Chapter IX

 

The California Diaries Books

 

 

The California Diaries series is about Dawn and her We © Kids Club friends in California.  These books were designed for a slightly older audience, as the author was attempting to hang on to readers who have out­grown the comparatively upbeat, happy-ending Baby-sitters Club books but who still identify with the charac­ters.  Each book is written in diary form in typeset that looks like handwriting.  This series deals with more ma­ture teenage themes and focuses on the changes Dawn and her friends are going through as they are growing up and interact­ing with older high school kids.

 

 

1.             Dawn

 

                August 1997

                *these books are unpaged*

 

                Dawn is confused because a part of her wants to stay a little girl as her friend Jill seems to want to do, and another part wants to grow up and be like older teenagers, as her friend Sunny has begun to do.  The girls’ 8th grade is suddenly moved into the high school building, resulting in a nightmare of hazing and other pressures.  While at a sleepover at Jill’s, Dawn and Sunny sneak out and attend an unsupervised high school party where alcohol is served and considerable vandalism is done at a teacher’s empty house.  Sunny drinks a great deal of alcohol at the party and passes out.  Because of the party episode, the entire school is in trouble, and Dawn’s friendship with Jill comes to an end.

 

Note:  Books 1 and 2 came out simultaneously in August 1997.   

 

 

2.             Sunny

 

                August 1997

                (Peter Lerangis)

 

                Sunny Winslow’s mother is dying of lung cancer, and Sunny believes her own life could not get any worse, with all the hospital visits and the lack of attention given to her by her father.  She bemoans having been named Sunny, which by now couldn’t describe her personality less accurately.  In desperation, she begins going overboard by being wild and shunning her younger-acting friends.  She begins ditching school to take a bus to go meet an older boy named Carson at the beach, and before anyone finds out, she eventually decides to run away for good with Carson to escape the difficulties at school and at home.  Sunny con­fesses in her diary that in general she is “scared--really scared.”

 

Note:  It was mentioned back on page 56 of book 87 that Dawn had just found out in Stoneybrook that her best California friend Sunny’s mother had contracted lung cancer from having started smoking when she was Sunny’s age.  Dawn’s desire to be with Sunny in her time of need was a major factor in her decision to move back to California, which she did in book 88.

 

 

3.             Maggie

 

                October 1997

                (Peter Lerangis)

 

                Maggie is under a lot of pressure from her parents to have super grades and excel at everything extra-curricular as well.  She is asked to join a local rock band called Vanish as a singer and songwriter and tries to de­cide whether she can fit it in along with everything else in her life.  When a band competi­tion with Vanish coincides with an important screening of a movie produced by her father, she has to lie in order to do both without him knowing.  She wonders if she will ever do something for herself instead of for her par­ents.

 

 

4.             Amalia

 

                December 1997

                (Peter Lerangis)

 

                Amalia enjoys confiding in her diary (her “Nbook”), but as Christmas approaches, she does not have many good things to write about.  She hangs around the high school kids in Vanish, and she is flat­tered when band member James, three years older, wants her to be his girlfriend.  As things with James become more and more complicated when he becomes too possessive, Amalia learns more about the Christmas spirit when she helps out with her older sister at a women’s shelter.

 

 

5.             Ducky

 

                February 1998

                (Peter Lerangis)

 

                Ducky is a 16-year-old junior in high school, but he feels out of place with his peers and prefers the company of Dawn’s younger crowd of eighth graders.  Because of this, he must endure grief from his classmates.  His best friend is Alex, and he has to take care of Alex who gets drunk at a party and needs to be taken home.  Like others in this series, the character of Ducky demonstrates the seemingly hopeless existence of being a teenager and has little fun and thinks life is totally useless and wretched. 

 

 

6.             Sunny:  Diary Two

 

                April 1998

                (Peter Lerangis)

 

                Sunny has been watching her mother become more and more sick in the hospital from lung can­cer brought on by smoking, and she is becoming more withdrawn all the time.  Sunny has been staying at Dawn's house, and her attitude is causing a big rift between her and Dawn.  Things get worse when Sunny goes out to meet a boy leaving something burning on the Schafers' stove, putting Dawn's pregnant step­mother Carol in danger.

 

 

7.             Dawn:  Diary Two

 

                June 1998

                (Jeanne Betancourt)

 

                Dawn is very upset over the change in Sunny, and she feels her lifelong bond is slipping away.  "She's changed," writes Dawn, "from this clever, considerate, always-there-for-you friend into a sneaky, inconsiderate, never-to-be-trusted-again stranger."  Carol gives birth to Dawn's half-sister Elizabeth Grace.  By this time Dawn realizes that her friendship with Sunny is over.

 

 

8.                   Maggie:  Diary Two

 

August 1998

(Jeanne Betancourt)

 

There are plenty of problems in Maggie's life, with her mother's alcoholism and her father's be­ing away all the time, and lately Maggie has become obsessed with dieting, signaling suspicions among her friends of impending anorexia.  She also tries unsuccessfully to get Justin Randall to be her boy­friend.  Meanwhile, she copes by taking a job at the local dog and cat shelter.

 

 

9.                   Amalia:  Diary Two

 

October 1998

(Peter Lerangis)

 

Amalia is very worried about her friend Maggie's eating disorder, and she is also nervous about the upcoming first performance by Vanish at their school's Homecoming Bash.  Even as the group is re­hearsing for their big night, what Maggie would really like is to attract the latest new arrival at SMS, Brendan Jones.

 

 

10.                Ducky:  Diary Two

 

December 1998

(Peter Lerangis)

 

Ducky is not happy about his parents being away traveling all over the world on business all the time, but there's not much he can do about it.  He is also concerned about the obvious depression and drinking problem of his friend Alex.  "One moment Alex is there.  The next, he's gone.  And I can’t figure out how to get him back."  Ducky saves Alex's life in a suicide attempt.

 

 

11.                Dawn:  Diary Three

 

April 1999

 

Dawn is disappointed because her lifelong friendship with Sunny isn't getting any better.  Dawn's dad and stepmom reluctantly let Ducky drive Dawn and her friends to a rock concert; however, unbeknownst to Dawn, Ducky turns out to be an underage alcohol user, and he gets drunk at the concert, and they have to call Dawn's father to come and collect all of them because Ducky is unable to drive them home safely.  Sunny's mother comes home from the hospital for good because nothing more can be done for her lung cancer.

 

 

12.          Sunny:  Diary Three

 

                August 1999

 

                Sunny realizes that her mother will die in a matter of days, and she wants to spend as much time as she can with her, while continuing to write down her thoughts in her journal.  Sunny's mom gives Sunny all the journals she has kept during her life, and Sunny begins to eagerly read them.  As friends and relatives arrive at the house to say good-bye to Sunny's mother, Sunny wonders how she is ever going to cope after her mother is gone and funeral arrangements will have to be made.  Fortunately, Sunny and Dawn have become friends again, and Dawn is there for Sunny when the end finally comes, as are Amalia, Maggie, and Ducky.

 

 

13.          Maggie:  Diary Three

 

                December 1999

                (Jeanne Betancourt)

 

                Maggie's movie producer father is doing a film starring teen heartthrob Tyler Kendall.  All of Maggie's friends are excited, but not Maggie, who has no intention of being interested in a movie star.  She is humiliated when she and Tyler are seen together and a tabloid columnist writes about it.  Maggie's father asks Vanish to play music in the movie.  Tyler seems smitten with Maggie, and she isn’t sure how to handle it.

 

 

14.          Amalia:  Diary Three

 

                March 2000

                (Peter Lerangis)

 

                Amalia has a movie date with Brendan, and she is knocked down and spat upon outside the theater by a gang of drunken girls who make anti-Hispanic racist remarks to Amalia.  She is having difficulty dealing with it afterward, and she and Maggie have a falling-out.  She is also worried because her mother's drinking is getting worse.  Brendan is about to leave for camp all summer.

 

 

15.          Ducky:  Diary Three

 

                September 2000

                (Nola Thacker)

 

                Ducky begins to think Sunny is falling in love with him, but he is frustrated because he knows he doesn’t feel the same way, although he considers Sunny a good friend.  Maggie arrives at Ducky’s in the middle of the night with her little brother to escape her mother’s drunken rage.  Maggie demands that her father come back from traveling and put her mother in an alcohol treatment center..

 

Note:  This was the last book in the California Diaries series.