Goosebumps: Night of the Living Dummy III

Back from the Dead 

They say on a Friday the 13th spooky things can happen. They say, even the dead can rise from the dead... Like... dead blogs... Like this one!

It's been a year and a half since I've written a review on this site. I'm extremely sorry. The bulk of this blog was written while I was unemployed suffering from extreme anxiety so I had a lot of free time and needed an outlet. For the past 2 years I've been gainfully employed in a bakery which has been good for my life overall but bad for free time to update this blog. 

I'm going to try to rectify that. Even if I don't update as often as I used to, I should still be able to manage one every so often. The goal I have is to do at least 2 more updates before the end of the year. I have one entry I was planning to release earlier this year and just flat out flaked on. I also want to release one for Halloween, another spooky spooky day. Hopefully I can motivate myself!

During the drought of updates this page still managed to get a lot of hits. I still got a comment or two now again. I really appreciate that people were still visiting here even if I neglected it. I'll try to do better in the future.

Judging a Book by its Cover

 

Anyway, without further ado, time to talk about the book I'll be reading. What better book to return from the dead with than Night of the Living Dummy III. Yes, one RL Stine's most sequelled books. The star of these books, Slappy the Dummy, even has his own featured series called Goosebumps SlappyWorld that is still being published right now as we speak. 

The cover art immediately might help you realize why this particular series of Goosebumps is so popular. Ventriloquist dummies are creepy. This illustration answers the question, "what is creepier than one ventriloquist dummy?"..."a bunch of ventriloquist dummies!" They are just hanging out in a dank old attic. Who knows what they are planning? Nothing good!

It's worth noting that this whole dummy gathering is a real wooden sausage party. Only one of the puppet looks female. We demand haunted puppet equality now! If we don't get representation in demented dolls, where are we gonna get it? Oh well. It was the 90s, what are you gonna do.

So I'm assuming this book is indeed going to feature many dummies. Are they Slappy's relatives? Are they just other discarded puppets? Is Slappy bringing them to life or are they just coming to life on their own? So many questions to answer and there is only one way to find out. Let's read!

Getting Goosebumps

Trina lives in a creaky old house with mom, dad, and brother Dan. She'll call her brother Mouse sometimes because he's a tiny little dude. Trina on the other hand, is a bit chubby. Boy can I relate. They don't even really look like siblings. Has mom been fooling around? I'm guessing this book wont' tell us.

 

So the creepiest part of this creaky old house is the attic. Why? All the god damn eyes. What eyes? The ventriloquist dummy eyes. Before dad became a camera salesman he performed puppetry with his dummy Wilbur. Wilbur isn't the only dummy up there though. There are plenty. So many that dad calls it the dummy museum. I thought that's what you called Congress, heyo! Point is, these dummies don't get used much these days. Mostly just the occasional birthday party, or when Dan is trying to scare his sister. Speaking of trying to scare his sister, one of the dummies starts threatening Trina, but Dan is on the other side of the room. Who could it be? A living dummy! Wait, no, it's still chapter one. It's dad this time pranking his daughter. Nothing is better for childhood development than a little trauma.

Scaring his daughter wasn't the only goal though. Dad has a new dummy to show off. He found it in the garbage with its head split in two... You know... Slappy's head was broken in two at the end of Night of the Living Dummy 2. Weird coincidence eh? Well all it took was a little glue and this totally unrelated dummy is good as new. This couldn't be Slappy though, because they've named this dummy Smiley. What a nice friendly name! Smiley even has a little slip of paper in his suit pocket... full of cryptic sounding nonsense language words. Just like Slappy... And once they read it out load (why do they always read it out loud!??!) the Smiley even SLAPS Trina. You know I am beginning to think maybe this dummy IS Slappy.

Dad brushes aside the accusations of dummy assault with the news that the kids cousin Zane is coming to visit. The cousin they just love to scare. I think we can all see where this is going. Problem is, dad made the kids promise they wouldn't scare him. Darn.

So what happens? Zane is IMMEDIATELY startled by one of the dummies falling on him when he opened the bed room door. The kids play innocent, but who else could have rigged the dummy to do that?

When the kids go to put the dummy back in the attic Zane joins them. Their cousin is a newfound shutterbug and takes his camera everywhere. He uses the opportunity to get some dummy photos. It's all going great... until one of the dummies SLAPS him. This time it was a different culprit than the Trina slapper. Arnie, one of dad's older puppets did the deed. Trina blames Dan for both slaps, but her brother plays innocent yet again.

That night Cousin Zane startles Trina in her sleep by accident trying to get her to wake up. Though he is a big guy, he frightens easily and in this spooky house alone at night he thought he heard voices from the attic. He and his cousin go to the kitchen to have a bowl of cereal and calm down but a misplaced dummy scares them even more. Once again the blame is placed on Dan. They go to confront him upstairs but he is sound asleep. When they go to leave the room the dummy from the kitchen has followed them upstairs. Dan in his bed couldn't have pulled this one off! No, it was dad! Only he didn't scare them on purpose. He heard a ruckus in the kitchen and went to check on it only to find one of his dummies misplaced, so he was going to put it back. His is quite displeased as what he assumes is his kids nonsense. He told them not to scare Zane and yet all that's happened so far has been Zane getting scared. Dad makes them promise to knock it off or there will be hell to pay (ok maybe he didn't phrase it like that.)

So, now that dad has laid down the law surely there will be no more dummy shenanigans right? Wrong. Trina wakes up and immediately sees Rocky the dummy back in the kitchen. She doesn't know who did it but she wisely hauls him up to the attic immediately.

The rest of the day is spent playing nice with Zane. The amateur photographer wants to take pictures of.... their moldings. Ah yes, moldings, a fascination all young men have. He fills up his roll of film, reminding this that it is in fact the 1990s and film still exists, and goes down to the dark room with his cousins. Once he develops the photos he is very displeased. It seems all the photos, are photos of Rocky the dummy!

 

Trina decides to go upstairs and question the dummies. I am not sure why. She doesn't seem to really expect answers. She gets a response anyway. Smiley the new dummy starts insulting her in a hoarse whisper. She almost believes its the dummy until she notices Dan behind the couch. Dan blames Trina for the moving dummies. Trina blames Dan. Then Dan came up with the wildest accusation of all time. Zane has been doing it to himself. To get even with them for being assholes to their cousin. He does have a point though. Zane is the only one who could have taken those photos of Rocky the dummy.... right?

That night the siblings stake out the attic to catch Zane in the act. The hide for quite awhile before someone starts walking across the room, picking up a dummy. Who could be it? Zane!... Wait what, you  mean it was ACTUALLY Zane this whole time and none of the dummies are alive? Yes, he'd been doing it to get back at his cousins just as they theorized. They all declare that their scores have been settled and they are calling a ventriloquist truce.

Thanks to the truce they were all finally able to enjoy the visit. They spent the day out enjoying nature, riding bikes, taking photos. Everything was wonderful. Then they got home and Zane room was totally trashed, complete with a dummy as the centerpiece. Mom was quite upset but how could any of the kids have done this? They were outside with each other the whole day!

Sleeping that night Trina had nightmares about dummy. She awoke to the greatest nightmare of all, an actual dummy laying on top of her! Naturally she screamed and woke up her father who was extremely pissed about everything. All this dummy nonsense has to stop!

Later that night Dan startled Trina awake to launch accusations against Zane. In his opinion their cousin hasn't been honoring the truce. They have a point, who else could be doing it?

During dinner later that day that had a big feast with the neighbors in honor of the cousins visit. When Zane goes to get his camera there is a huge commotion. Someone has smashed his very expensive equipment. This just proves it couldn't be Zane causing the mischief. He would never break his own camera, he loves photography too much. Suddenly there is more commotion. Someone has overturned dishes for the delicious food planned for the dinner. Who could have done it? Well some dummies are present... Things are quickly getting out of control. 

Zane, however, is still the kids only suspect. Once again they wait in the attic to confront him when he goes to move the dummies around. They only had to wait a half an hour for him to show up with a dummy slung over his shoulder... only this time it wasn't zane... IT WAS SMILEY THE DUMMY!

They confront the doll, by name even, but he assures them his name isn't Smiley... It's Slappy! They tussle with the dummy, but he assures them that they are now his slaves. Slappy has never heard of the emancipation proclamation. They make a huge racket and Dad arrives. He is PISSED. Since he arrived to late to see any evidence of dummy life, he calls bullshit on his kids excuses and grounds them immediately. 

A tired and disgusted Dad leaves them to clean up their mess, and Slappy immediately lets the kids know about his plan to blackmail them into servitude. Parents, it seems, would never believe a dummy could come to life. In a last ditch effort Trina tries to pull Slappy's glued head apart, to no avail.

 

Then she comes up with one more last, last ditch effort. They toss him down the well in their yard. Despite being evil, Slappy is often easily overpowered by kids since he is, ya know, a tiny ventriloquist dummy.

They think their problems are all solved but that morning Slappy greets them at the breakfast table. They go to put him away and Slappy assures his slaves he's never going to give up. He will probably however let them down, and may even run around and will most definitely hurt them.

Trina comes up with a plan. She remembers those creepy words from the paper in Slappy's pocket and theorizes reading them brought him to life. Maybe reading them again would undo the damage? They go to get the paper from Slappy's pocket, but he isn't going to make it easy for them. Trina scuffles with the dummy, in a losing battle but Dan manages to grab the paper from his pocket and read the words.

Then there arises a problem. You see, Slappy doesn't suddenly lose his livelihood. no, instead all the rest of Dad's dummies are brought to life. They march forward to attack.... Slappy! Yes, the dummy crew circles round their evil brethren to do battle. Zane appears, and all the dummies are on the floor. Did the other puppets defeat Slappy? It seems so.

Now is the time for Zane to leave. They ask him about his broken camera but it turns out he isn't interested in photography anymore. No, now he is interested in... ventriloquism! Dad offers him a dummy and the kids know just the one to give him, Slappy. Trina is sure Slappy and Zane will have a grand old time together. As their cousin departs, Slappy turns to give Trina a goodbye wink.

 

THE END!

What I Thought

Once again one of the hardest parts of trying to review a Goosebumps book as an adult is to try and put yourself into the mind of a child. To try and remember there is a mindset that goes in to this book that believes anything is possible. Not the cynical mind of an adult who has read dozens of these.

So how do you write 3rd book about a living dummy and not immediately give away who is the culprit? If you remember Night of the Living Dummy the original, things were actually more about another puppet named Mr. Wood, with Slappy only being revealed to also be alive with the very last stinger. Night of the Living Dummy II was actually Slappy's main go around. So for number 3, what do you do? Do you get a new puppet? But Slappy is a pretty big feature at Goosebumps, even back in the day when this is published. You gotta have Slappy! So how do you make kids not immediately know that Slappy is the bad guy? Well Stine did his best. Step 1, add LOTS of Dummies. Any of them could be evil. Also, you remove Slappy's identity. Sure kids who have read the last book should probably be able to put the clues together, but by giving him the new name of Smiley you distance Slappy from some kids mind. Lastly, you have a triad of blame to shift. All the kids are blaming each other for every. Young readers that may not realize there HAS to be a supernatural element may indeed be quick to blame Dan, or Trina, or Zane. These things I believe ultimately I think are what make this book work for the age bracket its intended.

To that note, I'd just like to say that Zane as a character added a lot. Many Goosebumps books are merely siblings goading each other. Zane is an outsider who is familiar to both of them. It makes allegiances hard to sus out. The siblings don't want to trust each other, but also they both can't trust Zane. Zane's innocent act works extremely well. Even I wasn't totally suspecting that he would in fact be part of the shenanigans. The fact that he was guilty but also there was also in fact the mischievous Slappy involved "pulling the strings."

This didn't need some of the tricks of other books I like to feel interesting like an exotic locale or an absolutely bonkers new villain. All it takes is some misdirection and some interpersonal relationships. Sure, I wouldn't say there were any "new" tricks to this book, but ultimately I think RL Stine took the usual tricks he uses and just did them as well as he can.

Maybe it's because it's been over a year since I have read a Goosebumps book, but this book which is #40 overall, and #3 in the Dummy series could have easily felt extremely tired and stale, but I actually really enjoyed it. 

Rating: 4 creepy dummies I may or may not have already used in past reviews out of 5

Up Next

 

So in my intro I mentioned I'd like to do 2 more updates for 2021, at least. One of those I'm aiming for will be on Halloween. The other one, I have no idea, maybe December before the end of the year. I have a halfway written review written that I was intending to do earlier this year, that just never got finished. I will likely finish it for one of those 2 updates. Which one? I don't know. We'll see. I will say that review is not a Goosebumps book, but a book from a somewhat comparable series. The other review will be a Goosebumps book for sure. Likely from the original series. I am getting to the point where I just want to be finished with all the original books I own and fill in the gaps of what are in my possession. We'll see.

Once again I would like to thank everyone who still checked in on this blog. Thanks for everyone who leaves a comment. It lets me know you are reading. Thanks for humoring a fully grown adult who still reads kids books. I'm really going to try to get these updates done this year, but try not to get mad at me if I don't.

#29 Monster Blood III

Judging a Book by its Cover

More Monster Blood. When will these kids learn that messing with Monster Blood never works out well for
them. Now in the previous books a dog and a hamster consumed the slime and grew huge. From the looks of things, this time one of the kids eats it and it's attack of the 50 foot fifth grader. I notice you can only see his legs, which is a pretty good tactic. Makes him look unknowably huge. It makes me think of the nanny from The Muppet Babies. Something mysterious about not seeing the top half of a person.

Now this giant kid appears to be rampaging on an empty playground. It would kind of be more fun if we could see normal sized kids reactions to this giant. Or perhaps a stuffy upset adult mad at the crushing of the swing set. On the ground appears to be a can of Monster Blood... or some Slurm from Futurama. Also, stylishly, the kid seems to be wearing some Converse All-Stars.  If he becomes an outcast, surely it will be due to his size and not his fashion sense.

Tagline time! The front line is "Evan's growing up way too fast!" which is clever enough. It is turned from a phrase your aunt says when she sees you at Christmas to a declaration that you can now crush Dodge Caravan under your feet. The bag tagline is "It's the slime that never dies!" I don't really get that. Does slime die? Is the slime alive? It never seemed to be suggested that it was. Is "the _____ that never dies," a saying I am unaware of? Oh well. 1 out of 2 at bad. Lets get Goosebumps.

Getting Goosebumps

We open up in a daydream of Evan Ross getting attacked by slimy green balls of Monster Blood. He recalls his past confrontations with it, where it caused his pets to grow huge in size. His mother snaps him out of the daydream and back into the real world where he is not being attacked by ooze but is instead merely eating green Jell-o. He seems not to be a fan, due to its tendency to remind him of the horrible ooze of his nightmares. Well it seems in this book we will be treated to a new character. Evan has to babysit for 8 year old nephew Kermit who doesn't just have a geeky name, but is a genuine geek. He, it seems, is a total genius who has a tendency to make concoctions that are a wee bit devious. Evan has to put up with it, however, because that sweet sweet 3 dollars an hour will help him save up for a Walkman, which is a very 90s thing to save up for.

On his way to the little dork's house, Evan is confronted by stereotypical bully with stereotypical bully name Conan. Hassling him over nothing of any importance, Kermit appears with a liquid mixture that he purports will cause Conan to disappear. Instead it just makes his sure disappear... which makes Evan's nose get a wee bit broken by Conan. Later Evan talks these events over with Andy at a school. Now if you remember from the previous books, Andy is in fact a female, and she has a love of day-glo clothes, which is also a very 90s thing. Evan explains how Kermit claimed that Evan had picked the fight with Conan, Evan's baby sitter credentials to be questioned. Also, Evan claims Kermit did all this deliberately.  The evidence, he says, is in the kid's shit eating grin. Ok, maybe he didn't call it a shit eating grin, but I can read between the lines. Andy recommends retribution via Monster Blood which causes Evan to panic. Her claims that she also put some Monster Blood in his sandwich make panic even more. Thankfully it is too early in the book for actual Monster Blood to come into play. After he realizes this, he taunts her with her true name, Andrea, and makes her tell him where she has hidden the last "gift" of the titular ooze she was sent. Finally, he convinces her to come over to Kermit's with him. Supposedly he is not as bad when she's around. I find this doubtful!

Kermit's house smelled a little weird. The the kid comes bursting out screaming "It's gonna blow!" and Evan scrambled for his life. Andy, however, realizes it is a joke. Kermit cackles deviously. Evan beats him to death. Wait no, that last part is just what I wish happened. He actually tries to play it off like he didn't really believe the room was going to explode. Smooth. Next up, Kermit curse Andy's nasty mosquito bite with that shrinking serum he used on Conan's shirt, and it actually works with no ill effects. He decides that for his next project he is going to cure his dogs hiccups. Evan seems worried that if Kermit kills the dog the blame will be placed on the babysitter. Sensible. Andy, however, has been won over by his bug bite cure and thinks he should do it. Apparently that whole thing about pretending the house was going to explode is water under the bridge. She might have an ulterior motive though, she gets the nerd to do her math homework. Then he moves on to the hiccup cure. It does in fact cure the hiccups. It also causes the dog to bound around crazily yipping like a puppy. The problem is, it is not a puppy, it is a very large dog. It smashes up all kind of stuff, and naturally, Evan gets blamed. Even Kermit's fan Andy gets thrown under the bus and has to help clean up. She beats him to death instead. Wait no, once again I'm just saying what I wish would happen.

Anyway, after Andy finds out the "help" he gave her on her homework was all wrong, she convinces Evan it's time to break out the Monster Blood. What they plan to do with a slime that makes thing giant though, I really don't know. They gonna have a giant 8 year old pain in the ass on their hands? Evan almost immediately wusses out and backtracks on their plans. He realizes that a giant Kermit is a bad plan. Andy seems to think slipping the junk into one of the mixtures Kermit makes will have a cool result though. Sounds like she hasn't exactly thought this one through. Well, they call off the Monster Blood plans and go to Kermit's. They convince him to come outside and play for once, but first he gives them some delicious orange soda. Outside they start laughing uncontrollably. He drugged the pop with a laughing potion! And then, laughing endlessly, they beat him to death. Argh, man, I really gotta stop just typing my desires. Naturally, it's at this time that Conan comes out and doesn't take kindly to their fits of laughing. So in typical bully fashion, he beats em up, egged on of course by Kermit.

Finally, pushed to their limits, they decide to unleash Monster Blood. Evan distracted the dweeb with a candy bar while Andy planted the Monster Blood in his latest concoction. It works and the mixture starts growing in size! Kermit gets noticeably worried. Unfortunately, so do the too other kids when it starts engulfing them. POP it explodes. Their plan fails when Kermit in fact is totally delighted by the explosion. It fails again when Evan realizes he accidentally swallowed some and is now growing. First thing I would do as a giant? Stomp on Kermit. That little schmuck thinks it would be cool to grow giant like his cousin. Quickly he begins outgrowing the room and realizes he has to get out of the house before he bursts out of it! Struggling, he makes it. Outside, he notices that he is nearly as tall as the garage. Andy keeps making back jokes, and mad scientist Kermit thinks it is pretty much the coolest thing ever. Seriously, when is this little shit going to get stomped on?

Then Evan notices Conan picking on some kids. Now that even towers over the bully it is his turn to exact revenge. Ever the prick, Conan still picks on Evan even though he's huge, the doofus promptly gets placed into the branches of a rather tall tree. Personally I would have flung him like a rag doll through the air, but to each their own. Having fun with his new found size, he starts heading toward the playground, accidentally stomping cars and completely neglecting to SMASH KERMIT INTO THE GROUND! He heads to the baseball field where the children eagerly all urge him to play with them instead of running in fucking terror at the sight of human being that is large enough to smash cars with a single foot.

Just when he was starting to have some fun, the fuzz shows up. Cops and firefighters lead by Conan march against giant Evan. They ask him questions, and don't particularly care about the answers before they start blasting him with fire hoses. Apparently this is how you handle giant children. This causes Evan predictably to flee. Since he has long ass legs, he can do a pretty good job of it. Kermit gets the idea to use the potion he mixed to shrink Andy's bug bite to shrink kid ginormo. Unfortunately he doesn't have any left so he has to mix up another batch. Instead of shrinking him, this new mix turns him blue and gives him the hiccups. The next mix gave him feathers so he looked like a giant blue eagle. The last potion works, right as cops roll up and ask if they've seen any giant children around. Whew! All is right with the world again. That night Evan had a nightmare about what had happened. When he woke up his dog Trigger came in and picked him up in his mouth. Evan shrunk! FUCK YOU KERMIT!

What I Thought

I am getting a little sick of having annoying frustrating characters not getting their comeuppance. Doesn't RL Stine know how deeply satisfying it is to have little shits like Kermit get exactly what they deserve? Can't that happen like, once? And sure, though I may have shared my desire to see him pulverized, perhaps a more kid friendly retribution. For example, instead of the silly quick twist at the very end of Evan getting tiny, perhaps a freak lab accident leaves Kermit with a shrunken head? Or a wayward blast of the fire house and a bump on the head lower Kermits IQ by 20 points or such? Would that be so wrong? Maybe schadenfreude isn't the healthy attribute to cultivate in young people, but it's not like these books are filled with morals anyway! Clearly Evan and Andy have not learned their lessons about messing with Monster Blood after all this time. I think there is even Monster Blood IV yet to come (though I don't currently own it, I'll have to keep an eye out a thrift stores.)

So anyway, this was basically the same as the other Monster Bloods. Kids mess with it, it makes a thing big, they panic, and then unbig things. The difference this time was Kermit the annoying and the biggening happening to a kid instead of a pet. This actually was an interesting change for a couple reasons. 1) His fun at being huge and getting some revenge on his bully. 2) His fun quickly turning to terror as he is pursued by the authorities. Honestly though, I think it would have been fun if they mimicked some classic movies. Have him climb a building like King Kong! Let him destroy a little more than a car. Really there was too much them dealing with frustrating Kermit, and not enough rampaging around as a Giant. It seems like there is always too little payoff in these books.

Basically... this book is as mediocre as the rest of the book. It blends in fine. It did something slightly different with the theme of Monster Blood. After 30 books though, it's just nothing special. I can understand why it was about about this time that I started getting burnt out on these books 20ish years ago.

My Rating: 3 out of 5 Giants

 

Up Next

Well #30 in the series is It Came From Beneath the Sink. However, April Fools Day is coming up and I thought that'd be the perfect time to cover the second and final book in the spoof series Gooflumps. I recently found it for a buck at a thrift store and have been looking for an excuse to read it. So check back April 1st for the literary classic Eat Cheese and Barf!

#23 Return of the Mummy

Judging a Book by its Cover

Didn't get enough mummy in Curse of the Mummy's Tomb? Well now we have a returned mummy. Where the previous book's cover had merely a mummy on the cover, this book coming out of the sarcophagus. I definitely had to use spell check to spell sarcophagus. It's not a word that pops up in day to day usage. Anyway, sarcophagi are pretty cool looking so it makes for a neat cover. We can only see the mummy's hands emerging... well that and some stink mist. Stink doesn't have a visual component but I guess you gotta get the concept of odor across somehow. I wonder how much a mummy stinks though... I mean I get dead bodies rot and smell but this dead bodies is thousands of years old. I bet it smells a little musty at worst. I doubt there is any flesh left to rot. Oh well, it makes for a good looking cover.

Also of note is the color scheme. So often the two tone Goosebumps' ooze logo seems just randomly pick but here the blue green goes around quite nicely with the blue toned background and striped sarcophagus. Man I am using the word sarcophagus more than I have in the past 10 years combined here in these few paragraphs!

Now there is a blurb for the Goosebumps Fan Club on the front. Often in the later books there would be blurbs for selling shit. I always wanted to join the fan club but never did. One of life's regrets. You got a hat, pen, autographed RL Stine poster and more for like 10 bucks. How could my mom never have under stood how much I needed that? Oh well. Are fan clubs even still a thing? I feel like the news letters and such that you get from them are now an online thing. I could be wrong about that though.

The taglines are disappointments. No puns. I like puns dammit. The front merely states that he's back from the dead which is pretty obvious from the title of the book and the cover illustration. The back says, "Dead... or alive?" And that is a trick question because it is both! Undead!

Enough about the cover. This was my favorite book growing up (if I remember correctly) and I want to get to reading. I am pretty sure this is a direct sequel with the same characters and everything. Though if memories serves right this isn't a return of THE mummy, as it is a different mummy than involved with the last  book. Speaking of the last book, if you need to get caught up here is my review of Curse of the Mummy's Tomb. Now onto Return of the Mummy!

Getting Goosebumps

As this is a direct sequel we have returning characters! Once again tween Gabe is going to visit his Uncle Ben (once again, not the rice guy) and his daughter Sari as they excavate another pyramid. It's a different pyramid this time so even though it is called Return of the Mummy it is a different mummy. Also despite the undead shenanigans of last time Gabe seems pretty psyched. He has his mummy hand trinket that he carries with him at all times. Last book it woke the mummies from the dead but he seems pretty unsure about it's abilities. Mostly it is just a good luck charm. While last time he went to Egypt with his parents, this time he is going alone to be with Uncle Ben because truly his parents can trust in the "almost lead our son to his early demise" antics of ol' Ben.

So Gabe arrives by plane and immediately is onto Uncle Ben's sense of humor. He is dressed up in robes with a thick accent looking to pick up Gabe in a cab. Nevermind, that's just an Egyptian cabby. Simple mistake to make right? The real Ben arrives with his daughter and immediately Sari and Gabe resume their rivalry. Gabe is slightly sympathetic towards her, however, as he realizes she rarely gets to see her dad due to his studies. Not overly sympathetic though because she is kind of a bitch.

Instead of staying at a hotel this time they are camping right at the dig site.After arriving at the pyramid and Gabe is startled to find a mummy risen from the dead out to get him. Already? Jesus this is only like chapter 3. Oh right, practical joke from their trickster uncle. What a hilarious joke to play on kids that were almost murdered in a tomb last time you saw em. I am sure that's not horribly traumatizing in the slightest. Turns out that was an actor, as the media is there to shoot a commercial. Uncle Ben isn't such a horrible bastard though. He gives his nephew the gift of a scarab trapped in amber. They are said to be good luck for some reason even though one bite from a living scarab would kill you. And now Gabe feels a pinch at his leg. Oh god he's gonna die this early in the book? Or it's yet another prank this time from Sari. Again these tricks would probably be funnier if they didn't almost die in the last book. Maybe I'm just uptight.

Anyway so this time around the tomb in question is believed to belong to Prince Khor-Ru the cousin of King Tut which makes this a pretty major discovery. That is, if it hasn't been pillaged by robbers over the centuries. This importance has caused interest from a beautiful pantsuit wearing reporter named Nila who interrupts the crew as they enter the pyramid. She wants to cover this story and since she is a looker and has supposedly talked with Uncle Ben's partner he allows her to accompany them. She admires Gabe's scarab necklace showing him her own amber necklace that is sadly scarabless.

Now you would think entering a pyramid with a group that all have lights would go somewhat smoothly but somehow almost immediately Gabe gets lost and tumbles into a pit with thousands of spiders. How are those good luck charms working out for you now Gabe? He fears he is also getting attacked by a snake but it's actually a rope to save him. After he shakes off the thousands of spiders he makes sure his mummy hand thingy survived the fall. Oddly Nila seems to recognize it as "The Summoner." While the others move on Gabe sees The Summoner's fingers move. Creepy! After this whole fiasco they give up because they "explored enough." Explored enough? you were in there for like 10 seconds for Gabe got his stupid ass covered in spiders!

Two days later they get back into the pyramid for some excavating. As they are working to open the tomb they hear a bellowing, "PLEASE LET ME REST IN PEACE!" but alas it still isn't a real mummy woken from the dead, it's just Dr. Fielding who is Uncle Ben's partner. He believes there is a curse on the tomb. Hieroglyphics say if you repeatean ancient Egyptian phrase 5 times you will wake Prince Khor-Ru and feel his wrath. As a man of science Ben isn't swayed and his partner refuses to witness it and leaves. After chiseling away at the entry they reveal the tomb full of splendorous... nothing. But there is a seal to another room. They chip away and finally enter that one revealing the real resting place of the Prince. It is filled with jewels, treasures, and a sarcophagus containing the prince's mummy. The celebration is short lived, however, because 4 police officers from Cairo show up. They were sent by Dr. Fielding who has apparently changed his mind about the find and just wants to "protect" it.

Later that night Nila cons Uncle Ben into telling her the words that supposedly wake the prince from the dead, "Teki Kahru Teki Kahra Teki Khari." So if you at home want to raise the dead, now you know. I think Ben just told her because he wants to get in her pants and what better way than revealing an ancient curse? He is one smooth operator. Since Gabe was present for the reveal too he decides to try and get back at Sari for all the pranks by reciting the curse for her. Doing so freaks her out, but I think it also scares him a bit as well. To further add to the scare Dr. Fielding busts in right after they finish the curse. He needs to see Sari's father urgently! Suspicious, the kids follow him and see him gruffly push Uncle Been into the pyramid and then leave abruptly past the kids without even acknowledging them. Weird.

Well the kids get some lights and enter the pyramid. The follow footprints to the tomb and see that the
sarcophagus is now closed. They open it revealing Ben inside. But if he is in there then where is the mummy? Alive and out to get them! And for real alive this time, none of this prank shit. Gabe's uncle is unconscious in the casket and the kids run into an empty room where they discover Nila. Instead of being a source of help she is the cause of the problem! She is not merely Nila but PRINCESS Nila, the mummy's sister and she stole Gabe's Summoner to raise her sibling from the dead. She tells the mummy to murder the children to eliminate the witnesses but in some sort of ancient sibling rivalry (or a desire to be left in peace) the mummy attacks Nila. In a chaotic panic Gabe accidentally rips off her amber pendant and drops to the floor. The princess disappears and a scarab scurries away in her place. Apparently through some magic kept herself alive all these years by turning into a scarab at night. Anyway I guess with his summoner a scarab or whatever, the mummy stops moving and Uncle Ben finally regains consciousness. Dr. Fielding returns with the police. Apparently he was a good guy after all and was just in a panic earlier.

Finally Gabe has the chance to brag to Sari since he saved the day. She, however, points out the Nila is still out there as a deadly scarab and she is probably out to get him. A moment later in bed Gabe screams, "OUCH!"

THE END.

What I Thought

I remember this book! Many times reading things I find it hard to fathom that I had ever read it before I remember nothing. Sometimes things come back to me as I was reading but this one I remembered a fair amount pretty early on. I didn't remember specifically that Nila was the mummy's sister but I did remember she was the bad guy. I have long remembered that this was my favorite Goosebumps book growing up and my actual memory of the plots seems to confirm it. I seem to remember having a mummy phase at some point in my life. I am not sure if this book caused it, or if I just liked this book because I read it during this phase.

So anyway, Goosebumps tend to be split between books that happen at home in every day life of a kid or books where kids go away to a location to get spooked. While the first option can be scary in it's own way I think I tend to find the latter more interesting. I've been at home, to school, etc. I have never been to a pyramid and reading about a kid going there is exciting! That isn't to say I wish all the Goosebumps were like this but perhaps that I tend to lead towards them.

Now I was worried rereading this. I didn't remember which mummy one I liked so much and the first book disappointed me. This one however I feel pretty favorably towards. I feel like it is just better written. There is more focus on one specific mummy which is good. Also Gabe doesn't summon it randomly like in the last book it's part of Nila's devious plan. And her plan isn't immediately obvious to the young. She seems like on of the "Good Guys" Pretty ladies don't have devious plans!

Of course this book has plenty of holes. It's a Goosebumps book! In true horror b-movie fashion it seems like the characters have all forgotten everything about the previous book. Gabe seems surprised his mummy hand summons mummies WHEN IT ALREADY SUMMONED MUMMIES. Also what's the deal with Nila? So she's like thousands of years old and just now happens to show up to revive her brother? Shouldn't she have known where he was buried this whole time? Couldn't she have tried this any other time during the past several thousand years? Also how did she not know the curse when it was written in the hieroglyphics? She should speak ancient Egyptian because she literally is an ancient Egyptian. I also don't completely understand why her brother attacked her. I guess he really just wanted to be left in peace, even by his sister? You think she woulda known about this.. But still, these are nitpicks in a series you can't really nitpick with. It's for kids. I am sure 8 year old me didn't think about this shit.

Really though, despite its flaws it may be my favorite Goosebumps book again. The setting is fun. The rivalry between cousins and the prankster uncle make for some decent false scares. It seems like it got into things quicker than the previous book. Also there is less ridiculous bullshit than the earlier one. I recall rolling my eyes a lot at Curse and not so much at Return. It's the rare sequel that improves the series.

Rating: 4 scarabs out of 5 (also did you know scarabs are a kind of dung beetle? DUNG!)

Next!

Phantom of the Auditorium. Presumably it will be based on Phantom of the Opera. A least very loosely based. I don't remember much about this book off the top of my head but I am pretty sure this was one of the first Goosebumps I read in 1 sitting. The idea of reading these books in one sitting now seems laughably easy but back in the day it took a little bit longer to get through. I plowed through it in one day however. I don't know why I remember that, but I do. So we shall see if any of the plot comes back to me as I'm reading it or if is entirely unfamiliar. Next time!

#18 Monster Blood II

Judging a Book by its Cover

Alternate Title: Attack of the Giant Hamster. He's a pretty mean looking bugger. The perspective of the photo makes it look scarier. Like you're looking up at him, because your tiny. Really that would just mean he's on a giant desk though. And the monster blood is oozing off of it. It's one of those rare times when the book borders compliment the book, being that they are pretty much green ooze themselves.

The tagline on the front is "He's one hungry hamster!" That just makes him sound obese, and not enormous in a scary way. "It's baaack...." is the uninspired tagline on the back. Disappointing.

All in all, I only have one thing to say, "Rodents Of Unusual Size? I don't think they exist!"

Getting Goosebumps

We start out with star of Monster Blood I, Evan and his dog Trigger. It seems Trigger somehow got a hold of monster blood again and is growing ever bigger. He grabs Evan and buries him in the garden. Oh no! Book over! Shortest book yet. Oh wait, he was just day dreaming in class. It seems he hasn't quite gotten over the antics of the first book. No one in Atlanta believes what happened and he's getting in trouble with his science teacher. As punishment he has to clean out the class's pet hamster cage. If that wasn't bad enough he keeps being hassled by school bully Conan "The Barbarian" Barber. The kid is only twelve but apparently looks as though he's 32... which frankly is kind of creepy.

At least everything goes smoothly with cleaning the hamsters cage, right? Wrong. Cuddles the hamster escapes and rather boldly for a hamster, jumps out the window and scurries around the school grounds. Guess who finds him? Evan? No! Conan, and he wants to force Evan to sing to get Cuddles back. What a dick. The science teacher shows up just in time for Conan to make Evan look even worse. Things just aren't going well for this kid. You'd think it was all uphill from his first dealing with monster blood.

Well in a convenient turn of plot, Evan's old tomboy friend Andrea, or "Andy" shows up in Atlanta. Apparently her parents moved somewhere and she is staying there with relatives as long as is necessary for the book. She even brought the old canister of monster blood with her! And, uh-oh, there is still some inside. On top of that, it's growing! While they briefly consider using it to prove Evan isn't crazy, after it nearly turns up in the hands of Conan they decide they need to dispose of it.Burying it is deemed the best method.

Later, Evan goes to tryout for the basketball team. After being slammed in the face in with a basketball, and somehow being dunked in the hoop by a middle schooler Evan fails to make the team. And Mr. Science teacher coach is blamed for letting Conan walk all over Evan. Andy dreams up the idea of using the monster blood to feed to Cuddles the hamster as a way of getting back at Mr. Science Teacher Coach. Evan goes along with it but when they try and dig it up, the monster blood is gone! Conan is the suspected culprit, and to prove it they commit breaking and entering.

Once they retrieve the can of monster blood and narrowly escape being caught by Conan they decide the best course of action is just to bury it again. Or do they? Well it turns out Andy decides Evan "needs a laugh" so she fed Cuddles the hamster some monster blood. By school the next day, Cuddles is the size of a large rabbit. Evan comes in early the morning after to discover that Cuddles got big enough to bust out of its cage. He puts a conveniently placed dog leash on it, and cuts class. The teacher however, thinks it's pretty rad to have a giant hamster... that is until the next day...

Yes, Cuddles is like 10 feet tall the day after. It is raising all sorts of hell, with the teacher trying to tame him like a lion and having no success. There is only one solution: Evan has to eat some of the monster blood to combat it. He eats enough so he starts growing immediately. When he himself is 10 feet tall he tries to confront the beast, but as he is still outweighed the hamster dominates him. Evan stops growing and can't figure out why. Just as the hamster is about to sink its teeth into him, POOF everything is back to normal. What the hell? Well, it turns out that can of monster blood has an expiration date, and its today. CONVENIENT!

In the end, Conan made to look like a fool because he was crying for mommy when confronted by Cuddles. Evan was made to look like a hero since he bravely ate the repulsive goo. As a reward, he received the now normal sized Cuddles. Andy, the loyal side kick, got a package in the mail from her parents. Guess what it is? More monster blood! Oh man. Hey, where is Cuddles? HEY! WHAT IS CUDDLES EATING?

The end.

What I Thought of it

Hamsters! Not what I'd call a scary monster. Even a big one doesn't seem particularly scary to me. Maybe if it was Godzilla sized. That might have been cooler. Still, I guess it is something familiar to kids and the idea of one getting huge and terrorizing the school is pretty fun. Sadly however, it's reign of terror is short. In Stine's books there is a decent amount of buildup but then everything gets solved in a couple really short chapters. Sometimes I think if he just lengthened the books by about 50% they would improve about 100%. And it's not like kids couldn't read just a little bit more.

Anyway. Sequel. I believe this is the first direct sequel to a previous book. Truth be told, I already forgot about a bit of the previous Monster Blood. Andy I like as a character. She is a bit memorable as far as Goosebumps characters go. Evan is as generic a protagonist as they come. He doesn't grow as a character any, but I suppose that isn't what these books are about. They are about having fun with kind of freaky events. This book is more fun than freaky. But as its aimed at 10 year olds, that's probably ok.

Now, about the ending. 9 times out of 10 the overly silly stupid Stine ending bugs the crap out of me. This one I kind of liked. Sure it being the expiration date was kind of a lame gag... but it was lame enough to make me chuckle. The notion that this sci-fi, magic, poweful mystic goo has an expiration date? Classic! I'll allow it.

Rating: 3 out of 5 Conans

Up Next

Next up in the series is Deep Trouble which I believe is part Jaws, part Creature From the Black Lagoon, and Part Splash. However, the next book I read is gonna be a special surprise. Check back in a couple weeks for that.