Karen's Unicorn

Baby-Sitters Little Sister #89

by Ann M. Martin

Karen is the only person who believes the circus unicorn can grant wishes, because she has some wishes she wants to come true.

Genres: Childrens, Middle Grade, Young Adult, Collections, Unicorns, Juvenile, Fiction

104 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

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

[Brooke]

A real Unicorn

[Victoria]

This was downright adorable. Everyone who knows someone named Karen and Bob should read it. :)

[Heidi]

Content: Clean

Here is another book that's been sitting around for 20+ years that I finally gave a go. I was certainly not expecting to enjoy it so much. It was definitely written for a younger audience but.... I kinda loved it. But maybe that's because I too believe in unicorns.

[Michaela O'dowd]

Only bought it at the book fair for the little rubber unicorn that came with it.

[Vicki Nemeth]

Weird to read with no contractions. I don't recall other books missing them when I was reading at this level.

The actual content of the book is really well done, though. I'm impressed with how many interactions and events Martin came up with to make the story well rounded and realistic. Now I know why my own writing moved toward poetry and content instead of fiction.

One thing worth noting about this book for girls is that it models girls and women respecting and uplifting each other, not treating submission to a queen bee as growth and maturity. Instead, Karen grows by solving problems, helping other people grow, and wrestling with her intellectual pursuits.

As a '90s book, it also models how supporting people's own growth and avoiding thought control is *less* of a post-truth phenomenon than imposing a more widely accepted belief. There is even some logic broken down for an audience Karen's age. Considering how obscure science philosophy is even to adults, it was valuable to read a beginner-level breakdown of one concept.

Wow, I think I may have just convinced myself to recommend this book despite the lack of contractions. If you're an adult, you can look past them for its short length anyways. Whoever the early readers who need this are, I'm glad there are good books out there for them.

[Em's Adventures]

So cute! I felt sorry for Karen having parents that won't just let her believe in Unicorns at the age of seven, it's much more fun when you are little and your parents tell stories and let you believe in the tooth fairy, Easter bunny and Santa for example. There's nothing wrong with that. It's magical to believe and then when you grow up and realize it's not real it doesn't take away from the magic you had as a child.

[Jaclyn]

This was charming. I'm glad Karen gets to hold on to her belief in unicorns, and I'm glad things worked out for Andrew and his bike riding, and for Seth and Karen's mom and their search for a new location for Seth's woodworking shop.

[Alex]

This one was really fun.

[CJ]

I absolutely loved this book. Because I'm eleven, it was a little strange to me that a seven-year-old is the big girl, the older sister. Andrew was a really well-written character, and I love how you know the first names of "Mommy" and Seth. It's really funny how the unicorn has a "special" name, but they just call him Bob. I got this book from my neighbors, and now I am going to donate it so others can enjoy it too.

[Angelique]

This series of books are just flat out boring. I usually love kids books but these were such a chore to read. It's like the author is getting paid by the word so she throws as many as she can get away with into the story just to get a fat paycheck.

[Hallie Chandler]

This series of books are just flat out boring. I usually love kids books but these were such a chore to read. It's like the author is getting paid by the word so she throws as many as she can get away with into the story just to get a fat paycheck.

[Kimberly]

I rated this based on my impressionso of the book when I read it at the age of 10. I probably wouldn't enjoy it as much now, ten years later. At the time though, I loved this book.

[Sarah Lu]

I just wish that Karen was not so incredibly gullible.

[Mellanie C]

I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/14688219