Poor Claudia. She
gets the saddest books in this series.
She’s got Mimi having a stroke, her aunt having a miscarriage, racism,
child abuse and this one. The death of
Mimi. I drew the death of Mimi.
It’s really not a snarkable book; I’ll just hit some of the
highlights and the mommy moments. There
aren’t really any AWESOME CLAUDIA OUTFITS in this book. L
Claudia starts by telling us how Mimi isn’t doing too well
any more. She’s forgetful and struggles
with her words even more so than usual.
She’s also taken to wandering around in somewhat of a daze, confused
about where she is and what she’s doing.
Claudia and Janine are spending more time helping, especially with
dinner.
Mallory has a run in with Mimi, where Mimi yells at her, but
then gives her a porcelain bird. That
very evening, Mimi faints out of her chair at dinner and an ambulance is
called. She spends the next few days in
the hospital. Claudia volunteers her
time, but then is resentful. It seems to
me this has happened before, after
Mimi had her stroke. The doctors don’t
know what’s wrong with her and run many tests, but the only thing that seems to
work is a blood transfusion.
Mimi comes home and Claudia is even more resentful and ends
up throwing magazines at her bed because she’s late for her BSC meeting. She’s extremely sorry, of course, and can’t
apologize enough. Mimi’s also starting
to give more things away.
Claudia has her art lesson in the basement (subplot) and
Mimi comes downstairs to investigate.
She ends up fainting again and MA shunts the kids outside while Janine
calls the ambulance. This time Mimi is
in severe pain, arching her back and screaming.
Unfortunately, the nurses didn’t put her gown on well and it ends up
around her waist. Finally the pain
subsides and Claudia readjusts Mimi. But
the doctors still don’t know what’s wrong with her. Since they can’t figure it out, they decide
to send her home since she’s stable. She
talks to Claudia on the phone the night before she’s to come home, but signs
off saying she doesn’t want to “confuse the muses.”
The next morning Claudia wakes up at 4:54am and hears her
parents up and moving around. Mimi has
died. The next few days are a blur for
Claudia. The BSC is there for support
and even Stacey come up from NYC for the funeral. But Claud’s in a daze and her grades start to
slip. She can’t stand to look at her
painting of Mimi and moves it to the attic.
Things finally come to a head when she spots Janine in
Mimi’s room going through her things.
She explodes and ends up saying she hates Mimi. Her parents happen to hear her and they have
a talk. Claudia’s angry that Mimi died,
that the doctors didn’t do more, that she’s sad and lonely. Her parents and Janine talk and Claudia feels
better. They sort through Mimi’s things and
find she has labeled many items to give away.
Claudia herself makes a collage in memory of Mimi and hangs
it up in Mimi’s old room, now the guest room.
She returns Mimi’s portrait to her room.
Subplot
A newer client, Mrs. Addison, calls the club asking Claudia
if she’d give her daughter Corrie art lessons.
Claudia decides to ask a bunch of the neighborhood kids to join as well
and MA volunteers to help.
It turns out that Corrie gets dropped off way early and
picked up way late. Her parents seem to
prefer to shuttle their children from one activity to another while they live
their own life. Corrie and her brother
Sean feel abandoned and Corrie latches on to Claudia.
Claudia finally confronts Mrs. Addison about how the
children feel abandoned and voila! Mr.
and Mrs. Addison magically decide to be caring and attentive parents.
The other students band together after Mimi’s death and make
a large collage for her in memory of Mimi.
Mommy Moments:
- Mr. and Mrs. Kishi, we’ve been through this before. You can’t just expect Claudia to take care of her ailing grandmother without a little teensy bit of resentment. She’s a thirteen-year-old girl.
- I get that the BSC is correct in saying it seems that the Addisons are abandoning their children. BUT if some thirteen year old kid told me I wasn’t spending enough time with my kids, I don’t think I’d magically change my life overnight.
Continuity
- In this book, Emily Michelle is doing wonderful. She’s picking up the language so fast , is speaking clearly and is thriving in her environment. Yet, in the next Claudia book EM suddenly is doing terrible and is no where near where she should be. Huh.
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