Reader Beware

One of my most precious memories from my children's childhood involves reading to my daughters, Amber and Katie, and their close friend, Destiny. We spent many afternoons and evenings in their room as I read aloud books of their choosing. The girls had a special appreciation for scary stories, especially when the weather added to the ambiance, for instance when the only illumination was flashlight because the blizzard howling around the trailer had knocked out the power. One of our favorite authors was R.L. Stine. True confession. Even though the girls are grown and flown I still read his writing.
If you're around my kids' age or younger Stine's narratives probably played a role in your wonder years. They were and remain hugely popular. Deservedly so. They are damn good roller coaster rides of stories. So the contributors to Briana Morgan and Roxie Voorhees' Reader Beware: A Fear Street Appreciation Anthology took on a daunting task: penning Stine worthy tales. And their creations perfectly capture the magic. Two qualities that they shared with the author who inspired them in particular come to mind.
Stine's narratives are so immersive! Whether reading or listening you're never safely distanced in your house. YOU ARE THERE! You're walking through the creepy neighborhood, encountering beings you shouldn't be seeing in the abandoned wreck of a house, running for your life through the woods you've been warned never to enter. The contributors to his tribute create a similar ambiance.
*In The Sleepover, through the perfectly chosen details, you're locked in the "shrouded in shadows" basement, the gloom punctuated by dark eerie shapes, the floor's chill seeping into your feet, waiting…. Upstairs you've seen the corpse of a friend. "A creak overhead sent Emily's heart racing. Now that Heather was gone, the killer would come for Emily then Jake. Trapped in the basement, they were sitting ducks,"
*We're all pretty much acquainted with the creepiness of basements. I as terrified of going into the basement of my childhood home at night even though it contained nothing more sinister than a washer and dryer. But a forbidden space in a former hospital turned boarding school is something few of us have a template for. The author of No Students Allowed On The Fifth Floor weaves something pretty much all of us have experienced, the fear of being caught somewhere we're not supposed to be, into her vividly described narrative. "The floor is stranger than I'd pictured, and my fingers itch to draw. Huge overhead beams crisscross the space like an old-timer bridge. The head clearance is low, and it feels like the weight of the floors above bear down on us." When I read the story I felt the weight pressing down on me.
*And when you read Road Hogs you're with the group of teens on a nightmarish road trip. "Two lumbering men in faded blue coveralls appear from behind the store, dragging baseball bats against the ground. Rubbery boar masks complete with tusked snouts and tufts of coarse hair sprouting from their scalps, obscure their faces. They move swiftly toward the Mustang, snorting and squealing."
Stine also pairs what would be horrific for anyone, say stumbling on a mangled corpse, with more mundane horrors, such as the helplessness of being a child or teen with your fate in the hands of more powerful beings, or even potentially benign experiences.
*The narrator of This Place Sucks arrives at the gruesome beach scene by a very ordinary route. "There was no way divorce did not suck. From the early days of bickering to the scratchy-suited courtroom appearances, and finally, to the big yellow truck waiting to carry everything you owned across the country to some piddling-ass town on the coast of nowhere stinking of old people and rotten fish."
*The murder that starts things rolling in Swimming Pool is committed by the narrator's little brother acting out of desperation when menaced by a powerful bully. "'Your uncle can't do shit.' He threw back his head and. "When I'm done with you, they won't even be able to identif—' THUNK."
*The setting for Wicker Baskets is an Easter egg hunt like the ones I took Amber and her siblings to—except that in this one the bunny has gone vengeful and homicidal. The opening paragraph is elegant in its simplicity, succinct yet laden with foreshadowing. "The egg. The cliff. The fall. The scream that stopped halfway down. The splash that never came."
Reader Beware contains thirteen Stine worthy gems. If you are a fan of the man or of narratives that have you checking your closet and under the bed before you turn out the lights you're in for a treat.
On a purrrsonal note, I'm so proud of my Amber for getting her fine narrative included in this really top notch thriller anthology. Since 2011 I've reviewed well over 2,500 books for this blog. Now I finally have a favorite. The two things I'm most looking forward to in 2025 are Amber's book, Little White Flowers, coming out and my stroke delayed graduation from my masters program.
A great big shout out goes out to the book's talented contributors, the editors who pulled the pieces together into a most excellent volume, and the masterful writer whose works inspired the anthology.
Jules Hathaway