Review - Goosebumps Most Wanted: Creature Teacher: The Final Exam

Goosebumps Most Wanted - Creature Teacher: The Final Exam
By R.L. Stine
Publisher: Scholastic
Pub. Date: February 25, 2014
List Price: $6.99
ASIN: 978-0545627733
Pages: 160
Buy Links: Paperback, Kindle

Review:

Author R.L. Stine has been scaring kids with his Goosebumps books since 1992. The creepy book series was inspired by the Twilight Zone, in which both usually had a shocking ending, but course Stine's stories involved kids as the main characters. A television series of the same name aired from 1995 to 1998, which most of the episodes have crawled their way onto DVDs over the last several years. The books were so popular that several spin-off series were created, Give Yourself Goosebumps, Tales to Give You Goosebumps and Goosebumps Presents and Goosebumps Series 2000. Stine took a slight break from the Goosebumps world, but returned in 2008 with a brand-new series Goosebumps Horrorland and later followed by Goosebumps Hall of Horrors.

The latest series is titled Goosebumps Most Wanted, where Stine's favorite villains return to haunt a new generation of readers. The newest installment, Creature Teacher: The Final Exam, hit bookshelves yesterday; which is a sequel to 1998's Goosebumps Series 2000: Creature Teacher.

This terrifying tale centers on twelve-year-old Tommy Farrelly, who is not looking forward to spending the rest of his summer at Winner Island Camp, a camp that teaches you how to become a winner. The camp's tag-line is: Winners Are Always Winners. His parents are winners at everything, as well as his younger sister, so he is being sent to a strange camp to learn how to be like them.

Upon arriving at Winner's Island Camp a few days late, Tommy meets Ricardo and Sophie and learns of the camp's terrible secret. Each kid will leave the camp a winner, well, except for one loser - who will be eaten by the "teacher" Mrs. Maaargh, and Tommy happens to be on the bottom of the winners' list.

There were many horror books aimed for middle graders and young adults throughout the 90s and Goosebumps happens to be the only series still being published today (Though Stine's Fear Street is returning later this year.). With freakish cover art on the covers and shocking endings, generations of kids (and some adults) have been scared-to-death by R.L. Stine's storytelling. The sixth entry in the Goosebumps Most Wanted series may creep a few kids into not wanting to attend camp this summer, so they may be better off reading the book after they arrive at camp, but, then again, they will probably want to return home.

R.L. Stine uses short chapters to keep his readers turning the pages, which in fact made me read this book in a short amount of time yesterday. I've been a fan of the author since I was a kid and I have continued to read his titles into my early thirties. The books in the Most Wanted series opens up with R.L.Stine introducing his readers to the "Most Wanted" wall, where the books shifts to the point-of-view of a middle grader. Goosebumps Most Wanted: Creature Teacher: The Final Exam is a fun well-written horror story for kids. I enjoyed reading it and recommend it to other readers, young and old.

*Disclaimer - I received a complimentary copy in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.