Claudia and the Terrible Truth

by Ann M. Martin

Book Overview

In one of the strongest Babysitters Club books ever, the club must deal with a client who is abusive toward his children. Ann M. Martin addresses a difficult and important topic in her characteristic... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0590059955
• ISBN13: 9780590059954
• Release Date: January 1998
• Publisher: Apple
• Length: 10 Pages
• Weight: 0.26 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.3" x 7.6"
• Age Range: 8 to 12 years
• Grade Range: Grades 3 to 7

Customer Reviews

Good Book, But Very Sad!

I enjoyed Claudia and the Terrible Truth. She starts sitting for new clients, the Nicholls. Nate and Joey are nice, well behaved boys, but they seem too jumpy and nervous. Claudia doesn't like the way Mr. Nicholls yell at the boys and his wife. He seems to have harsh rules like no talking at the dinnertable and no stuffed animals and bedtime stories. He says stuffed animals are childish and the boys are 8 and 5. Nate admitted to Claudia that their father threw away their stuffed animals given by their mother! He even threw a huge fit over a peanut butter jar left by Claudia on the counter. BIG DEAL! It's nothing to make war about, it's not like Claudia and the boys trashed the kitchen. Claudia notices that he verbally abuses Nate, Joey, and Mrs. Nicholls. The boys got all nervous about grass stains and paint stains at a parade meeting. I mean, they're kids and they deserve to play. Your childhood is short and that's what washing machines are for! The boys even got severly punished because Joey touched his father's briefcase! He didn't break it or mess up the stuff in it. Even though Nate didn't do anything, he was punished along with Joey and they had to scrub down the house while Claudia supervised and were banned from the parade meeting, tv, snack, and friends. Then Claudia heard Mr. Nicholls holler about his paper being in the recycle bin and smacked Joey hard. She decided to tell her mom about it and the boys and mother were removed from the house and went to live with relatives. At least they were safe from that evil jerk. I disagree with the reader from Maryland. Claudia never mentioned about never being smacked by her parents. She mentioned that she and her sister were never raised hell at by their parents like Mr. Nicholls did with his boys. It's okay to be firm with your kids and discipline them when they do something wrong, but abuse is not okay. Mr. Nicholls was very dominating and abusive. He reminded me of a Nazi. He took inventory of every crumb of food in the house and wanted everything obsessively neat and perfect in the house. Only robots could be perfectly neat.Anyways, I give this book a 10.

"Claudia to the Rescue"

Hi! My name is Sadira Jewelsten! I?ve read BSC books since I was eight until I was seventeen. I really enjoyed ?Claudia and the Terrible Truth?. It brought about a very sensitive subject in a way that kids and teens alike would be able to understand it.It all begins when the BSC receives a new client who isn?t all he seems. Claudia finds this out when she is assigned to baby-sit Joey and Nate and discovers a horrible secret about their home life-Nate and Joey are being abused by their father. The boys first lie to Claudia about where they?ve gotten some of the bruises that Claudia is able to see, but later, Claudia-unseen by the father-witnesses it from a hiding place on the stairs. She doesn?t? know what to do at first, but then she does the right thing and tells her mother. Ann m. Martin definitely has a way of bringing her readers into the story. I felt like I was right there with Claudia, feeling exactly as nervous and confused as she stood on the stairs and heard the loud slap of the boys being hit. That?s how powerful it was. For anyone who is looking for a book that brings up a the subject of abusie in a way that really opens your eyes to it, I highly recommend ?Claudia and the Terrible Truth?.

Excellent and very moving

I really liked CLAUIDA AND THE TERRIBLE TRUTH. I felt really sorry for Nate and Joey because they get abused by their father. It is a very good book so defenetely read it! I gave it 5 stars because it dealt with a very big issue in the world and not many books do that.Keep up the good work Ann and you will have even more readers in the UK!!!

5 stars all the way!

This book is very touching. It is about 2 kids named Nate and Joey, who's father abuses them. When Claudia is baby-sitting, she notices their father get all upset when Nate TOUCHES his brief case. Touches it. NOT brakes it. I mean BIG DEAL! Then, when she goes upstairs to get her coat she hears a slap, and when she sees Joey, his cheek looks red. I really like this book!

wow.

I loved this book. It is such a powerful and moving story. Claudia, like any other baby-sitter would be, is scared when she starts getting the impression that Mr. Nichols abuses his kids. Another reader said that it's the wrong kind of abuse, but I don't think that's true. My parents never gave me a black eye when they thought I did something wrong, as Mr. Nichols does. Claudia deals with the problem maturely and composedly. This book will give you some idea as to how to act in a scary baby-sitting situation. Read it.