Danielle is feeling better and her cancer is in remission– so her parents let her do anything she wants. Esme looks into parent behavior following a pediatric cancer remission, Emily is mad at the extra fake wedding and has some questions about everyone in this, especially Stacey, and Anne takes a dive into roller-blading… in a dystopian hellscape! Did YOU steal a car at age 9? Tell us about it in the comments!

Watson has a heart attack and Nannie is SO PETTY it’s almost INSPIRATIONAL! Join us as we discuss the psychological effects of heart attacks, the salaries of CEOs in the 1990s v. today (trigger warning, it’s very depressing), but then dance the blues away with JAZZERCISE! Also, y’all have heard of the Brementown musicians, right? RIGHT!?!?!

Stacey is house-sitting for the Johanssen’s while they’re in PARIS and things get spooky-ooky. Emily muses on Shannon’s thoughts on the two party system, Esme just has a bunch of nuggets (though she likes Stacey and Robert’s playful aggression/affection “punch-punch-hug”) and Anne regales us with the origin of Mad Libs! Oh, Stacey dog-sits for Carrot. Spoooooooky!

Compulsory Heterosexuality! Sing it with us! We stay home to attend the Barrett-DeWitt wedding and head back to Palo City to watch Jack and Carol tie the knot ON THE BEACH!!?!? What?! Connecticut is SHOOK. Why did Carol have so many lava lamps? And why is Jessi a mall Santa? It’s not because she’s Black that we are concerned y’all… she’s an eleven-year old-girl. Maggie’s white girl dreadlocks, however? We have some words. Come along and splash in the December surf!

Jeanne Betancourt joins the ghostwriting team and she is… old? We learn about Stacey’s pre-diabetes life and how snapshot signal events shaped her. Was her vacation buddy a hick? How is this book like "Inside Out 2"? And what kinda MTV timeline are we really talking here? Tune in and find out!

Mallory gets to meet her favorite author, work for her, get help with a school assignment, and also act like a total B! Why is she like this? Emily talks about the role of authorial intent in philosophy, Esme examines if Mallory’s behavior is normative adolescent egocentrism, and Anne tells us how she could easily make a Lemon Twist, a seventies progenitor of the Skip-It. How many times can YOU Skip-it?

There’s an armed robber in Palo City and Dawn is on the case! Emily talks about the messages about crime and criminals and we try to decide why we learned so much about Connecticut real estate in this California story. Also, why are emotions discussed like that? And are you team St. Ive’s apricot scrub, or are you Emily? Tune in to find out!

Mary Anne asks Logan to play with Jake– but doesn’t tell anyone. And then still doesn’t. Watch her and Logan act like teens while we discuss some of the messages about gender and fatness and then do a whole lot about haunted houses! Oooooooh it’s so spooky for August!

We finally get a whole book from Shannon’s perspective! And it is… incredibly melancholy and lonely? We watch Mrs. Kilbourne wrestle with the “problem that has no name” while Shannon hates her for it. It’s… a bummer. But the BSC’s Mother’s Day softball game sounds hecka fun! Tune in to hear whether Shannon is a brat or just sad and whether or not we would have dipped on the trip to Paris!

It’s been four years of Stuck in Stoneybrook! Enjoy this bonus episode of us answering listener questions and pondering our future. (Ponder, ponder, ponder.) We sound kind of sleepy in this one, but we are enthusiastic on the INSIDE! Thank you for four years of fun!!!

Claud’s Aunt Peaches is moving back to Stoneybrook! And she’s pregnant! But this is a book about Claudia’s family, so of course it’s full of tragedy! Em highlights the message being sent when a competent working woman is thrilled to give it up to be a mom and then doesn’t get to be a mom. Esme examined the data on nesting behavior and explains why new kid Natalie is so peer rejected, while Anne talks about “The Miracle of Life” (the documentary, not, you know, life). Peaches be CRAZY (not...

The baby-sitters are back on the case in this most Nancy-Drewish yet of mysteries! We spend some time discussing how our relationship to photography has changed, and discuss the impact of A Day in the Life of America. Emily’s finally happy with someone going to jail, and Anne… well, you’ll have to listen. We don’t think you would guess what Anne covers from reading the book! ADHD hyperfocus solves the crime! 

We’re back in Palo City! Dawn gets hired to hang out with 12-year-old Whitney, who has Down Syndrome. We discuss myths and facts and Down Syndrome, Emily highlights disability justice and disability theory, and of course we have to revisit the groundbreaking family show, “Life Goes On.” Also Dawn is a Summer and so on trend, and the adults are horny. Come along!

The BSC doesn’t just work on summer vacation, they also give themselves extra homework! In this not so special super special, all the girls (and Logan!) share their most vivid memory. Emily leads us through a book club discussion where we discuss the hits (CLAUDIA!!!) and the misses (why do like half of their most vivid memories involve Mary Anne?). Come read a bunch of non-mandatory 8th grade essays with us!

We travel to Davis Park on Fire Island (actual, real places!) to hang with Stacey and Mr. McGill for two weeks! But also with… Robert? Wait, what? Didn’t Stace already learn this lesson? We discuss lying to ourselves and hy 13 year olds might be more prone to doing it, heterosexist divorce tropes, Johnny Depp in 1994, and how VERY deeply we wanted Mr. McGill’s friend Stu Majors to be his secret boyfriend. Catch the ferry at Patchogue and meet us there!

We travel to Davis Park on Fire Island (actual, real places!) to hang with Stacey and Mr. McGill for two weeks! But also with… Robert? Wait, what? Didn’t Stace already learn this lesson? We discuss lying to ourselves and hy 13 year olds might be more prone to doing it, heterosexist divorce tropes, Johnny Depp in 1994, and how VERY deeply we wanted Mr. McGill’s friend Stu Majors to be his secret boyfriend. Catch the ferry at Patchogue and meet us there!

An A-grade-nerd teaches the next Short Takes segment and Jessi has to wrestle with finding the line between being funny and being mean. Does she do it? Anne covers plenty of pop culture nuggets, we revisit the literature on teasing and affiliation, and have some debate about cool nerds v. nerdy cool people. Which one are you?

We are so excited to welcome author, podcaster, journalist and the Kristiest of Kristy to the podcast, Jo Piazza! We discuss her new mystery, "The Sicilian Inheritance" (coming April 2nd!) and how it stacks up to this Mystery at the Mall! We also lament the death of malls and third spaces, as dazzled by Jo’s sheer number of ideas, and have a brief discussion about CPS and weird nineties movies. Come along! And read :The Sicilian Inheritance"! 

Kristy makes the SMS softball team (why has it taken 74 books for this to happen?!?) and has to make some tough decisions about hazing! We take a deep dive on the practice, looking at the history of it (with some pretty disturbing info from antiquity from Emily) and the data (this does happen in suburban middle schools!) with Esme. Anne takes us to a weird place with a possibly fictional Disney live action movie. Batter up!

Oh man, we did not like this book! It has taken over as the worst one we have read so far! Huzzah! At least it prompts us to have a good conversation about what makes a good BSC book! We also discuss the fakeout OCD plot, how ridiculous a four year old Jenny is, the origins of the word “Prissy” and whether the Pikes have anything to do with the Weasleys. We try to make the book better than it was! Come along!

Let’s talk banned books! Oh wait, this book was written in 1994 and IT’S WORSE NOW, NOT BETTER. Thanks for trying, AMM and Ellen Miles! Em gives us some good history on banned books, while we discuss what drives kids toward “fire involvement,” we meet another misunderstood old lady, and meet another wealthy old Stoneybrook family, the Ellways. Do brown M&Ms taste best? Listen to find out! 

We head back to California to watch Dawn commit lots of crimes! Esme dives into Kristy’s envy and we feel bad for Carol as Emily reminds us of the trope of the evil stepmom, while Anne reminisces about local TV coverage and we all discuss invisible labor. Come get some sun and some much-needed organization!

Many apologies: we are all outta gas! We will see you in January! 

Claudia has a catch-a-boyfriend scheme and we are HERE FOR IT. Esme discusses the realism in some of these dates Claud… attends, and both Anne and Esme pine for the nineties. Emily has some good feminist nuggets (why do so many people discuss PHYSIQUE) and boy, do we miss personal ads. Pull out your copy of the SMS Express and join us!