen handled the situation she was in, very mature.

[Katy Lovejoy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another great Karen moment