Finding readalikes to The Baby-Sitters Club is a tougher task now than in the 1980s and 1990s when there were plenty of paperback pretenders to the BSC throne: Sleepover Friends, Sunset Island, Saddle Club. However, none of them have had the same impact or the longevity, though I will happily grant Saddle Club its own Horse Girl vibe. Moreover, maybe you’re looking for something with Big BSC Energy but set in contemporary times. The Baby-Sitters Club series is singular in some ways. No other current series that centers the realistic lives of tween and teen girls is being published with firehose intensity of the BSC books. So we have to read wide instead of deep. The good news is that there are a lot of books and series that have some of the same appeal as The Baby-Sitters Club.
What is the appeal of the BSC?
Part of Ann M. Martin’s genius was allowing the main characters of The Baby-Sitters Club to share the stage. With multiple true main characters, there were potential favorites for every reader. There were a variety of life experiences to distribute among them. Big issues, like divorce and chronic illness, permeate the books. Littler issues, like annoying siblings, provide realism and levity. And to me, the real gift of the Baby-Sitters Club books is the way they take the lives of these girls seriously. Their conflicts play out in ways that show readers what real friendship can look like. Their business, goofy as it is to a contemporary reader, brings the girls together again and again. They earn money, they problem solve, they have fun. So these are the things I’ve tried to honor in these recommendations. Books that follow a group. Adventures that are realistic (mostly). Perhaps a little entrepreneurial spirit. Lastly, friendship as a theme above all. And if it’s babysitting you want, we’ve got a little of that too.
Books Like The Baby-Sitters Club
The Baby-Sitters Club, at its best, represents what fiction can do for young readers. I hope some books on the list might do the same for today’s readers. These are the books that become companions in life, reflecting our realities back to us or offering glimpses into lives we can dream about. And they remind us to never underestimate the power of a group of girls with a great idea and a little dedication (and maybe a dedicated phone line, too).
