by Nelson
Reader Beware; You’re in for a Scare!
Join us as DoubtFire ventures into the terrifying world of zombies, werewolves, egg monsters, and annoying siblings that is GOOSEBUMPS.
You Can’t Scare Me! is absolutely hilarious. Since coming back to these books as a part of my descent into a full-on midlife crisis, this entry is the first one that had me laughing out loud every few chapters. That said, you don’t have to do too much research to discover that this isn’t one of the series’ more popular titles – with a common consensus that the cover art promises a more exciting story than we actually get. But, more so than the “deceptive” artwork, the fifteenth Goosebumps book doesn’t really feel much like Goosebumps at all, and I can’t help but wonder if this originated as an unpublished manuscript from one of Stine’s earlier series like Rotten School. We do eventually get a scene with the mud folks rising from the depths, but they’re hardly the focus of the book. Instead, this one is all about four kids trying to put the school’s popular girl in her place.
Our story gives us a nice, well-balanced group of kids – two boys and two girls – who are obsessed with how their classmate Courtney can seemingly do no wrong. Eddie, our main character, gets embarrassed during a field trip when he stumbles on a green snake and has a straight up fit until Courtney shows up, pets the thing, and condescendingly tells him how harmless green snakes are. From there, Eddie, his buddy Harry (but call him Hat because he always wears a hat and these Goosebumps kids come up with some of the most creative nicknames in the world), Molly, and Charlene make a pact to take sweet revenge and reduce Courtney to a quivering shell of a human being. Their only problem is that every single attempt goes terribly awry. They try putting a rubber snake in her lunch bag, but she winds up giving her lunch to their teacher because he left his lunch at home and has the audacity to take food from one of his own students. Anyway, the snake terrifies the teacher, but Courtney springs to the rescue and proceeds to stomp the rubber reptile until it breaks in half. An attempt to drop a tarantula on her head goes wrong and leads to Courtney holding the spider in her hand and giving a lecture to the class on how harmless the furry little fella is. Eddie and pals even have to deal with the sheer perfection that is Courtney when they’re not trying to play pranks on her – like when the neighbor’s cat gets stuck up a tree. Eddie is hesitant to climb up and retrieve it because he doesn’t like heights, but Guess Who shows up out of nowhere, shoots up the tree, rescues the cat, and takes a moment to tell everyone how much she loves climbing things before heading off.
Things come to a head when the four pals decide to try and use their town’s Local Legend against their classmate. See, it seems that Mud Monsters rise up out of Muddy Creek once a year and…hang out in the woods and stuff. Eddie’s older brother happens to be making a short movie about the creatures, and he’s got a costume that everyone decides would be perfect for finally unleashing pure, unadulterated horror on poor Courtney. So the Fearsome Foursome concoct a scheme to lure their target to the creek at night where Eddie’s older brother will show up in his Mud Monster outfit and teach Little Miss Perfect a lesson about being difficult to frighten. At this point, it’s pretty obvious how this is going to go. The real Mud Monsters show up and send all of the kids running out of the woods in terror. But, hey, Courtney finally got scared, and everyone will know what a pathetic little coward she really is, right? Nah. The story ends with the revelation that Courtney’s encounter with the monsters has cemented her status as the hero of the school, and Eddie and pals finally decide to leave her alone because they’re too scared to try anything else. And, honestly, they should just give up. These kids are terrible at pranks. No one even tried to sneak an earthworm into Courtney’s lunch.
Mr. Melvin let out another cry, and the snake dropped to the floor.
The room filled with startled shrieks and cries.
Courtney leapt up from her seat. She gave Mr. Melvin a gentle shove to move him out of the way. Then she began stomping on the snake. Fierce, hard stomps.
Heroic stomps.
A few seconds later, she picked the snake up and flashed Mr. Melvin a triumphant grin.
Doubtfire 
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