Junie B. Jones and the Stupid Smelly Bus (1992) is the first of 28 books in the New York Times best-selling Junie B. Jones series by Barbara Park. It won the New Hampshire Great Stone Face Children’s Book Award in 1995 and the Wisconsin Golden Archer Book Award in 1998. Park was a prolific and popular author who won more than 40 children’s book awards, including many children’s choice and parents’ choice awards. Junie B. Jones and the Stupid Smelly Bus explores both the challenges and the joys of childhood; this includes the way that adults often dismiss children’s feelings and the consequences of that dismissal, as well as the joy that children reap from simple, small things like books and pencil sharpeners. It also reveals how children of Junie B.’s age break rules not because they are oppositional but because they are anxious or confused. Its themes include the Human Desire for Independence and Control, The Unbridled Joy of Children, The Consequences of Dismissing Children’s Feelings, The Anxiety Created by New Rules and Experiences, and Children’s Highly Developed Sense of Fairness. 

This guide refers to the 1992 Random House Children’s Books edition.

Plot Summary

Junie B. Jones is about to start kindergarten. She met Mrs., her teacher, last week. Mrs. called her “Junie,” and Junie B. corrected her; she tells the reader that people always forget her “B.” Mrs. asked if Junie B. would ride the bus, and Junie B. asked where it goes. Mother replied in the affirmative but didn’t answer Junie B.’s question. After asking multiple times, Junie B. lost her temper, upsetting her mother and Mrs. Finally, Mother said that the bus is yellow and will take her to school.

Junie B. worries about the bus for days. The night before school starts, she tells her mother that she doesn’t want to ride it, but Mother simply tells her not to worry. Junie B. must cover her ears when the bus arrives because it is so loud. Her mother tells her to be a “big girl,” promising fun, but when Junie B. tries to sit, another girl won’t let her sit down. Junie B. fears that the bending door could cut her in half. A boy called Jim sits with her, and when she touches his backpack, he yells and moves, prompting her immediate dislike. Junie B. begins to cry. 

When the bus finally gets to school, other children push her, and she falls, dirtying her skirt. Mrs. greets her, forgetting the “B” again. Then, Jim steps on her shoe, and Junie B. yells at him, but Mrs. corrects only her. Another little girl, Lucille, is sitting in the chair that Junie B. wanted. Lucille says that children pour chocolate milk on other children’s heads on the bus ride home, and this makes Junie B. nervous. Later, when Junie B. hears the bus outside, she hides in a supply closet.

Junie B. tells herself a story, drifts off, and then plays for a bit, pretending to be the teacher. She goes to the water fountain and then the library, hiding when a custodian comes in. In the nurse’s office, she pretends to be the nurse. She plays with a pair of crutches but bumps her head while trying to use them because they are too tall. Junie B. finds all the doors in the hallway locked, including the restroom. She needs to use the restroom and feels that she’s having an emergency, so she returns to the nurse’s office and calls 911. While running outside, she hears sirens. A custodian chases her, but she gets scared and begins to cry. She says that she’s having an emergency, and he lets her in.

When Junie B. is finished using the restroom, the hallway is full of first responders. The principal crossly says that she must follow the rules, and Mother is grouchy, too. On the way home, she says that Junie B. scared everyone, but Junie B. says that she didn’t want chocolate milk poured on her head. She starts to cry, and Mother calms down. She says that a girl named Grace will ride the bus for the first time tomorrow, suggesting that Junie B. could sit with her. Junie B. met Grace at school that day, and later that night, Junie B.’s mother calls Grace’s mother. The girls talk, and Junie B. starts to get excited about tomorrow.