Okay, bargain shoppers: in this book you get not one but TWO twists and they’re both pretty good.

Honestly, me being an adult was what messed up my ability to figure out one of the twists. One of the characters has a condition where they bruise easily and my adult brain is thinking something that’s real.

Turns out no. I was wrong.

But that’s fine.

Now I have to find the last one to figure out if Callie can ever break the hold 99 Fear Street has on her!

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A pretty quick ride, but there was a stutter in the beginning when two bodies are found and the innocent party doesn’t immediately call the cops. Why would you NOT call the cops if you found two bodies cut to pieces?

In this story it’s justified by saying the person who found them needed to let her friend know her parents had been murdered before calling the cops.

But then cops show up and she realizes that SHE’S going to be a suspect and that’s what makes the whole rest of the story happen.

That said, it was a fun, fast ride and it had the highest body count I’ve found so far (4), but they’re also explained away by the end so did they really count?

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So, I’ve read more than a couple Fear Street books now and this one?

This one’s my favorite.

I’m a sucker for imposter stories (probably from watching The Hand That Rocks the Cradle at too young of an age) and this story is definitely that.

But it’s also FAST and exciting. Spooky and actually kinda logical - a huge ask for Stine.

This was a true pleasure to read.

What’s your favorite Fear Street book?

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I hate to throw up qualifiers but if you actually take the time to put yourself in the positions of these young women and really bask in the story rather than try to rush through it, this might be one of the spookiest Fear Street books of the lot.

It’s good.

Really good.

And you should read it.

But can we talk about this cover? Does this feel weird and kind of… I don’t know… icky to anyone else?

No? Just me?

I mean, there’s nothing misleading or disingenuous about this cover - I would actually say it does a good job portraying the sisters’ appearances. But the whole nightgowns and horror-stricken faces feels a little… I don’t know. Exploitative? Definitely SOMETHING. I just can’t put my finger on it.

What do you think?

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I think I’ve reached the point where I’m beginning to look beyond Stine’s penchant for characters who don’t use much (if any) logic or rational thought.

It’s best to just… give in and go with the flow. It makes the story way more enjoyable when I’m not getting hung up on why anyone would, I don’t know, start fires for funsies.

For instance.

And, once I got over that hurtle, I enjoyed the story as a whole.

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As a kid I read a LOT of RL Stine. I started with Goosebumps, moved to Fear Street, then his stand-alone novels, and then, unfortunately, his adult novel.

And beyond the adult novel, “Superstitious” - which I seem to remember having VERY awkward sex scenes - this is the book I remember the best.

Because this book is bananas.

Not in a bad way. During this re-read, I have been less than hospitable to Stine and my own memories because a LOT of them don’t hold up but this is just as bananas and FUN as I remember.

The idea of coming home to your parents being missing is intriguing. As a teenager, you’re in that awkward stage where you know a lot of what’s going on and you know people should be listening to you and treating you seriously but everyone is hung up on the idea that you’re still a kid.

Because you are! Kind of! It’s an awkward time where you have zero power, aren’t treated seriously, but you aren’t oblivious like a younger kid would be. You see the threats, you know the danger, and you wish someone would listen to you.

It’s weird in the series. A protagonist kills a dog (weird in this series), two people die (also weird in the series), and this is before the CULT pops up. The cult that thinks America is on the wrong track and wants to use violence to take over the country and “Make America Great Again.”

Basically.

*shudder*

I never thought I’d say this, but RL Stine CALLED IT in a fuckin’ YA horror novel.

Y’all! Whodathunk?!

Also, there’s a lot of head-hopping between chapters with no chapter names to let you know who’s head you’re in and that slows you down as you figure it out. That’s the worst part of the book, though.

The rest is just a bananas, weird, fun time.

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My least favorite thing in story-telling is the trope when people aren't open and honest because of some sort of hesitation. It's usually bad news or revealing something about them that they feel betrays a weakness or vulnerability.

I just think the world would be a better place if we were more open with that kind of stuff. If I know I'm a fragile being, why would that sooner mean I'm the ONLY fragile being rather than mean that EVERYONE'S fragile? And, if the latter is the case, why wouldn't acknowledging that make us progress as a society?

My second least-favorite trope is the love triangle.

Third least-favorite is the hunky curmudgeon.

Fourth-place? Set of steak knives.

Anyway, it's an unfortunate pet peeve because I'll admit that the benefits of being open and honest would also take the wind of the sails of thrillers and horrors because there wouldn't be any secrets to keep.

And that's what's tying this book together - the idea that the kids basically snuck away for an overnight alone without adult supervision. There, a completely reasonable series of events happened that ended with a bad guy getting killed and yet none of the kids wanted to go to the authorities because their parents would be, like, SO made at them!

Stine leans hard into a knack for writing super annoying characters to really hammer home the agony of waiting for the reveal, the final act, and the end of the book.

This one wasn't my favorite.

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If there was ever a toe-in-the-water to the Fear Street series, this is it. It’s also the only copy of a classic Fear Street in size, cover, and price at my local Books-A-Million and I can’t help but feel that’s because it doesn’t bring the scares (or, really, much of anything).

The story centers on a douche of a dude who is so self-centered and full of himself that he challenges himself to date twins within a specific time frame. They both fall in love with him and begin to play off each other while a third sister - an EVIL sister - is thrown into the mix.

The only thing I kept thinking throughout the whole book is that SURELY sisters would talk to each other more. I mean, I wasn’t particularly close to my brother when we were teenagers, but we knew who each other was dating.

It wasn’t a dumb book per se, but it wasn’t anything special.

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Talk about a red herring - this book flat-out exposes the killer in the past few pages. If you like the idea of sudden surprises, this is up your alley.

That said, there were a couple of things that were interesting in this book:

1) The weird idea that longevity in your relationship is more important than it really is in high school. Like, if you can just make it longer together than any other couple, you’ll find real happiness. In reality, splitting up and finding someone else would probably make you more happy. But I did see it in high school - hell, I participated in it in high school - and it’s always struck out to me as one of the weirder things we did. Like we were really giving it our best to be grown-ups as children.

2) Abusive relationships. In this book, the abuser was portrayed more as a “wild card,” than anything else, but the words were there. He cracked a pool cue over a friend’s head and said his hand must have slipped. The next paragraph said sometimes the guy would be fun and the life of the party and sometimes… his hand would slip.

But the guy who got his head cracked open never faltered in his dedication to his friend. He WAS going behind the guy’s back with his girlfriend, but he wouldn’t let anyone talk shit about his bud and wouldn’t hear that maybe he was dangerous.

It was clear to everyone else, though.

This one’s a whole lot of drama, but it still works. It was a fun time.

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You know what? Let’s go back to the beginning. To Fear Street #1.

I keep getting thrown with the Columbo/Law & Order: CI openings where a crime is committed by SOMEONE and then the story actually starts, but it’s fine. I like Columbo and I LOVED CI.

I will say that a common critique you’re going to hear from me is a plot driven by poor communication. It’s a pet peeve of mine and just lazy writing. It’s also all OVER the Fear Street series.

Anyway, this book centers around a kid in high school who falls in love with the new girl, Anna. It IS a little strange that none of his friends know who she is, has her in their classes, and everyone that DOES know Anna insists that Anna…

Is dead.

I looked this up on Wikipedia to make sure I remembered the plot since I read this a couple years ago and it says that the boyfriend was convinced she was alive with her “human-like kisses.”

I literally laughed out loud.

Anyway, it turns out “Anna” isn’t Anna at ALL and she’s actually WILLA, Anna’s sister who killed Anna out of jealousy and assumed her identity. There’s a brother, Brad, and he plays a pretty important role. He shoved a girl down some stairs and I think he even killed a cat to stuff in a locker as a warning, but I don’t care about him.

My mind got snagged HARD on the idea that a teenage girl killed her teenage girl sister and just ADOPTED her personality. Where were her parents? Where was Brad? Why had nobody heard of Anna? Why is Willa going to school?

I just think that if you’re going to murder a sibling and assume their identity, high school years are the WORST years to do it.

That said, it was fun to re-read and still way better than Goosebumps.

I’m excited for the next one.

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