My life as a reader began thanks to an evil, living ventriloquist dummy.
If it wasn’t for “Night of the Living Dummy” by R.L. Stine, I probably wouldn’t have gotten into making horror my main reading genre. I’ll never forget that moment when I knew horror was for me.
I was about 12 years old, and visiting my local public library here in Queens, NY. That cover of “Night of the Living Dummy” immediately caught my eye when I was going through the tiny horror section available to me. I read the back cover, never heard of this author, and since it was barely 150 pages, I figured I would check it out to see what it was about.
I remember it was over the weekend, and instead of watching my favorite cartoons over cereal, it was Goosebumps over cereal. I couldn’t put this book down, and once I was done, Slappy left a scar on me that would stay on me forever.
I kept reading more and more Goosebumps by Stine, and loved the terror, scares, characters, and everything else in between. These were easy-to-read paperbacks and widely available, which is what hooked me. I’ve always hated waiting for things, especially for books. But every library and bookstore had several Goosebumps books waiting to be devoured.
Every year at my elementary school, the famous Scholastic Book Fairs were always a blast to visit, especially since they had all sorts of cool, bookish things. Bookmarks, pens, totes, you name it. It was at this moment that I got my hands on a Goosebumps bookmark, which opened up a whole new world of enjoying my favorite book series.
Over time, I would have Goosebumps t-shirts and hats, and I would love watching the TV show. If it wasn’t for finding that random Goosebumps book as a kid, I probably would have gotten into fantasy, mystery, or who knows, maybe I wouldn’t even be the avid reader and book reviewer I am today.
Thanks to Goosebumps, I’ve easily read hundreds of horror books over my life, and even though I dived into other reading genres as well as taken a long break from reading, I came back home in the summer of 2021. It was during the pandemic, and I was getting bored with video games. Late one night, I looked up what fun hobbies to do during that tough time, and lo and behold, the No. 1 hobby was reading.
At the time, it all came back to me. Slappy. Goosebumps. Haunted Masks. Evil Cameras. Summer Camps. I knew it was time to get back into reading horror, and almost five years later, it’s as if I never missed a beat. I get so much joy these days from reading horror books and writing reviews. So much so that it’s added a new layer of fun and excitement to this amazing hobby of reading. I love collecting e-books, wearing horror book-inspired t-shirts, writing book reviews, and discovering new horror authors. I’ll have more info in the future, but I have big plans this summer to make a triumphant return to the world of Goosebumps.
At the end of the day, you never know how your love of reading can happen faster than a New York minute. All it took me was a creepy-looking ventriloquist dummy on a book cover, and the rest is history. Horror is and will forever be my happy place, and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.
Karru Marri Odonna Loma Molonu Karrano
by LTJ81