Halloween Party (Fear Street)

The invitation arrived in a black-bordered envelope and was delivered by the beautiful and mysterious transfer student. The inside showed a coffin with the inscription “Reserved for You” — perfect for an all-night Halloween party in an old house on Fear Street.

The party was well under way when the lights went out. That’s to be expected at a Halloween party. But when the lights came back on, there was a boy on the floor with a knife in his back. Just a Halloween prank? Maybe. Maybe not?

GOT U COVERED 📙

Author: R.L Stine

Published: 1990

Series: Fear Street

Tagline: There is going to be an uninvited guest at this Halloween party on Fear Street.

Description: A girl in a red dress and white cape, looking scared at a floating skull pumpkin.

“But no one felt like dancing anymore because the light showed a horrifying sight. In front of the fireplace, half on and half off the rug, lay a limp body. Blood trickled down its sides from the huge carving knife sticking out of its back.” - pg. 46

THOUGHTS 💭

Terry Ryan gets an invitation to an exclusive Halloween party hosted by Justine Cameron along with eight other kids at his school. One of which is his girlfriend of six months, Niki Meyer. As news of the invitations spread around the school and students’ curiosity are peaked about who else got invited to the party, the list reveals that a total of nine kids got invited to Justine’s party: Teddy Ryan, Niki Meyer, Trisha McCormick, Ricky Schorr, Murphy Carter, Angela Martiner, Les Whittle, David Sommers and Alex Beale. This group is there for a specific reason (which gets revealed later in a cool way) but everyone is somewhat puzzled as to why all of them were invited. They don’t personally hangout with each other nor do they really know Justine Cameron all that well either.

Now there is a little drama triangle happening between Teddy, Niki and Alex which plays heavily into the conflict of this story. Teddy and Alex used to be good friends since they were kids, however that all went astray after Niki started dating Teddy, but before that, she and Alex were dating. So it gets pretty messy between the boys. There’s a lot of showing off, snide remarks, jealousy and bickering between the two in the book - basically your typical macho contest between two straight guys, which Niki is rightfully having none of.

An aspect of conflict established was the jocks vs wimps teams. Because the group of invitees were so random, Murphy (who is a football jock) categorised them into two groups: wimps or jocks, to establish a prank war between the attendees and to see who would be able to survive the entire Halloween party due to Fear Street’s infamous reputation of evil happenings and hauntings.

When the characters arrive at the mansion party, Justine went into great detail in order to make it feel like a night to remember. From the decorations, the set-up, the music and of course the food.

But let’s not forget the surprises. Justine has oh so many surprises in store for her party guests and she’s going to make sure that no one leaves before each and every one of them is experienced…That is until one of the guests is murdered.

“Justine’s living room was an eerie wonder, the ultimate fantasy of the ultimate Halloween dream — or nightmare. Artificial cobwebs hung in every corner, and cutouts of skeletons, witches and bats dipped and swooped from the ceiling. Along the narrow balcony above one side of the living room were colored spotlights that seemed to sweep the room in time to the music, their flickering lights causing everything to move eerily. The only other light came from the huge open fireplace, where a big black kettle was boiling, sending greenish fumes bubbling up. All the furniture was from another century…The whole effect was like the world’s most modern haunted castle.” - pg. 36

Overall I liked this book, but I didn’t love it. The reason is that it took somewhat long to get into the actual action and mystery of the book. At some point, the pranks being pulled started to feel more like a tease, rather than a treat.

It is mentioned that Niki is nearly deaf after an accident she had in the second grade, but can speak and lip read really well, so much so that not many people catch on to that fact about her. I thought that was a nice additional layer to her character and loved how her disability was actually her advantage, especially in the climax. I felt like Niki was more of the main character and focus than Terry. She is the one who ends up doing more of the heavy lifting when it comes to the overall story. So giving her the “girlfriend-of” slot was probably a misjudgment on Stine’s part.

Now during my reading, besides the three main people highlighted in the group: Terry, Niki and Alex - I struggled to follow some of the other characters. They weren’t given enough stand out moments in the book to give them any distinguishable presence and they often felt like filler characters. Many times, I was struck with a reminder that they even featured at the party. Although integral to the reveal, felt unnecessary because not many of them are given much development. They serve reactionary purposes, rather than storyline purpose.

We also get a fun mention of characters from another Fear Street Book, Wrong Number’s Deena and Jade. Apparently Ricky Schorr is also a character from another book, The Overnight, which I do own but haven’t read yet. I also assume that the reputation Fear Street has with being haunted could possibly be due to the previous book in the series, Haunted. Just a thought. I enjoy these little easter eggs sprinkled in because it helps to make the residents of Shadyside feel so interconnected and the town fully realised.

Now there are enough moments in between that help to keep the spookiness ongoing like when Niki stumbles across some weird information involving Justine, a certain person tumbles off the staircase bannister which was tampered with, when Terry and David make a gruesome discovery of a body and a bloodied jacket. But it takes a moment to get there, which is why I think the climax chapters of the book are the most satisfying part of the whole book. The motive along with the monologue gave me all the 80’s slasher vibes. It's got the elaborate scheme mixed with the eccentric drama and emotional performance 🎭 - very appetising stuff for any cheesy slasher horror fan.

At only 147 pages, you could easily finish this on a toasty October night with perhaps a vanilla chai latte or hot chocolate ☕.

I grade this book a B+

This might not go on my list of memorable Stine entries, but it was still a fun time nonetheless.

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