I remember liking this one a lot with the previous read, and given that ghost stories are usually Stine's best works, this should be another success. Unless we have another situation where a book has not aged as well as it should have. It's heads or tails as we cover The Headless Ghost.
THE HEADLESS GHOST
RELEASE MONTH: November, 1995
FRONT TAGLINE: Major headache!
COVER STORY
I really like this cover. It's not one that scared me, but it was always one I admired for its use of bright oranges and blues to give a cold, haunted feel. I like the details like the broken railing and the spider webs to assure the reader that Hill House is definitely old and creepy. And then there's our titular headless ghost who does give a frightening look with his head in his hands. Overall, another solid piece.
THEY'VE GOT A REAL HEAD START...
Everyone knows about Hill House. It's the biggest tourist attraction in town. That's because it's haunted. Haunted by the ghost of a thirteen year old boy. A boy with no head!
Duane and Stephanie love Hill House. It's dark. And creepy. And totally scary.
Still, they've never actually seen the ghost. Until the night they decide to go on a search. A search for his head...
STORY
This book is mostly set around a place called Hill House, which is apparently a bad thing that Stine did because there are other works that use the name Hill House and this is a disservice or something? Despite the name Hill House being kind of a common name. Eh, to me it's like how a lot of cartoons use the name Metro City. It's not that big a deal. Anyhoo, our protagonists, Duane Comack and Stephanie Alpert love Hill House. Almost as much as they love terrorizing the other kids in town because they're a pair of pranksters, calling themselves the "Twin Terrors of Wheeler Falls", which usually fall into my "oh god, this again" category for Goosebumps. But they almost always try to catch a Hill House tour whenever possible.
The house is run by a couple named Otto and Edna. Otto is described as looking like a dolphin, which is quite the way to do that Stine. He gives tours every night to tell tourists about the many horrific events that have transpired within Hill House. The origins go back 200 years prior as a sea captain named Captain Bell built the house for his wife. But he was called to the sea again, where he would end up dying. When he returned, his wife left ages ago due to grief. Cut to a century later and a family known as the Craw family. Turns out that the sea captain's ghost still haunted the house and the young son Andrew saw him. Enraged, the captain grabbed Andrew by the head and tore it right off, then hid it somewhere in the house because, I don't know, he was bored?
After Duane and Stephanie scare some kids, Stephanie gets an idea. Why not search for the head? If the stories are true than it must still exist on the grounds. They could get it and haunt more people with it, because you know, it's hard to top "real child's skull" as a haunting prop I guess? Duane, the more rational of the two thinks this is a bad idea, but after being called a coward by Stephanie, he decides to go along with it. We get Otto talking about Captain Bell again before mentioning more of the Craw family. Andrew's sister Hannah stayed in her doll-filled room until her death (I wonder if she too became a ghost next door) and their mother fell down the steps and died. So, wonderful happy memories at Hill House.
Duane and Stephanie take this chance to leave the tour and search for the head. They enter a room called the "scratching room" that gives people rashes. A toy room where they think they see the head but it's a bowling ball. And a room filled with cats. Stephanie's enjoying herself while Duane is freaked out, not helped by Stephanie's pranks. However, they end up caught by Otto who scolds them for not staying with the tour. They return as Edna takes over, mentioning that Joseph Craw, the patriarch, died by arrant flames from the fireplace.
As the kids leave, they run into a mysterious boy in a long turtleneck. He says his name is Seth and he too wants to find the head of Andrew Craw. He claims to have snuck into Hill House and saw an elderly ghost slide down the stairs. I mean, gotta entertain yourself somehow posthumously. The next night, Duane and Stephanie sneak off again and meet Seth who pretends to collapse to his death, but neither Stephanie, and surprisingly not even Duane believe him.
They soon find the kitchen where Seth tells them of yet another grisly tale of Hill House because lord knows we haven't made it clear that this place is freaky. It's about a boy named Jeremy who never ate anything but strawberry ice cream which would be delivered to him via dumbwaiter. One day, he crawled too far into the dumbwaiter shaft and fell to his death. Somehow later three bowls came up with his heart, his eyes and his teeth. That's a weird one. Guess the Captain ghost is a bit of a culinary genius?
Seth leads Duane and Stephanie to the pantry, then locks the door on them. He then reveals that he's the real Andrew Craw. He says that this isn't even his original head and he has eyes for Duane's. As Seth goes to snatch a skull, Duane and Stephanie notice a conveniently placed ladder that goes underneath the house. As they go down, the ladder breaks on them and it crashes into a wall. And in that wall just so happens to be Andrew Craw's head. As Seth approaches them, the kids see the real Andrew Craw arrive and thank them for finding his head. He takes the head and leaves, just as Otto arrives. He didn't see the ghost, but he scolds Seth, who we learn is his nephew, for scaring Duane and Stephanie.
TWIST ENDING
A few months pass and Duane and Stephanie have stopped taking the nightly tour. Mainly since, you know, they saw an actual ghost. They go back up and take another tour from Otto and Edna. However, when they leave, they get stopped by a pair of cops who wonder what they were doing at Hill House. When they mention the tour, the officers mention that there hasn't been a tour at Hill House for months since the house was abandoned. As they leave, Duane and Stephanie look and see what appears to be the ghosts of Otto and Edna at the window.
CONCLUSION
I think this one dropped a bit for me since my last reading. I still really like it and feel in terms of atmosphere and the general feel of horror stories, there is a lot to like about The Headless Ghost. The book builds up Hill House very well, and builds up the many bizarre incidents that took place there. I mean the dumbwaiter story alone is enough to be a memorable scare. And the build with Seth is well done, playing itself up as a really good misdirect until we get the real Andrew Craw. I just really like the vibe of how haunted the house really feels. But, upon further thought, the ultimate execution of the hauntings feels really flat.
I think the problem comes with how much Hill House is built up. The story of Captain Bell and his ghost. The fates of not just Andrew but the entire Craw family. And even the extra bit with the ice cream boy. So many creepy concepts that just don't feel like they matter in the grand scheme. There's a lot that just feels left on the cutting room floor for what is ultimately a pretty tame adventure through a creepy house up until it ramps up super quick to get us to the head. And, as such, it makes coming back to this book a bit weaker in particular. Doesn't help that Duane and Stephanie aren't that interesting protagonists. Stephanie in particular just comes off as unlikable, while Duane is more cowardly and reasonable, but never gets any moments to really feel interesting.
So, yeah. This is one that kind of feels more lackluster than I remember. Not the worst book ever, but it feels like it's missing something big to make it feel memorable. I'll still give it high marks for scary imagery in the stories and an okay enough twist. In the end, this book ultimately falls into middle ground instead of being the classic I thought it was. It's a shame that while there's a lot to like, this book doesn't quite has its head on its shoulders.
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