NNtG: Ghosts of Fear Street #11: The Boy Who Ate Fear Street

CONTENT WARNING: LOTS OF TALK ABOUT EATING GROSS STUFF, SO QUICK HEADS UP JUST IN CASE YOU DON'T HAVE THE STOMACH FOR THIS ONE. 

It's time for another serving of Ghosts of Fear Street. And we have quite the full plate on our hands this time. This is actually a Ghosts Book that I know the twist of beforehand so I know what's coming. Maybe it's why this one hasn't been a priority book. But what better time than now to put this one on the menu? Open wide, it's The Boy Who Ate Fear Street.

This cover is as gross as it is overly cartoonish. In other words, a perfect cover. One of Broeck Steadman's best. You have the bugs and dirt for the gross out factor, while also having the boy's cartoonish face. Be it the eerie green skin tone or the giant chipmunk cheeks. He's clearly eating Fear Street, but he's not doing a good job keeping it all down. Definitely one of the best Ghosts covers if not kids horror covers out there. Bravo.

Sam Kinny is a kid who hates surprises. He also hates how his rosy cheeks are constantly pinched by people. But he does like the news from his friend Kevin Sullivan that he's... wait, Kevin Sullivan? His best friend is the Taskmaster? After he leaves, does Sam tell Kevin "I Respect You, Booker Man!". If I didn't make a wrestling reference, I'd have gone nuts... Anyway, Sam's invited over for dinner. Sam loves macaroni and cheese, white rice and raisins and marshmallows. Surprised he hasn't got room for some saltines and ice milk. In fact, most of the food he eats is white. Possibly rich in its whiteness. Sam doesn't always eat bland white food. He enjoys Coke, that's not white. Well, not THAT coke. Also he doesn't drink Coke, but Sprite. This book came out a couple years prior, I'd be certain that Sam would be enjoying a nice, pointless Crystal Pepsi.

Sam heads out, but stops to talk with his parents. His mom is a doll maker and his dad is a handyman. If you already guessed where this is going, cool, but we're super early. Sam meets with Kevin and his sister Lissa. Lissa mentions that their Great-Aunt Sylvie has shown up to live with them for a month. She's really cool, teaching them karate moves and cooking up something fierce. Complete with a spice rack and everything. She also possibly talks with the dead. That's concerning. As she's working on something in a pot, she gives Sam a spoonful to taste. He starts to gag a bit at the smell, since again, he's only eaten bland food. 

Kevin drags Sam to Sylvie's room where she has a weird voodoo mask on the wall, which is concerning for a few reasons, as is the mirror with eyes carved into the back of it. As Kevin and Lissa go to eat, Sam notices that something is crawling on him. A snake. Yes, Sylvie has a snake named Shirley. Somehow that's less concerning than the eye mirror and voodoo mask. See, Sylvie has all sorts of healing powers. She goes all around the world learning stories about ancient sprits and learning mystical spells. Also she's really into crystals which, yeah that checks out. It's why she's in Shadyside, specifically on, where else, Fear Street. All the stories about the supernatural events, particularly the ghosts. The ghosts that may reside on Fear Street. The R.L. Stine's Ghosts of Fear Street if you will. I mean, ghosts are one thing, wait till she learns about the monkey skull cult and the evil entity that keeps possessing cheerleaders. 

Sam is about to leave, but Sylvie promises that he doesn't have to eat what Kevin and Lissa eat. She made him some nice, bland, white as Casper's ass mac and cheese. She tells the story of a kid who ate bland food, but when his two friends ate a random berry, they started to eat everything they could get their hands on and then got so fat they became Mr. Creosote and exploded. She then serves Sam some rice pudding. He enjoys it until his throat suddenly starts to burn. Turns out that Aunt Sylvie added a spice from the Orient, though she blames it on Great-Uncle Henry. Sam is more concerned that despite him being forced to eat the pudding, Sylvie doesn't eat any of it. 

After that incident, Sam returns home and goes immediately to bed. And then wakes up and goes to bread. As in making a sandwich in the middle of the night. He starts to eat it and really enjoys it in a way he doesn't usually enjoy his sandwiches. However, he soon realizes that the bread he used was actually a pair of sponges. He actually made himself a sponge and lemon detergent sandwich. The next day, he finds the milk to taste awful and his cream of wheat to taste like sand mixed with vinegar. Given this kid eats the blandest foods, I'm surprised he knows what vinegar would even taste like. He goes to use the TV and pet his dog Fred, but keeps making strange static shocks. Again, you probably know where we're going, but we're still a bit away.

At school, Sam is still getting shocks, so Lissa and Kevin suggest shocking Lucas Johnson in the back of the neck. Sam does so, but the shock is so powerful, it kills Lucas instantl-Oh, of course it doesn't. It was all a joke at Sam's expense. But even Sam gets a good laugh at it and moves on from this whole incident and decides to skip lunch. The new art teacher, Ms. Munson, asks Sam to help paste some posters to salute Autumn at Shadyside. And, in Ralph Wiggum-esque fashion, Sam ends up eating some of the paste. And like does it in a creepy almost pleasurable manner which, when even I'm creeped out by that, maybe we're on to something with this book. Kevin catches him eating the paste, but Sam pulls the worst poker face and claims that he thought it was mayonnaise. You know those art rooms and their mayonnaise. 

At gym, Sam and his class run the bleachers. Normally, this is usually a piece of bland white cake for Sam, but he finds himself too weak to do anything. But enough of that, Lissa and Kevin want Sam to come over as apparently Aunt Sylvie channeled the spirit of Bruce Lee to help them learn martial arts. What in the hell am I reading? Sam opts out of that and heads home. He again eats white food and doesn't like it. He does however think about eating dog food from Fred's bowl, but he opts out of it. He does find some chocolate flakes and eats them. No. Wait. He's eating fleas. No seriously, what the hell is this book? 

So yeah. That happened. Sam tries to call Kevin, but keeps getting Aunt Sylvie who can't hear him and hangs up a couple times. But in fairness, Sam is suddenly the Micro Machines guy and is talking so fast that of course no one could understand him. But with all of this happening, he's convinced that whatever Sylvie put in that rice must have put some sort of curse on him. He tries to tell Kevin and Lissa, but Sylvie shows up and gives him a bag containing a pair of eyes! No. Wait, blue stones that Sam's mom can use for one of her dolls. She mentions that she can see into Sam. A lot of Yin, but not enough Yang, which is what she learned from a Chinese witch doctor. Again, need to reiterate, what the hell is this book?

As Sam again tries to explain to Lissa and Kevin, he starts to pour pepper into his hand and lick it up. And then he can only speak by making dog references. He does finally spit it out about being cursed. Kevin and Lissa don't believe he could be cursed. Then Sam cuts his hand on the table causing blue blood to spray out. He rushes home and tries to call a doctor. When the only one available is a vet, he is about to go there before Kevin and Lissa tell him that he should go with them. But, he's still worried about Sylvie. And then he starts eating leaves. You know what they say, leaves of four, eat some more. But it's not just leaves this time. Dirt, flowers, and worms. Yes, we get more actual eating of worms than we got in the book Go Eat Worms!

Sam gets dragged into the house as Kevin and Lissa try to find any answers. But this gives Sam time to just eat all of Sylvie's face cream. That's more than enough for the siblings who say that the only way Sam's getting rid of this is to confront Sylvie. They do just that and learn that Sylvie is a witch doctor. She makes a chant which, no, does not contain the words "walla walla bing bang". She then reveals that actually, she was full of crap and not actually a witch doctor. She was screwing with Sam's head some more. She says that she never put any curse on Sam. But not only does he not believe her, but he sees that he's starting to swell up. Hopefully he doesn't eat anything wafeur thin. He rushes home and shows his parents the damage. They realize immediately what happened. Add if you guessed it correctly, congrats.

You see, Sam is actually a robot. Yup. He's a robot child with a functioning digestive system and a heart and everything else. A delicate system that can only take the blandest of foods to go through. Anything remotely spicy will fry his circuits. That also explains the shocks and his body reacting weirdly. Also, I guess he's one of his mom's dolls too which is really weird, but okay. Later, a now fully functional Sam heads back to Kevin and Lissa's. And I guess his system is fixed as he can now eat ketchup in sandwiches and meatballs and stuff.

This is another visit from our friend Stephen Roos. It's also our final book from his (In the order I read them that is) which is a shame as I like his books. I even really like this one, but I will say it feels really chaotic. Both in a good, crazy book misadventures way and in a roughshod, we need a swerve to make it not count with Aunt Sylvie sort of conclusion. Almost feels like there probably was some sort of connection to Sylvie with all of her weirdness, but it went in such a bizarre direction that I don't think it could have worked all too well either. So instead we get the robot ending and honestly, while super predictable, it's still a solid enough twist. Though, again why this robot/doll has functioning organs of any kind is weird, but I guess the Kinnys are just damn good robot doll makers. 

If you want gross stuff in your horror, you've come to the right place. This book is chock full of some of the more screwed up moments in any of these books I've read. Be it the paste eating scene or the fleas or the blue blood or the insanity of Sam eating everything in sight. Never to a super over the top fashion. Like, if this were a Stine book, the snake or the dog would no doubt have been eaten. But what we still get is effective and memorable, which I think is testament to one of the better horror for kids ideas we've gotten from these books. Even if it came with a lot of bizarre, confusing stuff in the middle. So less dizzying highs or terrifying lows, but creamy middles. So creamy you want to just double fist'em and stuff in your mouth like a bizarre chipmunk.

Sam is an okay protagonist. Bland, but for once that's actually part of the character's traits. That he can only eat bland food and anything with any spice to it could screw him up. Kevin and Lissa are okay side characters and Aunt Sylvie is a decent red herring. Never feeling inherently evil, but never feeling like someone that Sam should trust. Hits in sort of that Aunt Kathryn from Monster Blood vibe of wondering what her deal was. Was she really a witch doctor who could talk to spirits, or just probably senile? I guess the latter is the correct answer. 

So, overall, I liked this one. You could argue it gets a bit too weird and takes some strange turns, not to mention a rather predictable twist, but the general plot is fun and the gross scares actually work in this book's favor. So, once again I leave a Ghosts book feeling like I didn't waste my time and I enjoyed what I read. I leave full and satisfied and hardly Hangry. Now that's food for thought. The Boy Who Ate Fear Street gets a B+.