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