One Day At Horrorland

Plot Summary: Lizzy and her family get lost on the way to a theme park and instead stumble upon HorrorLand, a slightly different theme park. This one is run by a bunch of monsters called Horrors, and all the rides have the potential to end in death! Maybe. It's not really made clear because after the twist of discovering all the danger is real, there's another twist that it's actually all for a monster TV show. So maybe none of the rides were dangerous after all. Either way, the family have to go through a monster maze before finally being allowed to leave. The twist is they get followed and offered tickets to come back, a fact I'm sure won't be mentioned at all in the sequel.

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YES, THIS IS WHAT I WAS WAITING FOR. BEST GOOSEBUMPS BOOK EVER!

Ahem.

Okay, so I can't say it's the best yet but my god, how I loved this book as a child. I am clearly very biased here but I have to say, I think it holds up as one of the best. It has a reasonably original plot (okay, not super original but still) and I loved reading how each of the rides turned gruesome. The protagonist isn't a complete moron and the terror actually involves the entire family which is rare. Also the climax is sooooo cool. Monster. Maze. It's total bullshit that they all survive but still. The only downside is that I guess the TV angle is a little weird, and the characters aren't the best. Still, my love of this book remains in tact. What other Goosebump book might feature an actual human head casually being carried like a yo-yo? What other book starts with the family car literally exploding? NONE OF THEM, THAT'S WHAT.

Worst Bond Line: The HorrorLand Horrors conveniently get defeated by being pinched and Lizzy has this to say: 'See? I always come through in a pinch!'

Most hilarious 'scary' moment: Lizzy panics at the thought of being crushed into 'a human square'.

Best of friends: Luke and Clay, who Luke spends most of the book pinching, punching or otherwise mocking horribly.

Surprisingly dramatic moment: The family car EXPLODES. Right at the end of chapter one. No lame bee-throwing cliffhangers here.

Rating:

The Scarecrow Walks at Midnight

Plot Summary: Jodie and her brother Mark go stay at grandparents' farm every summer. This year however, their grandparents are acting really weird. A guy called Stanley has put up a bunch of extra scarecrows in their fields and keeps talking about a mysterious book which brings them to life. Jodie then hallucinates that the scarecrows are alive for most of the book until they actually do come to life very briefly. Then they're set on fire and burn. After not actually being established as a threat. But hey, a stuffed bear comes to life in the end!

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To think, I was actually kind of excited to read this book. I think it was maybe one that scared me when I was a kid and it certainly has a decent premise in my eyes. Unfortunately, it doesn't move past the basic concept of LIVING SCARECROWS! In fact, every cliffhanger in this book is basically identical. The main character sees a LIVING SCARECRO-h wait, no she didn't. Her grandparents are really LIVING SCARECRO-h wait, nope, they're holding a broom. It gets really old, really fast. Even when the scarecrows do eventually become living, it's not really scary because we're not given any idea of what the scarecrows will actually do. Why are they threatening? Are they trying to kill the protagonists? Why? And how when they're just normal scarecrows? It's a creepy premise like I said but it's just wasted here. Doctor Who did it better sorry.

Stine shows how politically correct he is: Stanley is kind of questionable as a bad guy because, erm...well, it's heavily implied he has special needs. Yeeeeah. Nice work there Stine. Way to make this far harder to enjoy now.

Weirdest running theme: The first few pages mention dictionaries twice in different contexts.

Worst Bond Line: There's a joke about corn which is not worth repeating.

Terrible family alert: Letting your grandkids come stay with you when you're trying to placate a man threatening you with scarecrows is pretty irresponsible behaviour really.

You Can't Scare Me!

Plot Summary: Eddie, Molly, Hat and Charlene all have a massive issue with a girl in their class, Courtney. You see, Courtney doesn't scare easy. That's pretty much it. Okay, she's a bit of a bitch but otherwise, that's their sole motivation for deciding to try and terrify her for the entire book. After numerous failed attempts, they eventually turn to the local legend of the mud monsters to try and scare her once and for all. Eddie enlists his brother and his friends to pretend to be mud monsters but during the prank, real mud monsters show up and scare all four protagonists so much that they basically become scarred forever. Yay?

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I'm torn as to how I feel about this book. On the one hand, it's very predictable and repetitive. On the other hand, BEE THROWING. SLIGHTLY SELF-AWARE HUMOUR. This book manages to save itself from awfulness by sheer entertainment value alone. It also has a reasonably good message to it as well. The four main protagonists basically try and terrify some poor girl because she's slightly up herself and in return, they get horrible mental trauma. The moral of the story is don't devote your life to petty revenge and pranks. Also please wash your hair (I'm talking to you Hat).

Getting crap past the radar: 'I had a little trouble putting a worm on my hook.'

Weirdest running theme: Kids yet again fail to know what moss is, following the trend of The Werewolf of Fever Swamp. Does...does moss not grow in America?

Somebody get this kid a therapist: Molly recalls being scared by a rubber snake so badly that she screamed for an hour. And no one could get her to stop.

Idiot of the year award: Eddie and Hat forget to bring a tarantula-collecting receptacle and only realise right before they pick up said tarantula.

BONUS Terrible family alert: Courtney's scientist uncle tells her the Loch Ness Monster is real.

Rating:

.5

Monster Blood II

Plot Summary: Hey, so you know Evan from the first book? Turns out he's a complete moron and is being ridiculed at school because he told everyone about Monster Blood and, surprise surprise, they didn't believe him. Andy shows up conveniently with some Monster Blood because she's a complete idiot too and then she feeds it to the science teacher's hamster because the teacher has been mean to Evan. The hamster grows huge, almost kills everyone until Evan eats Monster Blood to try and grow bigger than the hamster so he can 'pick it up'. Thankfully the Monster Blood expires, shrinking Evan and the hamster back to normal size. But don't worry, Andy's parents sent her a bunch more for all the sequels!

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Dear god, this book was painful. It's bad. Really bad. It's easily the worst I've read so far. By page 22 I had highlighted more dumb moments than in the entirety of all the other books. It starts with Evan having a super detailed dream that turns out to be a DAYdream he's just having in class. By page 16 there are two 'hamster out the window' fakeouts. TWO. And it just doesn't get any better. The plot runs entirely on everyone behaving in the stupidest way possible, from Andy refusing to stop dicking around with Monster Blood to the bully and his mum announcing to an empty house that they're back just so the protagonists can hear them and get out in time. There's so much stupid that I can't cram it all in here. The conclusion is cheap, lazy and also makes no goddamn sense which fits the rest of the book perfectly I guess. Surely it can only get better from here?

Serial killer in the making: Evan has a near-psychotic hatred of Cuddles the hamster for no apparent reason. He fantasises about throwing him out the window, baking him alive and squashing him into a rug. No wonder the science teacher hates him.

Editor, what editor?: 'Why do people think hamsters are cute? he wondered...Because of their cute little buck teeth?'

Future supermodel: Andy wears a long neon green T shirt over a short neon orange T shirt. Apparently both are visible somehow.

Most convenient name bestowed: Conan Barber, the bully who everyone calls 'Conan the Barbarian'.

BONUS Getting crap past the radar: Evan's science teacher keeps a mysterious leash in his cupboard.

Rating:

The Werewolf of Fever Swamp

Plot Summary: Grady's scientist father uproots his entire family to go live near a swamp. In between bouts of exploring the swamp, Grady meets two new friends, a dog and a swamp hermit. Weird things start happening and dead animals start turning up everywhere, which is apparently cause for concern. After hearing werewolf rumours, Grady begins to worry that his new dog Wolf (yes, Wolf) might be the culprit. Fortunately it's just his human friend Will who is responsible. Will proves himself as the worst werewolf ever as he gets scared off by Wolf, but in the process Grady gets bitten and the curse is passed on. Oops.

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To give it some credit, there are a lot of suspects for the potential werewolf. Unfortunately, it's still pretty obvious that the culprit is Will. I would have honestly preferred Stine to go a different direction and either make Wolf the actual werewolf (obviously rejiggling the plot to make it a surprise) or else make the girl the werewolf. I mean, everyone knew it wasn't going to be Wolf right because it's a werewolf. Wolf-like dogs can't be werewolves!

Grady is also surprisingly okay with his one real human friend in the swamp turning out to be the werewolf. He's far more concerned at the prospect of giving up his dog, to the point that upon seeing the werewolf it's pretty much his first thought.

This isn't a bad book but it's fairly linear and not that creative in terms of plot. An okay read but mostly that's because I love werewolves. It has a lot of the staples of lazy Goosebumps writing, including the weirdly calm parents and reckless protagonist.

Terrible family alert: Grady's dad moves everyone to the swamp so he can study some swamp deer. The book specifically tells us how upset Grady's sister is to miss her final year with her friends and how she cried for days. He also seems totally unconcerned with the prospect of his kids hanging out with a crazy swamp hermit because some guy in town told him the hermit was okay.

Idiot of the year award: Grady is not only unable to recognise moss but insists on investigating the weird werewolf scratching noises multiple times on his own in the dead of night. Really, he deserved to get bitten.

Captain Obvious: 'It's a human wolf! I realized to my terror. A werewolf!'.

Most convenient nickname bestower: Grady names his dog Wolf in a place where there's an actual werewolf.

Rating:

.5

Piano Lessons Can Be Murder

Plot Summary: Jerry moves into a new house and his family discovers a piano in the attic which appears to play ghostly music. He decides to learn how to play it which leads to him taking lessons from the ominously-named Dr. Shreek. Soon however, it becomes apparent that things are not as they seem and Jerry's piano is being haunted by a ghost with no hands, telling him to stay away. It turns out that Dr. Shreek is in fact a robot and the real villain is the janitor who has been stealing students' hands for years unnoticed. The ghost then saves Jerry and all the hands carry the janitor out to his creepy, unspecified hand-related death.

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Hey Goosebumps book covers-stop spoiling your twists!

Another very unique story in the series, weird but quite compelling. The protagonist is a massive jerk really what with all his practical jokes, but he's also oddly likeable. He has more personality than most of them anyway. The story is creepy and combines several different elements pretty effectively, though I was so sick of hearing the line 'beautiful hands' by the end of it. It also addresses elements often ignored by Goosebumps books, such as parental involvement, and deals with it more realistically than say Night of the Living Dummy. It may be one of the only times the villain actually dies as well, even if it is only implied. The image of hands killing a guy is both hilarious and also genuinely creepy. Only clumsy foreshadowing and general weirdness stop this from being one of the best, but it's definitely one of the better.

Weirdest running joke: 'Drop her/his teeth'.

Best of friends: Jerry and Sean, whose friendship ends with Jerry's move on page 4.

OMG so funny lol and Terrible family alert: Jerry drops a KETTLE on his dad's foot. It wasn't heated up but it's not clear he knows that fact when he laughs maniacally as water pools around his father's feet.

Somebody get this kid a therapist: Oh wait, they actually do. Not that it helps but kudos to his poor parents for trying.

Rating: