Kristy and the Mystery Train

The Baby-Sitters Club Mysteries #30

by Ann M. Martin, Nola Thacker

Derek Masters, child star and friend of the BSC, is about to board a special "mystery train" publicizing his latest movie...and he wants a bunch of his Stoneybrook friends, including three baby-sitters, to join him!

It sounds like a blast, but problems appear before the train even leaves the station. Someone seems determined to ruin the trip - no matter what. Good thing the BSC is on the case, because this is turning into one dangerous ride!

Genres: Mystery, Middle Grade, Childrens, Fiction, Friendship, Young Adult

160 pages, Paperback

First published June 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

[FIND ME ON STORYGRAPH · Rating 2 out of 5]

this is my first time reading this book!

in this mystery by ghostwriter Nola Thacker (not our usual mystery ghostwriter, Ellen Miles, but you wouldn’t know it because this book is exactly as ridiculous as ellen’s usual oeuvre), derek masters from Jessi and the Superbrat is back in stoneybrook after finishing shooting a new movie, a mystery on a train going from boston to charleston. to promote the movie, the stars and some crew will take an actual train from boston to charleston, stopping along the way for press conferences. derek was allowed to bring some friends, so his dad hires kristy, abby, and stacey to come along and babysit. weird things start to happen on the train: everyone gets spooky threatening notes, someone puts a fake hand in someone else’s food, there’s a smoke bomb outside a cabin where kristy and others are trapped, etc. all of this culminates in the babysitters seeing silhouettes of two people arguing in the observation car and then seeing one of the silhouettes get thrown over the side of the train. the babysitters are convinced someone was murdered, but none of the grownups believe them. suspects include the publicist, who may want to stir up more promotion for the movie; the husband of the leading lady, since she left him for the leading man in the movie; the only journalist who was actually given a press pass and is allowed to travel with them; and the scriptwriter/father of todd masters’s best friend, who seems to be acting oddly sometimes. turns out it’s his fault: he was teaching a screenwriting class and stole a script idea from one of his students, who has been blackmailing him for money but who finally decided that money wasn’t good enough and he wanted to come clean and get the glory he felt he deserved. he faked the “murder” in the observation car so that people would think the scriptwriter had killed him to silence him. the subplot is that the other babysitters are helping out at greenbrook club, the country club from Abby and the Secret Society. jessi discovers that stephen stanton-cha can’t swim, so she privately teaches him.

highlights:
-there’s a kind of meta-joke where mal says something to abby about kristy and the vampires and jessi says something about how abby should read the mystery notebook and read how vampires came to our little town. it’s funny because that book is actually called Kristy and the Vampires, and there’s actually a mystery book you can read about it.
-THE DIRECTOR'S NAME IS ROCK HARDING. his name is ROCK HARDING. this is not a drill.
-the publicist's name is ANNE ARBOUR. the names in this book! ahhhhhh I love cheesy names so much!
-benjamin, the snooty rich star of the movie, tips poorly. of course he does.
-they have a contest for the kids for who can decorate their swim cap the most creatively. and ben hobart (who is in 6th grade and is sometimes mallory’s boyfriend) competes alongside the much younger kids.

-the villain ends up getting a screenwriting credit and gets paid, even though what he did wasn’t appropriate. also they say the screenwriter’s career is effectively over, which is fair because he stole a story and didn’t credit his student in the first place. I appreciate fairness, and these books frequently villainize the villains and don’t let them get anything nice, even if they deserve it. like in Claudia and the Mystery at the Museum, where the thief was a custodian who was just trying to get enough money to retire, and the bsc joke about how he’s gonna retire in prison. WOOF. but this book’s ending was a nice touch.

lowlights/nitpicks:
-kristy says while exercising that she alternates between the nordictrack and the treadmill. nordictrack is a company that makes lots of exercise equipment including treadmills. do you mean you alternate between the elliptical and treadmill?
-at the greenbrook club pool party they CLOSE THE POOL DURING SNACK TIME TO PREVENT ANYONE FROM BEING TEMPTED TO SWIM AFTER EATING. first off, that cramping thing has never been proven. second, why don’t you let people make mistakes and learn from them?
-ben hobart keeps hanging out with the young kids and acting like one of them -- teasing stephen, joking about puking and the like, etc. he's 11 and sometimes dates mallory, so what's the deal? when mal and jessi are in 8th grade is he gonna be their alan gray?
-they claim laurence (the screenwriter/villain) "fiddled with the train controls so that it almost jumped the track." I'm pretty sure that you can’t fiddle with train controls to purposely ALMOST jump the track. also where was the conductor when this was happening?

outfits
claudia outfits:
-"Today she was in bright mode: red shorts, a purple crop top over a longer red-and-white-striped muscle shirt, purple socks, and red high-tops laced with red-and-white-striped shoelaces. Her hair was pulled up to one side with a knot of red and purple scrunchies, and her earrings were shiny red apples."
-"Claudia was wearing a huge tie-dyed T-shirt knotted at the waist, and her sandals sported flowers that matched the flower barrette holding back her hair. Her gear was in a funky, bright yellow, plastic mesh tote that was exactly the same shade as the rims of her big, round sunglasses."
stacey outfit:
-"Stacey was wearing an oversized butter-colored linen shirt that matched her hair, which was pulled back into a sleek French braid. Her baggy chino shorts were rolled up to exactly the same length on each leg, above the knee. Her sandals had cork soles, which made her look even taller and more elegant."

jackie disaster:
-gets his feet tangled in his cutoffs, then falls on mallory
-running near the pool, karen brewer tells him to walk instead of run, so he stops suddenly and loses his balance and falls into the pool

snacks in claudia’s room:
-chips (n.s.)

[Ciara · Rating 1 out of 5]

yet another fucing ridiculous babysitters club mystery. kristy & abby are running a krushers practice one afternoon when derek masters shows up unexpectedly. no one even knew he was in town. he announces that he just filmed a major motion picture called "night train to charleston," a murder mystery set on a train. to publicize the film, he & the other stars, the director, & other people associated with the film are taking a three-day train ride from boston to charleston. derek's parents have invited him to bring along some friends. he has invited greg, his best friend from los angeles, & he wants to bring nicky pike, his best friend from stoneybrook.

mr. masters calls the babysitters club that afternoon to explain that he & mrs. masters are surprising derek by inviting along a few of derek's other stoneybrook friends: buddy barrett, linny papadakis (who doesn't even go to school with derek when he lives in stoneybrook, so i don't even know how they know each other), & david michael. derek's little brother will also be accompanied by his best friend, daniel, who is the son of the movie's scriptwriter. with all these kids underfoot, the masters want three members of the babysitters club to tag along & watch them. kristy, stacey, & abby take the job.

first, there are a bunch of geographical inaccuracies about boston. kristy says that they "walked practically all the way across boston". she then elaborates that they walked through the public gardens, across the common, & around beacon hill. all of which takes about ten minutes. it's seriously not even ten square blocks. then she says they saw the hancock tower...which is certainly walkable from the common, but is not in beacon hill. it's in back bay. kristy says that you can see almost all of boston "& most of massachusetts" from the observation deck. please, sister. i don't think you can even see somerville. yes, i am getting nitpicky because i lived in boston for eight years & i don't understand why babysitters club books always have to butcher the geography. or why the characters are always so fascinated by fanueil hall. there's nothing there except, like, a replica of the "cheers" bar & a chowder restaurant, maybe a few kiosks where you can buy plastic lobsters or something. how is this in any way interesting to 13-year-olds?

anyway, then they board the train & the mystery starts heating up. apparently the female lead, elle, recently split up with her husband, charlie, & took up with the male lead, benjamin. charlie is very distraught about this & causes a big scene in front of the press in boston before the train leaves. kristy hears him mutter something like, "you'll be sorry." because vague threats are always the best way to win back your lady love.

everyone on the train gets a program of planned stops & info about the movie, & each program includes a scrap of paper that says something like, "the truth will come out. you can't stop it." derek suggests that the scraps are fake clues planted to stir up a mysterious feeling on board the train & get people pumped about the movie, but kristy notices the publicist looking surprised & distressed by the fake clue, so she's not so sure.

that evening, the babysitters & kids are hanging out in their cabins when suddenly they begin to fill with smoke. kristy tries to open the door to, i don't know, flee to the observation deck or something, but the door is locked. after a while, it opens again & kristy learns that there was no fire. someone set off a smoke bomb. everyone stops panicking. kristy asks the conductor who could have locked the door & he's like, "i don't know. pretty much anyone," because he figures anyone could have stolen the staff master key. very helpful.

the next evening, stacey & kristy walk derek's little brother & his friend out to the observation deck to look at the stars. as soon as they get out there, the train goes into a tunnel & the electricity cuts out. then they overhear an argument on the deck. they stay quiet & listen, but they can't figure out who is arguing or what they're arguing about. just as the train emerges from the tunnel, kristy & stacey see one of the figures push the other figure over the railing. kristy thinks she hears the splash of the body landing in the river below the train trestle.

naturally, they flip out & alert the conductor, who stops the train. porters do a head count, but no one is missing. no one believes that kristy & claudia really saw anyone go overboard. the consensus is that the girls panicked & let their imaginations run away with them. the publicist is especially pissed because now the whole timetable for the train schedule of the interviews with movie magazines is all thrown out of whack. there is also some confusion because the one reporter that has been permitted to ride the entire route, jane atlantic, tells kristy that she received a note saying something like, "if you want a juicy scoop, come to the observation deck at 8pm." kristy also goes back to canvas the area for clues & finds a scrap of the movie script stuck to the railing somehow. she pockets it.

when the train stops in DC, the babysitters share the details of the mystery with the older kids, & together, they sneak into all the cabins to look for copies of the script & see if anyone is missing the page that kristy found on the observation deck. they come up empty-handed, but later that evening, kristy realizes that the names on the script page she has are different from the names in the final script. she asks derek about it & he confirms that the names are all different, but the dialogue is all the same. kristy goes to bed & ponders this new information, & as happens in pretty much all the mystery books, she magically solves the mystery just be reasoning it out.

she rushes into the stage car, where the main leads are performing some scenes from the film for an audience. just as she arrives, the room fills with smoke. the actors & mr. masters open up the vents & find more smoke bombs. after the smoke clears, kristy races over to mr. pierce, the screenwriter. she demands to know what's going on. then everyone sees that someone has written on the windows of the stage car, in huge red letters, something to the effect of, "the truth will come out. you're going to lose the only thing you love." mr. pierce freaks & says that some maniac is going after his son, who is sharing a cabin with derek's little bro, & they are currently in the company of abby. kristy goes tearing off to their cabin to protect them from whatever maniac is around.

when she gets to todd & daniel's cabin, abby is there alone. she says the boys had convinced her to let them play hide & seek. i thought she was reading them a bedtime story? kristy fills her in & they, stacey, mr. masters, & mr. pierce tear around looking for the kids. they find them just as some wild-eyed crazy dude with a half a fake mustache peeling off his lip appears on the scene. crazy dude lunges for daniel. kristy grabs daniel & dives into an empty cabin. she tells daniel to shut himself in the bathroom & lock the door while she kicks the shit out of crazy dude. abby & stacey pile on & mr. pierce hits him upside the head with a briefcase or something. kristy manages to shove crazy dude out of the cabin & lock the door (even though earlier in the book, i think the conductor said that you can only lock the doors, from inside or outside, with a key, which kristy does not have). when she opens the door again, crazy dude has been subdued & tied up with a stray pair of pants (yes, really).

mr. pierce explains: he teaches writing & crazy dude is a former student of his named laurence channing. he wrote a screenplay & showed it to mr. pierce. some years later, mr. pierce basically stole the screenplay idea & write "mystery train to charleston". laurence found out & shook mr. pierce down for some money, but once mr. pierce had paid him, laurence started to blackmail him, saying that the fact that he paid him anything was proof that he'd stolen the screenplay. somehow laurence had snuck on to the train (nice security, guys) & planted the creepy messages. he had arranged a meeting with mr. pierce on the observation deck, where they argued about the blackmail. laurence then jumped overboard. he planned for jane atlantic to see him fall & accuse mr. pierce of pushing (ie, murdering) him. he hoped that mr. pierce would be arrested & tried, at which point laurence would turn up alive & claim amnesia from the fall off the trestle into the river. by this point, everyone will have figured out that mr. pierce stole the screenplay concept & his reputation will be destroyed.

can you fucking believe that? dude jumped off a moving train on a trestle into a river to try to fake his own death. then he snuck back on-board later ("he must have a had a car waiting," mr. masters infers) to try to kidnap daniel. what the fuck? that's the dumbest thing i've ever heard.

anyway, his plan went awry when jane atlantic was late for the meeting, stacey, who supposedly looks exactly like jane atlantic, saw the whole thing instead, & laurence thought his plan had worked. he has been arrested & is undergoing a psychiatric evaluation. screenwriting credit for the film will be split between laurence & mr. pierce, & mr. pierce will continue to teach, but "his screenwriting career is over." because that makes sense. dude plagiarized a student's work. he clearly doesn't have the moral fiber to write hollywood screenplays, but by all means, let him continue to teach.

only six more mysteries to go. hallelujah.

[Raine Villanueva · Rating 2 out of 5]

Child star Derek Masters came to Stoneybrook once again to invite the kids Nicky, Linny, Buddy and David Michael, and baby-sitters Kristy, Abby and Stacey to a train ride to promote the movie "Night Train to Charleston". It was an amazing adventure at first when they came to Boston and took a train ride, when weird situations happened there, including the notes that the girls need to find out. Kristy, Abby and Stacey are going to solve the mystery. On my first read I thought it was boring and didn't like the plot, until....

There's a subplot in some few chapters where the remaining baby-sitters Claudia, Mary Anne, Mallory and Jessi are at Greenbrook Country Club for a pool party with some kids, in which Claudia stated that they are all "party anemals". I didn't like the scenes there, and it's also not related to the mystery either, thus it was happened after Abby and the Secret Society as explained, which I haven't read the book yet.

This is the first time I'm reading a mystery book, so I'll give it a two star rating for it.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I say the BSC Mysteries jumped the shark, this is exactly the kind of story I'm talking about: farfetched, over the top, unbelievable, and just plain silly. And it's always ridiculous that the teenage baby-sitters are the ones who save the day. So yeah, this one is not one of my faves.

Also poor Ben Hobart, demoted from BSC boyfriend to pretty much another one of the kids. Shouldn't have argued with Mal about the card catalogue, bud.

[Lianna Kendig · Rating 2 out of 5]

(LL)
Some of the parts in here were suspenseful, but it was so unrealistic and implausible I was taken out of the story too often.
The premise was that three teenagers were to watch like eight kids over two nights on a train far away from home simply because there is one adult (that the parents have never met or did meet before leaving their children with her) watching over all of them? Yeah, that makes sense.

[Devon · Rating 2 out of 5]

This one was a slog to get through. Although there seemed to be real danger, none of it seemed to be pressing enough to keep me turning the pages. And the personalities of all of the babysitters just seemed dampened for some reason. Maybe because there were so many kids, too, and their personalities and anecdotes didn't get a chance to shine through.

[Christy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Twelve pages of learning about every fact about the Baby Sitter's Club later, and I am officially so freaking over this series.

This one was a bit more dangerous than the other mysteries. I enjoyed the train setting, but the pool party side story was just unnecessary and boring.

[Samantha · Rating 1 out of 5]

I swear that I am developing a twitch from these horrible mysteries. They just get continually worse! How was any of this allowed to happen!?

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

*2.5

[Jenn N · Rating 3 out of 5]

By installment 30 of the Mysteries, Fonzie wasn’t just jumping over a shark, he was soaring. It’s still a fun little read and actually one I didn’t read as a kid.

[aem · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a bit scary!

[Christina]

Read my recap at A Year with the BSC via Stoneybrook Forever: www.livethemovies.com/bsc-blog/myster...

[Jaclyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not bad. Happy I actually guessed the baddie and motive on this one.

[Liesl]

I thought that juxtaposing the intense scenes on the train with the idyllic Stoneybrook summer worked really well.

My very favorite line was, "This is a stupid way to die."

[Leigh · Rating 2 out of 5]

This one had potential but it fell flat. Kristy, Abby and Stacey join Derek Masters and some of the cast and crew of his latest movie on a fancy mystery train going to Charleston. Weird things happen, it tries to be Agatha Christie with funny names like Jane Atlantic and Anne Arbour and the kids possibly witnessing a murder. It's just boring. The b plot is worse. The kid from Abby and the Secret Society can't swim and Jessi teaches him.

[V. Arrow · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mystery on a train! Mystery on a train! Mystery on a train!

Also:

"Karen ceased shrieking abruptly to stare seriously at Mal. “If it’s totally waterproof, how are you going to get it off? It could be stuck on you forever. You could turn all pale, like those things that live in caves and never go out in the sun. Then you’d shrivel up and —”"

Nobody is doing it like Karen Brewer.

[Maria Elmvang · Rating 1 out of 5]

"Murder on the Orient Express" starring three members of the BSC. Boring and unrealistic both - not a good combination.

[Kara · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ridiculous.