Tag: books

Anne Rivers Siddons’ The House Next Door

The cover of The House Next Door, showing a house hidden behind vegetation.

What’s a house without a ghost? Still one bad motherfucker, if The House Next Door is to be believed. It doesn’t need any incorporeal spirit rattling its chains or throwing plates. Those are so… last year. Instead, it relies on a person’s own weaknesses, feeding them until they become grotesqueries and horrors beyond imagining. And what if you just happen to live next door to all of the zany butchery?

That’s the premise of The House Next Door. The neighbors, Colquitt and Walter, are pissed when they find out the empty lot next to their house— in a very influential Atlanta neighborhood— is to be no more. A newly-minted architect has been hired by an old money daughter of the South to build a house that says fuck daddy in all its glory. Colquitt and Walter do come around on it, even becoming close friends with the architect, as they see his talent come alive in the form of a modern home. Then shit starts to go down.

After several suspicious wildlife maulings, the new neighbors lose everything that is valuable to them: a child, reputation, their father— until they are driven from the home in an attempt to to maintain their reputations. Two more families follow, along with various incidences of “bad luck” with those who visit the house. The architect loses his talent, other neighbors watch their son throw his life away, and  “Col,” as the book often calls her, and Walter almost implode an otherwise impenetrable marriage. Walking into this house is the karma equivalent of breaking a billion mirrors and passing under a ladder on your way out. It takes a family or two, as well as the drunken ramblings of the architect, before anyone believes something might be going on and Col/Walt find a reason to start taking… action. 

Siddons is known for her slice of Southern, and I think that shows well in this horror story. One has to move those stories at a certain pace, or they become absolute trudges. In this case, it meant there was always more action with enough of the slice of life to make the story of this strange house in a conservative (of course, they think themselves liberal), old money community feel like an avoidable tragedy.

There are some issues with language used to describe an queer entanglement. In addition, a Jewish character is portrayed as a new money-hungry boo. It’s an unforgivable part of an otherwise good book, even though many might say it perfectly emulates the mindset of the Southern WASP who happened to write in 1978 about other Southern WASPS. It definitely shows how even those who consider themselves on the right side of the Civil Rights movement are the type who speak and act one way in public and become entirely different people within their cloistered communities.

Would I Read it Again?: Yeah. Apparently I rushed a little at the end and missed important information. This happened a couple of times and I had to go back to correct my understanding. The book isn’t so spectacular that I would read it again just for enjoyment, since I feel like I got most of what I needed the first time.

Rating: 3. The writing was solid, but the Jewish character really just threw off everything for me, especially with all the calls to it the characters make. I knocked a point off for that since it wasn’t just narrator perception framing the racism. 

.

Michelle Paver’s Wakenhyrst

Cover of Wakenhyrst by Michelle Pacer. Old fashioned estate house with graveyard in front over a floral motif.

Michelle Paver is popular in many horror circles. She’s often mentioned on the /rhorrorlit board I follow for book suggestions. 

However, the first book I read of hers was Wakenhyrst, which has horror elements but is more of a gothic romance. It has the requisite madness and a “maybe” demon, along with some tragedy and death.

Spoiler? Maybe. The main character, Maud, suffers an impossibly patriarchal father, while being the most competent character in the book. The book is very much her coming of age, moving from the innocent superstitions of her life on the marsh to and finding her agency; and it’s not just agency from her father, but from all of the superstitions, beliefs, and the expectations of a woman in her position.

It was okay. I love Maud in all of her iterations, and her maturation has layers of shit she throws off as she learns. However, it’s just okay. Perhaps her horror is better (I’ve ordered the books). It shares a trait with “The Little Stranger” (a book by another author who I otherwise love and speak well of) in that it’s just too long. I know Gothic Lit has a habit of lingering, but in the case of “Wakenhyrst” it drags the action down. I just want it a little cleaner.

Would I Read it Again?: So. Yes. I would. Like many books of its ilk, I always want to confirm that my first opinion is correct. Maybe there are some details that make all of the extra worth it. Usually, I’m a little disappointed.

Rating: 3

Fear Street #3: The Overnight

I’m reading every Fear Street novel from my childhood and summarizing them here. Instead of subjecting you to all of the teen angst and bad decision making that turns Shadyside into the #1 place to be if you want to be murdered, I’ve taken on the burden.

Who am I kidding? I love trash horror. Enjoy the spoilers.

====

Of all the books I’ve read in the Fear Street series, which admittedly is both too many yet not enough, The Overnight might be the most straightforward one. There’s no real mystery, no threatening phone calls from a mysterious source, and no  teenagers go on a weirdly murderous rampage to solve otherwise mundane problems.

Della O’Conner is our “protagonist.” She’s one of those teens that thinks the cycle of breaking and making up with her boyfriend is some kind of foreplay. The lucky guy is Gary, and they both have the personalities of turnips. They’re members of the Outdoors Club, around which our drama revolves.

Other members include the very punk rock Suki Thomas, who is very up for stopping the fun and games between Della and Gary. Maia is the very overprotected friend with the requisite strict parents. There’s the preppy Pete, who also wants to end the shenanigans between the unhappy main couple by hooking up with Della; Ricky Schorr breaks up the monotony by having the sole trait of cracking bad jokes for 99% of his dialogue in the book. Because of this terrible habit, everyone is really mean to him, because Shadysiders are way more interested in picking on the weird kid than identifying possible murderers in their midst. The cast finishes out with some random parents, Mr. Abner (the teacher in charge of the Outdoors Club), and the two strangers who come into play during the overnight.

The story starts with the Outdoors Club meeting about their upcoming overnight trip. After some bad jokes from Ricky and bullying from the other members of the club, there’s some posturing over who gets to date Gary from Suki and Della. Mr. Abner comes in to end all of their fun. He has a family obligation so he can’t chaperone the upcoming overnight trip.

His suggestion to postpone it was vetoed without him present. Maia spent a lot of time convincing her parents to let her go because they appropriately treat her like a teenage girl loose among other teenaged Shadysiders who could be evil ghosts or have an axe stored in their locker. So, the teenagers decide to go on the trip by themselves. Della’s mom thinks the overnight is a bad idea even with Mr. Abner there. But they still go. To Fear Island. Because that ever goes well.

They make it out to the island with minimal distress from Ricky and lots of flirting from Suki (Gary) and Pete (Della). Della gets particularly pissy because Suki crawls up Gary’s ass, and it’s obvious, but guys, they’re on a break.  Ricky is a fan of ZAP, so he brought along some paintball guns. After they set up camp, they play some boys vs girls, and this is where the fun begins.

Della meets this creepy guy in the woods, and first mulls over how handsome he is. Like… a movie star, folx. He starts talking about how everyone is lacking in communication then attacks Della. She pushes him down a ravine; while she’s burying him with leaves, the rest of her rag-tag campers show up and verify that “he’s dead.” Instead of anyone thinking that they should tell their fucking parents, they all get very upset that someone might find out that they took the trip by themselves. Maia worries not one bit about the dead dude, but how she will never again be able to leave her house. Only Ricky has any sense, and in one of his few serious moments, he throws up everywhere. The friends agree to a cover up, and I honestly thought this would transition into a I Know What You Did Last Summer moment.

Instead, they go home and get terrorized for a week by people ding-dong-ditching them and sending threatening notes that include a charm from the dead man’s neklace. Maia is less worried about being murderated than her parents finding out, so they don’t end up going to the police. They do this even after they find out that the guy Della knocked down the hill was probably one of two men who robbed an old man and killed him. I’d say the suggestion of the culprits being ghosts was far-fetched, but they get points for considering a very real threat in Shadyside.

As a side note, Pete spends his time of abject horror also asking out Della. And even though she initially thought he was kind of a square, I guess watching Gary move on has opened her up to the possibility of dating someone whose main quality is being nice while wearing a popped collar. They go out on a date at a club together to seal the deal, and almost get run off the road by a psycho killer, but still no police, right?

Mr. Abner reschedules the real overnight with a chaperone for the next week, and the teenagers are appropriately terrified and provide a bunch of excuses. However, they realize they left one of Ricky’s ZAP guns on the effing corpse, so they agree to go back to retrieve it. Maia has no problem explaining the second overnight trip to her parents, so maybe they’re only strict when it’s convenient to explain plot points.

After a hike, they set up camp (again), and Mr. Abner sends the kids out to gather firewood. Not too far out though, because hanky panky is required on spooky islands. Della tries to get far enough out to retrieve the gun but is interrupted by Maia screaming. Someone knocked out Mr. Abner. Instead of leaving the island to get him help, they go out on an adventure to  find the gun. They find the spot where Della knocked the guy into the ravine and find that he’s not there. She gets attacked and starts to run, finding out both men are still alive.

The men’s entire idea was to blackmail the kids so that their rich parents would pay them. Their robbery was apparently a bust, except for killing that old guy. There’s some back and forth cartoon shenanigans, until Della finally escapes to the campsite. Thankfully, despite no one calling them, the police wait for her there so they can take the burglars into custody. Surprise police are best police? In this one case only?

Then, we finish off with the prerequisite snappy ending. Della is definitely dating Pete and never again wants to go outside. Probably smart, given the town they live in.

Death Count: 0 (2 Fear Street deaths total)

Death Count on Fear Street: 0 (1 total)

Actual Ghosts: 0 (0 total)

Rating: 10/10 for making it easy to write about.

Fear Street # 2: The Surprise Party

I’m reading every Fear Street novel from my childhood and summarizing them here. Instead of subjecting you to all of the teen angst and bad decision making that turns Shadyside into the #1 place to be if you want to be murdered, I’ve taken on the burden.

Who am I kidding? I love trash horror. Enjoy the spoilers.

====

I want to apologize. While a Fear Street book takes me all of an hour to read, I’ve had some difficulties in sitting down and writing about all of the illicit secrets and tantalizing murderers. The sky fell, and it’s been a complete pain in the ass.

When I say the sky fell, what I mean is that the ceiling in my dining room collapsed. Our house is over 100 years old and has seen quite a few repairs in its time. When we moved in, there was a hairline crack in the ceiling that we figured was from an old house settling in nice and right over time. We were wrong.

What had actually happened is that the previous owner had repaired the ceiling at some point. They nailed the thin wooden shims (lathe) that hold the plaster in with finishing nails. Then, they installed a heavy chandelier onto the lathe. Hundreds of pounds of plaster and lighting was all held in place by those teeny-tiny nails, and they finally said fuck it. The past month has been a process of putting up drywall, mudding drywall, and texturing and painting drywall. Since our dining room was already a wreck, we also took the opportunity to paint, refinish a few furniture and decorative pieces, and put up crown molding to hide the fact that our walls (or our new drywall ceiling) weren’t even.

We’re close to the finish line, though. Thus, I bring you the fine classical stories we all know and love from Fear Street.

===

After rereading three books (with one being very much out of order), I realized I’m going to run out of stuff to talk about. Every book is a simple premise that causes an inproportionate amount of teen drama, threatening phone calls, and sometimes murder and mutilation. I’m going to be shortening my recaps a little, unless a book is especially brilliant or bad.

Our main character is Meg Dalton. Meg has the habit of looking too young and being naive. Since naivety and gullibility are the traits of every protagonist in Shadyside so far, I’d say she’s cast perfectly. Her best friend, Shannon, looks like Molly Ringwald. Meg idealizes this beauty, which is just a reminder of how old I am as I get the reference and its sapphic vibes. Shannon once had a brother named Evan. Evan was murdered via shotgun the previous year in Shadyside and in the previous chapter in our world.

Meg has a moody, and frankly abusive, boyfriend named Tony. I’m not sure why she’s with this guy, beyond that fact that everyone in Shadyside has terrible judgement. He’s a condescending dickhead that has explosive anger issues, taking this all out on Meg. He also thinks he’s a murderer and almost becomes one— manifestation, baby!— just to cover his tracks. More on that later.

Dwayne is the town creeper, a rare feat in a town full of them. Brian is Meg’s cousin. The two of them play Wizards and Dungeons together in the woods, which practically means they are devil worshippers during this time period.

Our final two players are Ellen, who is Evan’s ex-girlfriend. She moved away after his death, and her return to Shadyside forms the premise of the book. What does she know? What secrets does Ellen hide within her heart? Is she a murderess? Nope. Just a plot device like Mke: Shannon’s half-brother who looks a lot like Evan.

There are several throwback moments to Lisa and Cory from the previous book. Apparently, not all is fair in their paradise. Cory is still a fucking moron, who knew?

Our story begins with a murder, supposedly over a girl who is very bad, and hoping to get away with it. I feel like wanting to get away with it is a given in the great majority of murders, and we should perhaps only mention cases where the murderer is just doing it to get caught and be treated to a fantastic trial and some jail time. Unless they’re a white dude, then they’ll just get job offers from Tucker Carlson.

We start our story with an introduction of the main players having a conversation while they ride their bikes, and Tony acts like an asshole. Meg reminisces or fantasizes about the past where he was nice, Evan was alive, and Ellen was around. Cory and Lisa interrupt her reverie, and Tony’s verbal abuse, to let them know that Ellen is coming back to town to visit a relative.

Meg decides with her friends that they should have a surprise party for Ellen so she knows they still love her. However, later that night, Meg receives a threatening phone call that she must not host a party. Apparently Ellen isn’t all that welcome. Also, can we talk about how in Fear Street phone calls are the modus operandi of all creepy people? Since the internet wasn’t around, I suppose every bully ever just needed to pick up the handset and make some vague threats. It’s just not Shadyside without 15 calls telling you that your current path is probably ill-advised.

Meg suspects it’s a joke, but Tony wants her to take it very seriously. He even advises her to call the police— how novel!— and wants her to not host the party. This doesn’t sound suspicious at all, especially from a guy who has temper tantrums every other second.

Along with more calls, Meg’s party invitations get torn up. She also receives a lunch bag full of red paint, almost gets run over, and gets a threatening message from the school secretary; however the woman doesn’t know who left it. Since the secretary also missed Cory hiding out in the principal’s office in the last book, I don’t think she should be responsible for children anymore.

Tony also gets some threatening messages and says he’s being followed, using those to support his efforts to have the party cancelled. When Meg doesn’t agree with him, he breaks up with her. A view into his thought processes reveals he wants to kill Meg because he’s afraid she might find out he was the one “killed” Evan. He tries to run her over, then contemplates pushing her off a cliff before he finds out she really has no clue he’s a complete dick.

Meg spends far too much time trying to figure out who the culprit might be. She recalls how Brian was in the woods the day Evan died and also changed from whatever happened there. Shannon, Brian, and Dwayne are also on her list. The last only gets there because he’s a creep who demeans dead Evan and lusts after Shannon, so at least she has some common sense. He also gropes Shannon a few times at a party, much to everyone’s gross-out factor.

She then makes the awful mistake of accusing Shannon, who rightly loses her shit on Meg about the accusation. Instead, Meg tries to justify her overreaction as guilt. Thankfully, she comes around on how it’s okay for her best friend to be pissed off at her for the accusation. Meg recalls a time the friends— Evan, Ellen, Tony, Meg, and Shannon— were all together. During a pool game, Evan goes batshit insane and smacks the hell out of Tony with a pool cue. After Evan knocks him out, Ellen starts screaming about how it wasn’t an accident, so there was some tension between the three.

Shit hits the fan when Tony and Brian go out to play Wizards and Dungeons together out in Fear Street woods. Tony pushes Brian down a gully because Brian witnessed Tony “kill” Evan. Both Brian and Meg are saved from Tony’s murderous intentions. This leads Meg to believe Brian has some sort of secret, so she then gives him the third degree. He responds with the kind of stuff you would expect a 10 year old to say about their video game adventure, so Meg’s just kind of pissed and low-key disturbed.

One awkward friend reunion later, the surprise party finally happens. Brian, despite his injuries, shows up to the party. Speaking like a drunken Gandalf, he tells everyone he’s brought Evan back to life. As I previously mentioned, Shannon’s other brother— Mike— looks a lot like Evan. They use this to freak Tony the fuck out, and he starts to brandish *the goddamned pistol* he brought to the party. He tells everyone he will confess to who killed Evan..

Only to freak the fuck out of the real killer, Dwayne, more. You see, Dwayne had a crush on Shannon, and Evan stood as the one obstacle to his adoration. You know, forgoing the fact that Shannon thinks he’s the worst. After shooting Tony, he takes the girls hostage, and the true story comes out.

A long time ago, in a land far away, Tony and Ellen were cheating on their respective partners. Ellen broke up with Evan, and he fled into the woods with a rifle. Tony and Ellen followed him, with Brian following after, and the gun went off in the middle of a fight. Tony assumed he killed his best friend. However, Evan was still alive. Dwayne finished him off because of his deep, abiding, and perfectly normal love for Shannon.

The girls distract him by screaming about a mouse, using the opportunity to knock Dwayne out. The final scene has Meg and Shannon discussing how Tony was responsible for threatening Meg. Brian, Mike, and Ellen made a plan to out Tony after he pushed Brian down the hill. Anyway, since Meg’s single now that Tony is no longer in the picture, Mike asks her out, and she agrees as long as there are no parties. I’d say she’s moving on a bit quickly, but I have a feeling the normal reaction to being almost dead in Fear Street  is to immediately hook up with anyone who hasn’t become a killer yet.

And now, on to book 3. Good Gods, save me.

Death Count: 1 (2 Fear Street deaths total)

Death Count on Fear Street: 1 (1 total)

Actual Ghosts: 0 (0 total)

Rating: 4/10 for the twist ending!

Fear Street #1: The New Girl

I’m reading every Fear Street novel from my childhood and summarizing them here. Instead of subjecting you to all of the teen angst and bad decision making that turns Shadyside into the #1 place to be if you want to be murdered, I’ve taken on the burden.

Who am I kidding? I love trash horror. Enjoy the spoilers.

====

Cover of The New Girl by R.L. Stine
It begins…

When I was a kid, I remember these books being the best thing to happen to me. They had twists, they had turns, they had lots of murders, and even more ghosts. I’m unhappy to say that childhood me was very, very wrong.

This book has exactly one murder, and it happens in the prologue. I feel like I was denied something wondrous, a promised utopia of scary shit happening to stupid people.

The New Girl is our introduction to the world of Shadyside and, more importantly, Fear Street. We’re introduced to the high school where one in three teens will be eaten by a ghost or stabbed by an otherwise “innocent” looking friend. On Fear Street, however, that rate increases to at least 1 in two, or maybe everybody. Lord knows I ain’t a statistician.

The point-of-view character for The New Girl is Cory Brooks. Cory is hot shit at Shadyside High because he is the gymnastic golden child of the school. Number 1 jock, or so we’re told. However, given all of that sports’ knowledge, the kid has no idea what a red flag means. They practically rain down on him like men in a Todrick Hall video, and he just…keeps…being…stupid.

Cory’s best friends are David Metcalf and Arnie… something. Neither was very memorable, and they were best friends by default because “dudes.” Their most vital role is to act as the Greek chorus to the absolute fucking tragedy that is Cory Brooks.

His actual best friend is Lisa Blume, his lifelong neighbor. If Cory is terrible at recognizing red flags, green ones might as well be non-existent. Lisa is thirsty for this idiot. She asks him out on a regular basis, and she drops hints big enough to sink the Titanic. She does everything short of stripping and telling Cory to take her in the halls of Shadyside.

Our villain is supposed to be Bradley Corwin. He’s creepy, controlling, and outrageously angry about this guy who keeps calling and asking about his dead sister. Cory thinks this makes Bradley a Bad Dude™ rather than asking some preliminary questions from the girl of dreams while they are at school, like “Why does your brother think you’re dead?” or “Are you a ghost?” Nevermind all of that when there is a willing body trying to make out with you, right? Shadyside ghosts, man, you just can’t resist them with things like logic and critical thinking.

Then there’s Anna. She’s so pretty Cory can’t take his eyes off her; he even loses a gymnastics meet when he sees her. She is as equally creepy as her brother Brad. Multiple people tell Cory this, but he ignores all of that because he’s just too infatuated with her. She doesn’t have much of a personality and pretty much acts like a cursed doll, but none of those cause Cory to hesitate more than one scene befores he’s back to fantasizing about being with her.

Now, to the plot. We know from the prologue that someone killed Anna, who was oh so perfect and beloved. The very first page tells us the girl is dead, so the fact that Anna is up and wandering around the high school looking for her first kill… I mean, boyfriend… should raise suspicion to the reader.

We meet Cory as he’s doing a headstand stunt to make the lunchroom laugh. While he is upside down, he sees this pretty, blonde girl and makes note of her eyes, for some bizarre reason. I guess it can be forgiven since all the blood was in his head, even if we’re not sure which one. He loses his balance and dumps food all over himself in response to just seeing her. He hardcore questions his friend about the new girl, so we know he’s really into her already.

His friend Lisa helps him clean up, and he sees the girl a second time. He interrupts Lisa’s macking on him several times to wax poetic about his Lenore. Her very first words to him are “Please don’t,” which means, of course, he will. He fucks up his life for a week or two while he tries to figure out if this girl is real. His classmates confirm her existence as Anna from Physics class who lives on Fear Street, which is almost 75% of her personality. However, he still falls into fits wondering if he has found true love or just another Fear Street ghost.

Fear Street, to those uninitiated to the terrors that form the basis of this entire series, is the worst street ever. The problem in Shadyside isn’t homelessness or poverty wages, it’s this one street with creepy houses, weird animals, and lots of murder. Just don’t live there, right? Everyone is in a competition to die first, and that definitely includes you too..

Look, there’s a lot of small things I simply can’t summarize. We’d be here half the day while Cory waffles on whether he wants to be a white knight to a girl he’s never certain is real. I lost count of all the concerning situations he gets into, ignores, or writes away as simply not possible while he watches them happen. At some point, he just forgoes reality entirely. There’s yelling at the protagonist that they shouldn’t run up the stairs; then there’s yelling at the protagonist to kindly not trip over the very obvious stairs they refuse to acknowledge exist.

  • He calls Anna’s house multiple times. Every time her brother or mother pick up, they freak out and tell him that Anna is dead or doesn’t live there.
  • Every time he sees Anna at practice, he falls off something. Bad luck charm, indeed.
  • Anna calls him a few times to leave eerie messages that insinuate she needs help. One of the few things she tells him is how he’s all hers now. Obviously a sane girl only in need of a latte, amiright?
  • He breaks into the principal’s office to find out Anna Corwin doesn’t exist and doesn’t even go to Shadyside. From his reaction, he thinks this only makes her hotter.
  • He’s easily distracted by making out with her, but I’ll give that a pass because teenagers.
  • He reads a newspaper article that talks about Anna Corwin dying the previous year, but fuck all of that.
  • He receives several phone calls where he gets threatened. Not only that, but right after Lisa asks him to a school dance where Anna can overhear, Lisa finds a dead cat in her locker and gets her own creepy calls. Cory thinks it has to be Bradley since he’s the scary one.
  • He has several close calls with almost acknowledging all of the neon signals Lisa is sending and reciprocating, but Anna is a great big ruiner with her creepy calls and dead cats.

At the dance, Lisa gets pushed down the stairs. She recalls seeing a tall figure; after some Scooby Doo madness, Cory gets them out of a locked room with his slick gymnastics moves. Thank god Anna wasn’t around, or he would have managed to fall through the open window twice and fallen on both of his heads. They see Brad flee the scene. This immediately invalidates all other evidence and means Brad is evil.

Anna supports this with her own story: her sister Willa died tragically, it broke the entire family apart, and Bradley refused to acknowledge the death. In his madness, he started to believe that Anna was the one that died and became possessive and crazy about her. The newspaper got it wrong. She is the real victim. Poor Anna.

After a frantic Anna call, Cory rushes to her house to find Bradley trying to restrain her. She screams about how Cory is there for her and wants her. Brad tries to warn Cory away, but since it looks like the story he’s spun up in his head about Anna is true, our hero instead attacks Bradley.

Cory tries to get her to call the cops, but she leads him upstairs with some sweet promises of action to distract him from the crime scene in the rooms below. She then comes at him with a knife and somehow, despite her presence, he actually manages to pull off a gymnastics move and not die.  Bradley gets his sister under control and tells the real story.

“Anna” is Willa, who killed her sister and took over her personality. Bradley was aware something was up when Anna started to go to school (like, how in the hell did the teachers miss that she wasn’t on the roster?), and Cory started calling the house asking for Anna. The reason that Bradley showed up to the dance was to get Willa back home before she killed someone. He made a mistake, thinking Lisa was Willa, and knocked her down the stairs by accident while trying to restrain her.

When it’s all said and done, Cory finally fucking recognizes that his girl Lisa has the hots for him. They watch a movie, kiss, and I assume become a couple with at least 50% more intelligence than Cory alone.

Death Count: 1, in the Prologue

Death Count on Fear Street: 0 (as far as I can tell, the sister died at their old house)

Actual Ghosts: 0

Rating: I don’t know… like 3/10?  I’m seriously wondering if these things are satires about stupid teens. We’ll see?

Want to support me? Join my Patreon. In the future, these posts will be available to my supporters first, so they can ask questions, make jokes, or otherwise be part of the terror I’ve brought upon myself. You get early access before I release this on my personal web page and whatever other nonsense I create during my read throughs.

We’re Going to Fear Street, Baby!

Warning: Spoilers

Recently, I watched the Fear Street movies on Netflix. They were everything I could have wanted from a movie based on those novels: lots of gore, teenage dumb, and bad things happening to Shadysiders. Given, Shadyside really only had a Fear Street problem in the books (as far as I remember), but I’m okay with a liberal interpretation as long as a cheerleader goes into bread slicer.

That inspired me to go back through all of the Fear Street novels. I basically lived in the library as a kid, checking out 30-40 books at a time because there was no internet; the only hobby I was “allowed” to have involved low parental involvement and commitment. I tore through the available Fear Street novels and whatever else I could get my nerdy hands on.. While I blame Stephen King and Peter Straub novels and movies for my love of horror— and let’s be frank, cheesy plotlines and practical effects— R.L. Stine was giving us terrible plot twists when M. Night Shyamalan was still figuring out how to hold a pen.

I’m writing a summary for every Fear Street book, reading all of teenage fiction so you don’t have to. Reviews will be erratic; while I have library cards for every metropolitan area and the state library, not all books are available either because they are on hold or the library just doesn’t have a copy of them (in which case, thank god for Kindle). These reviews include a lot of sarcasm. It might seem that I hate R.L. Stine, but I love his work with every fiber of my being. It is some of the best trashy horror, low-key entertainment that exists. Don’t come for me.

If you want to read the spoilers early and ask questions, you can join my Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/wuthering. You can also ask me to expound on certain plot points; I don’t promise those will be good since the main plot point of every Fear Street book is kids be dumb, yo. However, maybe I missed some complexity while a murderer throws every red flag out there, and the protagonists blithely walk into knives, chainsaws, and monsters.

Join me for bad decision island, teenage serial killers, and a thorough examination of what a shitshow it is to live on Fear Street!