Choice Words: Give Yourself Goosebumps #16: Secret Agent Grandma

It's time I guess. I've always been weirdly intrigued by this book's existence. From the title to just the general plot, it feels like the strangest concept for a Give Yourself Goosebumps book. Evil grandma alien. The cover doesn't fully help either, but sometimes the best books come in very mediocre packages. Will this be the case here, or are we in for a mess? Let's see with Secret Agent Grandma. 

This cover is not great. And that's not me just ripping on someone's art, it's actually the opinion of Mark Nagata, the cover artist. Mark has actually gone on record with his disappointment in the work. As you might know, Scholastic is the one who sends the artists the general outline for what they want the cover art to be, and unless you're Tim Jacobus and can pull a skeleton picnic out of your ass, you're pretty much beholden to what Scholastic wants. Mark didn't really like the concept given and his multiple attempts to make the art work didn't pan out well. And you can tell by the art itself. The painting of the trees and flowers looks very basic and less detailed. The alien's design is very generic and doesn't feel as cool or unique. The body shape and pose of the alien in the grandma suit are very stiff looking. And the clothing also super generic, but that's what's in the book so...

There are better sketches by Mark where this isn't as much of an issue. Even the sketch of what would be the final book cover looks so much better. But I believe this was also in this weird rush period where some of the book releases were messed up and his time to make a more improved, more engaging work was cut. Notably this was meant to be the 15th book in the series, but got moved back a month while Please Don't Feed the Vampire! took its spot. So I don't really blame Mark for not landing with the final work. Shit happens and they can't all be winners. 

As is the case with these books, given that the protagonist is often presented as the reader and no specific gender is given, I'll be using They/Them and "The Player" when I talk about our protagonist. Cool? Then that's just grand, ma. 

The player's parents are leaving town, so that means the player 's 75 year old grandmother is going to watch him. Grandma is known to wear yellow spandex pants and a purple shirt. So at least Nagata kept to the design. The player arrives at the train station where their name is called on the PA. The player receives a call by their parents which starts to break up, but it seems to be their parents trying to tell them to get out of there. Suddenly, the ground starts to shake. The player can choose to leave or stay, but leaving is a bad ending, so we're not at the official split yet. The ground is shaking on account of the train entering the station. It has the player's friends Chuck and Ginny there as they're going to play hockey, while the player is stuck with their grandma. Eventually Grandma shows up and keeps calling the player "Cookie". 

But before the train leaves, the player sees the words "empleh, empleh" written on a train window. Which gives us our first actual split in the plot... which is what you would think but one is just another bad ending. Man, this might be the longest so far without a proper plot split. The player immediately realizes the words spell out Help Me. When they look inside, they see a woman who looks exactly like Grandma being accosted by two agents. But grandma's outside calling a taxi. So after a surprising stretch, we finally get our true split in the path. Do we investigate what's going on with the grandma in the train, or follow the one outside?

PATH #1: GARDEN OF EVIL

The player opts not to help the grandma on the train and heads to the taxi with the definitely real Grandma, where she is really invested in the rose garden at the player's house, because she planted eggs-err, seeds in the garden during a meteor shower fifteen years ago and they should be ready to grow. The pair arrive, but the taxi driver is unable to lift the bags and inquires what's inside, which is a path. Open or not open the bags. The good ending requires not to, so we don't snoop. Grandma observes the rose garden as strange flowers begin to grow. She continues to show a bad poker face, but it's okay because the player is still being an idiot and not putting two and two together. The player then meets their friends Sophie and Andrew who bring up that there's a meteor shower tonight and, coincidentally, a meteor hit the player's house during the meteor shower fifteen years ago. What a coinkydink. 

The kids then see Grandma in the rose garden wearing a shiny silver suit. You could introduce Sophie and Andrew to her, or spy. Path says to spy, so we're spying. Either by searching her room or spying on her in the garden. Sneaking around a possible-but very likely-alien seems a bad call, so spying in her room it is. Then another split of searching under the bed or the closet. Wow, for all my issues of it taking so long to get to the split we're getting some super quick splits now. Closet's the choice and the kids find rubber hands and feet. But before they can wonder what's going on, Grandma approaches, so it's either stay in the closet or jump out the window. Defenestration is not the call, staying in the closet is. They manage to hide from Grandma long enough for her to leave. The kids find more stuff related to the meteor shower from fifteen years ago. They could ask their Grandma about it, because she's been so trusting, or wait until the shower happens to get their answer. It's a wait out since, I mean, asking does sound like a dumb call.

The time arrives and the kids watch as Grandma is in the garden. She tears off her face and skin to reveal a one-eyed purple alien underneath. The eggs in the garden begin to hatch, revealing smaller versions of the alien, who instructs them to find human outfits so they can finally enact their plan to take over the world. So now the player has to either stop them, or tell Andrew's parents first. I mean, you know the right path here. No way would telling parents be the right call because Goosebumps Parents. So the player, Sophie and Andrew try to put a stop to the aliens instead. And that's initially by throwing stuff from Grandma's bedroom at them, which works for a bit, but not fully. However, when her radio is thrown, it begins to play music which kills the aliens. The kids use a stereo and play music from it, which Grandma puts a stop to, but singing "Happy Birthday" does the trick, killing alien Grandma. The kids celebrate, with the player saying they should form a band to really knock 'em dead. So yeah, big evil alien invasion stopped by music. Alien Grandma clearly didn't think this thing through for 15 years. And that's also the only good ending path for this one, so let's see what happens when we follow the Grandma on the train.

PATH #2: THROW GRANDMA FROM THE TRAIN

The player heads into the train to see what's going on with the woman that looked like Grandma. The player could ask for help from the passengers or continue searching. We know that asking anyone anything is a pointless endeavor in the world of Goosebumps, so following the trail it is. That is until the conductor shows up asking for the player's ticket. Either explain or stall, but, again, talking to people is pointless, so the player stalls until Chuck and Ginny arrive and they tag along with them. The player tells the two about the Grandma being hauled off by agents, so the three search. They find Grandma in a baggage room, tied to a chair and under an orange light. Chuck walks under it, like an idiot, and freezes in place. It turns out the beam is a force field that keeps people in stasis mode. Soon the agents show back up and remove their glasses to reveal strange ping-pong ball-looking eyes and reptilian faces. Here we go with Stine and lizard people again.

The next option is go for the attack, or stall and wait. You'd think stalling would be the right call, but surprisingly no, the kids confront the agents by throwing luggage at them. However, Ginny ends up being caught, so the player and Chuck find the conductor... who is also an alien with tentacles. And I audibly went "Aw crap". But the tentacles grab the kids. Now we have the only real path in the book that could lead to good endings. Either by punching the alien or biting the tentacle. So hey, two paths that resort to violence, atta boy Bob. So we'll start with biting the tentacle. Biting the alien causes it to panic and knock over the force beam on Grandma, who then gets up and beats the crap out of the aliens because she's good at karate. She asks the kids to get her bags, to which they find secret government files inside. Before they can ask Grandma what's up, another Grandma shows up, saying the other's an impostor. Yup, figured we'd get a split like this, so is it #1 or #2? The good ending answer is #1. Grandma #2 freaks out, to which more Grandmas show up. Yeah, turns out the player's Grandma, the real one, is a scientist who created clones that the government and aliens want the secrets to. So now the player has five grandmas and a happy enough ending.

Okay, that's the path taken by biting an alien, but what if we punched it in the head instead? Punching the alien angers it, to which it tells the kids that Grandma is actually an evil alien named Mithra-Dithra who is trying to rule the solar system. It leads the kids to its spaceship and... vomits out alien dogs named Fido what the hell are you smoking, Bob? He has Fido attack the kids unless they tell it about where the player's home and flower garden are. We can either tell the alien or bluff out of it. Both are actually good endings. We'll start with telling the alien the player's address. The alien takes the kids back to the player's house and crushes the flowers with its ship. It apologizes and then plants new flowers which are gigantic roses. But more importantly the alien invasion is thwarted. And if we stall? Well the player reveals they are Smithra-Dithra and blasts the aliens with beams from their fingers. Grandma shows up and is proud of the player, and the two go on to rule the galaxy while Chuck and Ginny get to rule their own solar systems. Happy ending? I mean happy ending for YOU, not the galaxy. I guess that counts.

We have nineteen bad endings in this book. There is actually a third path to take in the book, which does give us the "secret agent" gimmick of the book. However, there are zero good endings that way, so that's a good old fashioned Stine screwover. But let's see just how screwed the player is by rating the bad endings. Faster Grandma, Grandma's gaining on us!

#01: The player opts to leave the train station but falls into a garbage truck. 

RATING: 1.5. At least it's better than the whole "You stupid kid, you really chose THAT? Go back to the previous page" gimmick. 

#02: It takes a minute for the player to realize "empleh" is "Help Me", but grandma, an alien, forces the player to take her to their mother's rose garden where her alien eggs hatch, ready to take over the wold. 

RATING: 2. Escalates a little weirdly, but still a neat ending.

#03: The kids tell Andrew's parents, but surprise, they're also the same aliens as Grandma . Andrew then takes out a baby alien that starts to eat the player's ear.

RATING: 2.5. Good build and a creepy enough ending. And this is why I say Because Goosebumps Parents.

#04: Hiding under the bed doesn't work and Grandma spits acid webs at the kids which begin to melt them.

RATING: 4. Super dark ending, super gross at that. The kind of memorable twist I wasn't expecting from a book called Secret Agent Grandma. 

#05: After escaping the special agent, the kids board the train, only it's a ghost train and they can never leave.

RATING: 3. This is mainly a book about aliens, but this is still a neat supernatural twist. Is it too dated to make a Sabin reference?

#06: The kids are about to squirt the aliens, but they tell them that Grandma was holding them captive. The special agent takes Grandma and now the player is left with the tiny aliens.

RATING: 2. Kind of falls more in ambiguous than straight up bad. Though I guess having to care for tiny aliens is still a bad situation...

#07: The special agents turns out to be an alien all along and drags the kids inside a train to presumably kill them.

RATING: 3.5. Good swerve and a dark twist. 

#08: Grandma reveals that she's actually an alien and so is the player and that all of this was staged for a movie.

RATING: 1.5. Not the worst idea ever, but a bit too overblown and far from the strongest way to pull the "Alien all along" swerve.

#09: The player wakes up to see their parents made scrambled eggs out of the alien eggs, so now that the player is eaten it, their fate seems to be either dying or becoming an alien.

RATING: 2.5. Not bad, BUT this would be a twist Stine would crib for My Friends Call Me Monster. 

#10: Stepping foot in the garden turns out to be a bad call as Grandma prepared for this and planted landmines. 

RATING: 3. Now that's how you pull a twist. And it would make sense that an alien would have something like landmines planned in case their plan goes bust. 

#11: Introducing Andrew and Sophie turns out to be a bad call as the player then sees a tendril grow out of the ground. An alien spits red goo on them, tuning the player into a giant rose.

RATING: 3.5. I like this one. Plays into what I said above this one that of course an alien would have planned for stuff like this. Plus the idea of being turned into a plant is super dark. Good stuff. 

#12: Opening the suitcase reveals a giant rosebush. A giant rose then eats the taxi driver, with Grandma saying that the player will be desert.

RATING: 3. I will say, another really decent twist. Stine actually put thought into flower-based twists with this one.

#13: A kid knocks over the player and Grandma, sending her device into the toilet and... that's it.

RATING: 0. No, seriously, what the hell was that one? So could nobody grab the device from the toilet? Did it break in the toilet water? Did it flush down? Is the boy going to defecate on it? I think it's apropos to call this one a crappy ending. That's what I get for praising him I guess.

#14: The floppy disk contains all of the video games coming out next year. The player is so enthralled they ignore the thugs coming in to attack.

RATING: 2. A lot of build to it and it is a silly enough ending. And given their litigious nature I could buy Nintendo sending thugs to kill a leaker.

#15: Picking the second Grandma reveals that she was the alien all along.

RATING: 2.5. I mean that's as obvious a twist as you could get with this type of story.

#16: The player leaps off the train. However, they did so over a bridge. And as they fall, they see that the train was hosting a costume party, so yeah, good call there champ.

RATING: 3. Would have been lower had Stine not added the fun little swerve of the kid jumping to their death being extremely pointless. Now this is fun Goosebumps.

#17: The kids wind up at an alien meeting, which is just a bunch of boring jargon about real estate and parking. So they get kicked out for snoring.

RATING: 2.5. Another one I found funny. A good swerve on the idea of a big alien meeting being exciting only to find out aliens are just really, really dull. Save for the toilet one, Stine's on his A game with this one.

#18: The book scolds the player for not taking the chance to encounter the aliens. 

RATING: 3. This of course is a staple, but there's just always something hilarious about Stine doing something to the extent of "You stupid moron, you dumb dillweed, why are you even reading these books you're so lame. Thanks for the money, sucker."

#19: The conductor doesn't believe the player and throws them from the train. The other grandma on the platform grounds them for jumping on a train.

RATING: 2. A fine way to screw the player over for, admittedly, a dumb idea.

BEST ALTERNATE ENDING: MELTING FOR YOU

WORST ALTERNATE ENDING: LITERAL TOILET HUMOR

You know what they say? Don't judge a book by it's cover. And yeah, that is not a great cover. But the contents within do feel like Stine had fun with this one. There's a lot of build with both stories, a lot of action, some solid horror and a lot of fun bad endings here. After the last few were far more middle of the road, this one feels like Stine really had a lot of ideas as to how to screw over the reader. Granted, it's not exactly as much "Secret Agent" grandma as it is "Secret Alien" grandma. But we do get at least a couple paths that do take the secret agent idea, so it's not a title bait and switch. You get two paths to good endings, and both surprisingly connect quite well, both focusing on the idea of the rose garden. The non-train one focuses on it more and I do think is the one Stine put the most effort into. A lot of build, some intrigue about the items in the closet, the alien eggs, the meteor shower, the final battle. I don't even mind that the way to beat the aliens ultimately boiled down to music. I mean we've had aliens felled by water and human germs before, so this shouldn't be too shocking. Even if, again, alien Grandma should have thought this through. Bring earplugs at least.

The train path is the more action packed of the two, giving us a lot more suspense and thrills. And I do like that we have two paths to good endings that revolve around how we go about violence towards said aliens. Punch or bite. Fist to face or mouthful of alien germs. My only issue is I feel all the good endings in the train path feel super rushed and lack a big fun finale. The clone Grandmas is good, but I was hoping for more. We get a bunch of supporting characters for both paths, which is fine, but despite the book trying to give them more character, they do sort of just blend into the background. None being Superfluous Clay, but none I'd remember outside of this book. And the endings, for the majority, are really good. Some decent violence, some fun screw-overs, and my favorite moment of Stine berating the reader that we've gotten so far. So, yeah. I really liked this one. Is it the best horror concept ever? Not really? But there's fun variety in the endings and the book flows well. So after all my years of rolling my eyes, I apologize to Secret Agent Grandma. Clearly I didn't know you had game. Secret Agent Grandma gets an A.