April Fools - Richie Tankersley Cusick

Oh, RTC, you know I can’t stay away for long. And here I am back again, unable to resist your loving arms with April Fools. And you know what? It’s pretty pretty good. If you replace the word ‘good’ with the word ‘shit’, that is. SLAM!




So, let’s set the scene – Belinda is best chums with Hildy and Frank, who are a couple. Belinda once had the hots for Frank herself but he chose Hildy. I don’t know why anyone would have the hots for Frank as he is an absolute imbecile. Exhibit A: the book opens with Belinda, Hildy and Frank driving home from an April Fool’s party (is this a thing?! How come I’ve never been invited to an April Fool’s party?!). Frank is drink driving because drink driving is totally 90s.


Upon reaching a hairpin bend, another car approaches them, honking away, and Frank decides to “give these hotshots a scare.” That’s probably the only time you’ll ever get to read the word ‘hotshot’ and the word ‘honking’ in the same sentence. W00t. And give them a scare Frank does, basically running them off the road and into a gorge. Why is there always a gorge? I don’t think I’ve ever even seen a gorge.

Anyway, Belinda wants to help the people in the gorge but Hildy and Frank are all like, “Belinda! Noooo.” And the car in the gorge goes KABOOM, but not before Belinda catches a glimpse of someone burning to death in the car. And also spots a man watching the three of them from above, who suspiciously remains unresponsive to Belinda’s cries for help.

Two weeks later, Hildy and Frank are ragging on Belinda for being upset. Jesus, it’s only been 2 weeks since they basically killed a carful of people Hildy totally tries to justify it by being all, “you know Frank, he’s always joking, that was totally just a joke, and those people should have watched where they were driving, as if their fiery death was EVEN our fault” Umm, Hildy? It kinda was your fault. She even accuses Belinda of being “dramatic”, saying “you’re acting like this is some kind of huge tragedy or something,.” Speechless.

Hildy also thinks they totes did the right thing by not telling the police about the accident, because Frank would get chucked off the swim team for drink driving, and Hildy was meant to be grounded so her parents would be pissed. Yeah, and the prison thing. Don’t forget the prison thing Hildy. Hildy doesn’t believe Belinda when she says there was a man there watching them. Belinda’s worried this man’s going to come after them. I'd agree that that’s a pretty safe bet

Belinda’s super smart, so she gets hired to be a tutor by some chick called Mrs Thorne. She needs a tutor for her stepson, Adam Thorne as he’s ill. The reason he’s ill is…because of the car accident he was in 2 weeks ago. Dun dun dunn. Mrs Thorne was also in the accident and escaped with just a few bruises, together with her husband, Adam’s dad who wasn’t so lucky and is currently in a coma. She’s a really cold bitch and she makes no secret of the fact that she hates Adam and really doesn’t give a shit about him.

Belinda tells Hildy but Hildy’s a psychopath and still doesn’t understand why she should care. There’s something about that Hildy that I really like. Hildy actually finds the whole situation hilariously funny. Like, irony or whatever. Frank and Hildy both think Belinda is insane for even thinking that this could be the SAME car accident. Okay psychos, either way you’ve definitely killed someone though, right?

Hildy actually thinks it all sounds incredibly romantic and encourages Belinda to agree to tutor Adam Thorne. He might be cute, right? And Frank thinks everything’s okay because there’s no way anyone could have survived their car accident. Him and Hildy are really made for each other.

Belinda goes to meet Adam at his super swish mansion and is warned by Mrs Thorne that he’s pretty hostile. Sure enough, Adam slinks in on a walking cane and talks to her from the shadows. It's kind of a beauty and the beast type bonding moment. Pathetically, Belinda actually faints. And then as she comes round she sees his face hovering over her and he’s all covered in gashes and icky looking. Understandably, Adam’s a bit upset that she actually fainted and Belinda leaves. There’s a spark between these two through, a spark I tells ya.

On her way out of her house, Belinda meets the butler or whatever, Mr Cobbs. Its quite a dramatic meeting, given that he’s raising a bloody meat cleaver over head. But don’t worry, that has a perfectly innocent explanation I guess. She also discovers shitloads of boxes full of poisonous snakes. Sigh, rich people, eh?
Cobbs make Belinda a lovely cup of tea. She figures out that he’s English because of : “Your accent of course. And you’re very…stiff.” Well, excuuuuuse me for having manners, Miss USA.

Belinda discovers that Adam has a stepbrother called Noel, who is Mrs Thorne’s son. She also sees a picture of Adam from before the accident. He’s a hotty mctotty. “He looked beautiful and evil at the same time and Belinda’s eye filled with tears.” How romantic.

So Belinda decides to take the job, and a bunch of weird stuff starts happening to her – she finds a doll’s head covered in blood and entrails in her mailbox, she gets sent a calendar with April Fool’s day marked in blood etc etc. Belinda suspects that hilarious prankster Frank may be behind all this but he totally flips out when she confronts him and is all, “you’d better not go to the police, cos if you do….”

A couple of days later, Belinda walks through the park to get to the Thorne’s house and a “windblown leaf” makes her jump. This girl really needs to toughen up. Then she realises that she’s wearing the jacket from the night of the accident, and it has a rag she picked up that fateful night in her pocket, it’s a blood-soaked hankie with the initial A on it. Gasp! A for….Adam?

When Belinda reaches the house, Mrs Thorne’s leaving for a business trip for a few days. Adam freaks Belinda out and she runs out of his room – bumping into his step-brother Noel. Who is also a hotty mctotty, but in more of a laid back, less…DANGEROUS kind of way. Noel offers to drive Belinda home.

They talk about Adam – Noel says he really doesn’t know Adam very well – their parents only married 3 years ago and they’ve been at separate schools. Noel doesn’t even know where Adam’s mother lives. Noel says that Adam’s always been kind of weird and scary, that has nothing to do with the accident. He also tells Belinda that his own mother (Mrs Thorne) is a massive bitch who only married Adam’s dad for the money. A girl’s gotta hustle for a living, yo.

A few days later, Belinda goes back to the Thorne house and Cobbs acts all weird, and is like you should leave and never come back and Belinda kind of laughs and then he’s like, I need to shut the door now, so come in, and I’m like WTF is going on here. Cobbs is properly dry. I think he’s meant to be super witty. He’s not. Belinda decides she likes Cobbs after blabbing on to him about her problems whilst he listens politely. These Americans huh. Belinda doesn’t even bother visiting Adam. Hmmm, maybe RTC has upped the inappropriate relationship stakes and Belinda’s going to start macking with the ancient British butler.

On her walk home through the park, Belinda sees a car there “waiting for her”. This book really makes very little sense. The car doesn’t move or anything but Belinda just totally loses her shit and runs back to the Thorne house, to the safety of Cobbs. But Cobbs doesn’t open the door, Adam does.Oh yeah, he also has a snake hanging around his neck. As you do.

Belinda’s bleeding from when she spazzed out and fell over after the horror of seeing a stationary car, so Adam fixes up her cut. Adam reveals all this creepy knowledge he knows about Belinda and he’s all stroking his finger down her face and stuff, and kind of hinting that he’s seen her somewhere before and that she might have a secret and also keeps going on about how gross his accident was. What a downer.

Luckily, Noel appears and saves Belinda from the weirdness. He drives her home and she tells him that someone in a car was ‘chasing’ her (which, frankly, I think is stretching the truth.) Belinda’s suspicious that it could have been Adam in the car. Noel thinks this is a ridiculous idea as Adam can barely even walk.

Hildy arrives round at Belinda’s house, thankfully sans her douche bag boyfriend Frank this time. Belinda tells Hildy that now she’s sure that it was the same accident, and that Adam may have seen her and is now wreaking some terrible revenge. Noel arrives at Belinda’s house again like 5 minutes after dropping her off. Why? And then they spot Cobbs, standing outside the house and staring creepily inside. Never trust the British, am I right? Noel and Hildy convince Belinda that her eye(s) may have been playing tricks on her.

Noel decides to tell Belinda some stuff about Adam – Adam has a history of imaganing things and being a compulsive liar. Noel also tells her that Adam is having a delusion that someone else started the car accident. Ummm, that ain’t no delusion, bro. And Mrs Thorne doesn’t even remember what happened, she’s always on a shitlaod of pills. Buzzing her tits off, mate. Oh, there’s also some picnic thing that people keep going on about and Noel asks Belinda to be his date.

Next day, Belinda’s back at the Thorne house and she marches right up to Adam’s room, having decided not to put up with any more of his creepy shit. She’s all, turn on the lights, yo! I feel so empowered! Adam’s all creepy as usual, and the bloody handkerchief that Belinda found in her pocket about a million years ago falls out her pocket. And Adam, sees it, and we knows that he knows that this means Belinda was definitely at the accident. Or something.

Belinda freaks out and uses the phone to call a cab. She overhears Adam on the phone to his dad’s doctor, and he’s all, when’s the old guy gonna hurry up and die? And basically drops massive hints that he’s going to kill his dad somehow. This kid’s not even TRYING to act sane.

At the picnic, Belinda and Noel are all laughter and joy. They suck face. Noel drives Belinda home,. They get rammed from behind by another car. They end up skidding and just miss landing in a ditch. Belinda tells Noel she thinks it was Adam and he loses his shit, all Adam can't even walk, as if he’d do this, and how comes you’re always going on about Adam anyway?

They drive back to Noel's house together, as Belinda doesn’t feel safe staying at home. Steamy. Adam and Cobbs are both out, having gone to the movies together. Hmm. I wonder if they DROVE to the movies. Noel lends Belinda a silky nightgown of his moms, then comes back and gets all cosy with her in the nightgown, and he’s all, mmmHMMM, this is even better on you than it is on mom. So. Very. Wrong.

Belinda ends up telling Noel the whole horrible story, and the subsequent attempts that someone has been making to terrify her. Noel suggests that the man watching from the cliff could have been Adam, and that he just lied about being in the car when the accident happened. Belinda seems surprised by this possibility. I thought that’s what she was thinking all along but WHATEVER. They come to the conclusion that Adam could have caused the crash on purpose to kill his dad and step mom. As they discuss it, they hear a door slam in the house. Uh oh, is that Adam listening in?

Belinda has a nightmare and then wakes up to find one of those pesky poisonous snakes in her bed. Oh the horror, the horror etc. Cobbs comes to fetch it. Yeah, I bet he “fetches” it good if you know what I mean.



Next morning, Belinda quizzes her homeboy Cobbs about Adam some MORE, asking him if he thinks that Adam is crazy. Cobbs tells her a little story: Adam’s parents fought loads when he was a kid, but he adored his father. Adams parents sent him away for a while to live with a mean aunt and uncle, Adam tried to run away and claimed they were abusing him, which they denied. Adam’s parents were too busy divorcing to bother with Adam, so they just left him there, until one night Adam and his aunt and uncle were in a car accident that killed the aunt and uncle. With her dying breath, Adam’s aunt gasped out the words “Adam…steering wheel…” but nothing was ever proved.

On her way out, Belinda spies Adam ruffling through some papers in his dad’s study and laughing evilly. I’m a little bit worried that Adam might actually be retarded.

Belinda goes to meet Hildy at the mall and now she has a new hypotheses – what if the car accident really wasn’t their fault, but the man on the hill was Adam, and he caused the accident and now he’s hunting down the witnesses – eg Belinda, Frank and Hildy. Despite the fact that they didn’t even witness him DO anything. And they clearly believe it’s their fault. Oh well, character motivation never WAS RTC’s strong point.

Belinda lets slip to Hildy that she told Noel all about what they did and Hildy goes nuts and tells Belinda that Frank played all those silly pranks on her such as the doll’s head one and the calendar one and the other ones that I can’t be bothered to write about. Frank is such a dick. Belinda agrees with me on this one, and goes to find Frank at the school’s pool to give him a stern telling off. Frank isn’t there – but his jacket is, floating ominously in the water. Hildy and Belinda have a total bust up, Hildy goes totally below the belt but for some reason Belinda keeps trying to apologise. They are NOT friends anymore.

Noel arrives at Belinda’s house later and drives her round to Hildy’s and Frank’s – neither of them are at home. Some random man shows up at Belinda’s door with an envelope for Belinda that’s he’s been paid to deliver by some guy. Inside the envelope is a braid of Hildy’s hair.

Belinda is now convinced that something terrible has happened to both Hildy and Frank, so Noel drives her round to his creepy house to calm her down. Cobbs isn’t in, he’s left a note to say that Mr Thorne has taken a turn for the worse so he’s gone to the hospital to be with him. Noel gets a call from Adam to say he is also at the hospital. Noel decides that he should go too, so off he pops, leaving Belinda all alone in the house….or IS she?!

Belinda does a bit of snooping and finds Mr Thorne’s last will and testament. She comes to the terrible conclusion that Adam has lured Noel away from the house to kill him, so that he will be the sole beneficiary of the will.

The phone rings and Belinda answers. It’s Cobbs – Noel isn’t at the hospital. And neither is Adam. Aaargh! Belinda hears someone moving around in the house - and out pops Adam, looking all scarred and inhuman and gross. She jumps back and somehow lands into Noel’s arms (I guess Noel has also arrived back home)

Adam suddenly stops limping and Noel reveals that he’s in on it too – Noel was the man watching from the hill! Noel and Adam force Belinda into a car with them, and in true villain style, they spill all. Adam explains that the car accident was all Noel’s idea as a way of killing their parents and getting the cash. Noel had worked it all out, exactly where to crash so Adam would be safe but the others would die (sounds like kind of a shonky plan to me), and then Belinda and her friends rocked up in a car tootling away and threw everything of balance. Meaning that Adam had to crash the car in the wrong spot and he got all injured and his stepmom survived and he’s totally pissed about it.

They take Belinda to a road with a gorge and they shove her into another car, containing Hildy and an unconscious Frank. Adam is going to push the car over the edge of the gorge to make it look like an accident. They also reveal that they’ve already killed Mrs Thorne, and she’s waiting for them at the bottom of the gorge. As the car starts rolling towards the gorge, Adam suddenly turns the gun on Noel and for some reason Belinda cares enough about this scumbag to be like, noooooo! And Noel and Adam start tussling, and then suddenly the police arrive with Cobbs and pull Belinda and her friends to safety. Hurrah!


Cobbs had suspected Noel and Adam were up to something, and then he sneakily listened in on some call and figured it all out or something? He drove to the Thorne house, saw Adam and Noel shoving Belinda into a car and rang the police straightaway “on the car telephone.” Heehee, good old car telephones.

Three days later, Hildy, Frank and Belinda are all A-OK. Hildy finally apologises to Belinda for her shitty behavoiour. Noel and Adam are “going through tests to see if they’re competent to stand trial” Which I guess is a nod to Adam’s possible retardation.

Cobbs arrives to speak to Belinda’s mom. Ok, this bit is fucking RIDICULOUS,. Cobbs barges in acting all British and cute and making tea for everyone and basically asks to come work as a butler for Belinda and her mom for FREE. Because Mr Thorne has left him a shitload of money in his will so he doesn't need payment. What the FUCK. Who decides they want to be a butler FOR FREE. Belinda sobs all over Cobbs about how much she misses Noel even though the guy is scum and Cobbs is all stroking her hair and she’s like, I love you Cobbs, and he’s like, I love you too, miss. And they make out. Well, OK, maybe not the last bit. But STILL!



"would you like some penis with your tea, miss?"

Conclusion: What the hell does this book actually have to do with April Fools day? Apart from the PROLOGUE, which happens to take place on April Fools day. I guess the publishers were just trying to cash in on that lucrative April Fools day merchandising market.

Trick Or Treat - Richie Tankersley Cusick

I’m being festive this week and going with Trick or Treat by RTC. Whaddya mean it’s not Halloween anymore? Chez Babysitter, it’s Halloween every day of the year.



Meet our heroine Martha. Martha likes sobbing and whining. Martha gets scared easily. Martha’s kind of a dickhead.

Martha’s dad has just married Connor’s mom, and Connor is just one year older than Martha. Connor is consistently lovely to Martha, and Martha consistently acts like a spoiled baby and treats him like shit because she thinks he’s a bit too thoughtful and weird. There’s also some weird sexual undercurrents bubbling under with these two, although that’s probably just me being mucky. I feel very protective of Connor.

Anyway, the whole happy family have just moved to a new town and a new house together, ‘The Old Bedford Place.’ Uh oh, you know when a house has a name like that that some bad shit has probably gone down there. Anyway, Martha hates the house because it’s scary and drafty and cold – like GHOSTLY cold, and she gets some weird vibes from it.

Within about five minutes of moving in, Martha’s dad and Sally swan off to Hawaii on honeymoon, leaving Martha and Connor home alone together. Nice parenting skills there.

On the first night, the ringing phone wakes Martha. The caller has a raspy voice (of course he does) and he’s all “look outside….Trick or Treat.” Outside her window is a hanging corpse with a big fat carving knife through its head. Umm, overkill much?
Oh, except it’s not a corpse. Shirtless Connor comes a –running to Martha’s screams and points out it’s just a scarecrow. Must be “kids” playing “pranks.” Kids eh? Those crazy murdering psychopath kids with their highly disturbing pranks, all a bit of harmless fun.

Martha and Connor drive into town together to buy picture hooks. In the hardware store, they meet a girl called Wynn and a guy called Blake, who are cousins. When Blake first sees Martha he looks pretty startled…almost as if he’d seen a ghost (hint hint). And when he hears that she’s living at ‘The Old Bedford Place,’ he’s double startled. Martha instantly has a crush on Blake, and once he has got over his initial reaction, the two flirt up a storm. Blake is like the school star, he’s amazing at everything and everybody loves him.

That night Martha goes for a walk in the houses’ grounds (which also includes a family cemetery bbs) and hears some crying and heavy breathing or something and gets scared, who cares.

At school the next day, Martha meets Greg – who is another cousin of Blake and Wynn. He’s also Martha’s creative writing teacher, and he looks soooooo similar to Blake that you know Martha’s a little hot for him. Oh sweet Jesus, does RTC actually have more than one plot line? If he also turns out to be an undercover police officer I’m going to kill myself.

Martha discovers that there was a murder at The Old Bedford Place, and together Connor and Martha discover the Bedford family mausoleum, which unsurprisingly, Martha isn’t too enamoured with. Later that night, Connor wakes Martha up to tell her that he can smell smoke – ohmigod mohmigod there’s a fire there’s a fire there’s a – tea towel on fire. And now Connor’s put it out. Oh. Well, that was exciting.

At school, Martha and Blake have lunch together. Blake tells Martha all about The Old Bedford Place. Turns out there was a murder there a year ago – almost EXACTLY a year ago, in fact, on Halloween. And the victim was one Elizabeth Bedford – Wynn’s best friend. Wynn even found the corpse (or what was left of it – frenzied stabbing attack, anyone?) in its bedroom – which is now Martha’s bedroom. The murderer was named Dennis, and he was Elizabeth’s ex boyfriend. In the months between their break up and Elizabeth’s death, he did all the usual stalker stuff, like make creepy phone calls, start small house fires etc. One more thing – Dennis himself has never been found. Gasp! They found his car and the knife but not a trace of Dennis.

That night, Connor and Martha discuss all this new information. Connor is a sweetie and even offers to switch bedrooms with Martha so she doesn’t have to sleep in the chamber of horrors. The phone rings again, and stupid old Martha answers it again. It’s the raspy voice again, this time it’s upped it’s game, saying “you’re dead Elizabeth. Trick or Treat.’ Umm, I'd choose treat I guess?

Martha hangs up and….the phone rings again. Relax, this time it’s Blake, and he invites her out for pizza with the ‘gang’: him, Wynn and Greg. Umm, I guess it’s cool for cousins to be close and all but isn’t it a weensy bit inappropriate for a teacher to be constantly hanging out with his students? Also, this is an example of the kind of thing that Greg says to Martha: “Martha, my newest and prettiest student, how’s life treating you at dear old Bedford?” And then he winks at her. Yeah yeah, put it back in your pants granddad. This guy kinda makes me want to wash in bleach.

They have a fine old time at the pizza place- and the guys reveal that they only didn’t invite Connor because Wynn has a maHOOsive crush on him and she refused to go along if he went. Martha reveals her absolute ignorance about the lovely Connor when she has to find out from Blake, who’s in his classes, that Connor is a genius, a regular walking encyclopaedia.



Back at home, before Connor lets her in Martha sees the shadow of someone moving about in her bedroom, yikes. Natch, when they go to check it out there’s nobody there.

Next day – Wynn confides in Martha that she can’t remember much from the (Halloween) night that Martha died – although she is convinced that Dennis didn’t do it, that there’s no way he was capable of murder. Also, Blake dated Elizabeth after she broke up with Dennis, which isn’t something Blake himself has ever mentioned to Martha. To make matters worse, supposedly Martha bears a strong resemblance to poor old dead Lizzie, hmmmm, and she just happens to also live in this girl’s bedroom, what a very strange coincidence. Why, if I wasn’t more trusting in RTC’s powers as an author, I’d say that sounds positively contrived.

Anyhoo, Martha has a crappy day at school and she ends up cutting class with Blake. He needs to go to a nearby town to gather decorations for the big Halloween dance – y’know the same Halloween dance that Elizabeth was brutally murdered directly after last year. Oh dear, anniversaries are never a good omen ion point horror books, ESPECIALLY if they happen to fall on Halloween. Things don’t look great for Martha.

So Blake takes Martha to a giant hay pile and it’s really romantic or something. They have this deep chat, Blake saying that he’s desperate to get away from the town and a basketball scholarship is his one big hope. Hmmm, you know who his one big rival for that scholarship was? Dennis. The Dennis who’s now missing after supposedly killing Blake’s girlfriend (my spell-check tells me that that ‘who’ should be a ‘whom’ but I REFUSE. Sorry, spell-check, it’s just against everything I believe in, I’m a strong advocate for poor grammar and syntax)

Blake’s about to kiss her but Martha goes and ruins it by mentioning his dead looky-likey girlfriend. Way to go, Martha. He pushes her away then denies that Martha really reminds him of Elizabeth beyond an initial superficial similarity. Everything is A-OK though, they make out again, and then gather the hay and pumpkins they need to take back to Bedford to use as decorations at the Halloween dance.

Back at the house, lovely Connor isn’t in. Martha sees something ‘floaty’ on the stairs and a silhouette inside her closet and gets herself all worked up, so worked up that she falls fast asleep. Once again, she is woken by a ringing phone. Once again, it’s the raspy voiced creep, who once again calls Martha ‘Elizabeth’ and once again signs off with ‘Trick or Treat.’ Okay, this raspy voiced guy needs to call me, I’m sure I could help him come up with some fresher material. I mean, I know serial killers and stalkers have certain rules of consistency they need to stick to, but that’s not to say they can’t spice things up a bit every now and again.

So, Connor finally arrives home, he had car trouble. He tries to calm Martha down but she’s a total bitch to him as usual. I really don’t get what her problem with Connor is. He even offered to swap rooms with her and take the horrible murder room for himself for God’s sake! Oy, won’t I have egg on my face if he turns out to to be the killer after all.

Martha finishes being a bitch and goes back to her room…and her closet door slowly creaks open…and Connor is standing there! Haha, go Connor! He figured out there’s a secret passageway running into Martha’s closet ( I guess she’s back in the murder room now. There’s a lot of dull bedroom yo-yoing but let’s just assume she’s always in the murder room) Martha kicks Connor in the shin and tells him she hates him. She also accuses him of being behind all the weird stuff that’s happened. In reply, Connor tells Martha that she knows nothing about him, and he totally shames her with all the stuff he knows about her. He totally called you out, Martha!

They kind of bond, Martha tells him all her fears. Connor tells her he feels the strange vibes in the house as well. He didn’t say anything before out of kindness, he didn’t want to make life any harder for Martha. I’m actually a little bit in love with Connor.

The next day, at school Wynn invites herself round to The Old Bedford Place for a study date- she feels like she needs to see the house where she found her best friend's corpse again. Really?! Is that absolutely necessary? Wynn hopes that going to the house will trigger her memories so she can know for sure that Dennis didn’t do it. All she remembers is the body and the blood.

Later, in the evening, Martha has to nip back into school to pick up a book before Connor picks her up. It’s deserted…but then…she hears a footstep. All the lights go out and the footsteps get louder and closer, “Martha’s eyes, wild with terror, were totally useless to her now.” I don’t know why I included that line, it just made me laugh but whatdoiknow.

Martha hides under some desks in a classroom, the footsteps guy follows her in, “her hand grappled with the knob” (hehehe) as she manages to run past him and escape, falling into Connor’s arms outside. The police don’t find anyone in the building, but Martha is pretty sure that somebody is trying to kill her.

Next night, Wynn comes to the murder house for a fun trip down memory lane. She tells Martha and Connor that the house has loads and loads of hidden tunnels. According to her, Dennis and Blake are also both aware of thse tunnels. Here’s what she remembers from the fateful Halloween one year ago: It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times (not really). The gist of it is – Blake and Elizabeth had an argument and Elizabeth went off with Dennis for a ‘chat.’ When Elizabeth hadn’t returned after an hour, Wynn, Greg and Blake went looking for her, and found her all smooshed up with a knife. Well, that was certainly worth it.

Night of the Halloween party (I’m sorta surprised they didn’t cancel it out of respect to the murdered but whatever) . Connor can’t go because he has the flu, but Martha is totally going even though she’s convinced there’s a killer on the loose who has a knife with her name on it. She dresses up like a gypsy. Blake picks her up and he’s death (how portentous), Greg is an executioner (double portentous) and Wynn is a witch (ummm).

Martha is loving the Halloween dance, until Wynn comes running up all panicky to tell Martha that she has just seen Dennis! Arggh! And then Martha gets a creepy (payphone) call again: “there’s no one home Elizabeth, it’s Halloween and they’re all dead” . Oh no, please don’t let Connor be hurt, what if Dennis reallly is alive and he's murdered him, arrrgghhh my tingly left arm and my clutchy heart. Oh, and the caller also throws in a ‘trick or treat.’

Martha, Wynn, Blake and Greg go racing back to Martha’s place to check on Connor. He’s fine. Not for long though. The lights go out and somehow everyone gets separated and Martha and Connor end up in Martha’s bedroom alone together being chased by someone with a swooshy knife that they keep swooshing around. Martha and Connor positively LEAP into the closet and run down the tunnel until they come to a storage closet. Their attacker starts a leetle fire outside the door and there’s nowhere to run (umm, not sure why they can’t just go back the way they came?). Luckily, Martha finds an extra secret double hidden tunnel behind some shelves and the pair follow it…ending up in….the mausoleum…dun dun dun. I totally guessed they would end up in the mausoleum as I was reading this, I award myself one hundred Awesome Points.

In the mausoleum, there’s a big ol’ altar shrine set up, complete with burning candles and decomposing corpse of Dennis. A tall black figure dressed as Death comes in and starts slashing at Connor, cutting him in the shoulder. Et tu, Blake? Only…it’s not Blake. We know this because Blake himself comes running in and tackles Death, who is actually…Wynn! Nice fake-out, RTC, I’ve certainly never seen you employ that device before.

Turns out Wynn really killed Elizabeth, and did all those creepy things in the months before her death. Reason? She was totally in love with Dennis. Wynn also accidentally killed Dennis, ooopsie daisy, she only meant to knock him out but I guess she doesn’t know her own strength. Oh well, these things happen, she shouldn’t beat herself up about it.

Wynn makes one more lunge for Martha with the knife but the police rock up and save the day. Connor’s going to be okay, and Martha even refers to him as her brother, aww, how sweet, all it took for Martha to like him was for Connor to sustain a near fatal injury whilst trying to save Martha’s life. Martha and Blake kiss in the mausoleum, of course they do. The end.

I’m left with a lot of questions at the end of this book. Like, are Martha and Connor’s parents ever going to come back? I have a sneaky suspicion that they have in fact run away to start a new life alone together. Also, I’m not sure if Wynn really had forgotten murdering Elizabeth or if that was just a fake out. This book was OK though, I just wish it had had some ghosts in it. It’s funny, you can really see the difference between the early ones (such as this), and the later ones where standards slipped and the writing became shoddier and shoddier. But it's weird, as the actual writing gets shoddier the books become more interesting as the writers are forced to dream up ever more implausible scenarios.

This book has got quite the following on Amazon, with particular praise being lavished on the ‘romance.’ Well, I guess this one really does have it all: undertones of incest, hay bale-based sexual tension and some potential hot student/teacher action (although sadly that promise was never realised - RTC, you’ve let me down, you’ve let your readers down, but most of all you’ve let yourself down.) A lot of people agreed with me and fell in love with Connor (hands off, he’s MINE), and at least one reader LUVED the book :

“i LUVED this book!!!! i was upset cuz she didnt like conor at all. i thoght it was really SWEET of conor(the nightmare part)i was dissappointed though cuz she still didnt like him after that. i luved conor.. he always tried to protect Martha..even wen he was close to dying. i read this book a bizzilion times n i still luv it. i'm glad that she went out w/blake...he was so sweet. i was soo surprised st the ending . this book got my heart pumping..its like i was Martha and i was experiencing everything..like the school part.. man i LUVED the book.”

This next review disturbs me slightly. A) because the reader is disproportionately angry at anybody who potentially dislikes the book, B) because I’m not sure that I like being called a crazy half wit and C) because there's something creepy about using then royal 'we' in a point horror book review.

“This book was a turn the page thriller! It was an on the edge of your seat til the finish kind of book. I don't know what some other people think, but if you dislike this book you must be crazy. It was full of suspense and mystery, and gave you that eerie felling that you are the person in the book. Any half wit can see that this book could have a high point in her career. This book has been written by the absolute master of suspense, horror and mystery in our books. We have read together 20 of her books. Just recently, Silent Stalker and Overdue. In our books she ranks number one, and her book deserves 5 stars and the honorable gold star”

Next time: I haven't settled on which book to do next, it's all up in the air and I have a couple to choose from. So I'll see you next time with a mystery recap, unless you die from the suspense first. (please don't die, I already have enough blood on my hands. )

The Mall - Richie Tankersley Cusick

The Mall – an angry commentary on a society that's hellbent on self destruction, guzzling down greasy fast food and sweatshop clothing? A gently humorous satire on a consumerist culture? The tragic tale of a loveless woman whose life is so empty that all she has room for is shopping? Or a ridiculous Point Horror book about a beautiful girl and all the men who are in love with her, at least one of whom is insane?

Man, Richie Tankersely Cusick has issues. I can’t say too much here or I’ll give away the big twist, but what is it with her and inappropriate relationships between teenage girls and much older men in positions of authority who have tendencies towards sexual aggression? First we saw this in The Teacher’s Pet, now in The Mall…in fact, the whole book follows a pretty similar plot line to Teacher’s Pet. I don’t know why this surprises me.



The Mall is set in a mall. Not just any old mall though – this is a super creepy old mall that’s been built over time and time again, until it’s packed full of all sorts of layers and tunnels and shops and subterranean chambers that have been abandoned and blocked off until the world has forgotten about them. There’s also some bad stuff going down here – several characters emphasise just how creepy this place is, and just how terrible an idea it would be to ever visit this mall after dark falls. I repeat – do NOT visit the mall after dark. Gee, I wonder if anyone’s going to end up trapped in the mall at night time?

So, The Mall opens with The Thoughts Of A Stalker – an unnamed narrator thinking about the object of his desires, who works at The Mallllllll (scary voice). He likes to stalk her by pretending to be a mannequin and just watching her. Umm, okay. Facebook sure has made stalking easier hasn’t it? Although there still is something to say for kickin’ it old school, after all you know what they say, “you can’t smell someone’s skin cells over the internet.” Who says that? Me, I do.

Trish Somerfield is our heroine, and the object of the stalker’s desires. Unless I tell you otherwise, you can pretty much assume that she is constantly in a state of “icy terror.” Trish works in the food court and her boss Bethany is a serious mega bitch. Also, Trish’s mom is conveniently ‘in Europe’ for the whole book.

Trish’s best friends are Nita and Imogene (nice spelling, not). They’re twins (yessss! Evil twin anyone?) and there’s a pretty detailed description of them but it’s probably just easier if I say Nita is Jessica Wakefield and Imogene is Elizabeth.

Storm Reynolds is a) the proud owner of like, the dumbest name EVER and b) the mall hottie. He’s pretty evasive about stuff like where he lives. Trish likes Storm and Storm likes Trish.

Also mysteriously evasive is Wyatt, who claims to be some kind of odd job man about the mall. Wyatt is quirky-cute and Nita decides she likes him. He has combed back long hair and wears stuff like this – jeans with holes, rock band t shirt, combat boots and a denim jacket with the sleeves cut off.

Muffin Man is this very very strange guy who Trish first spots watching her in the food court. He has a voice like a womans, “and a long, wispy beard on a pointed chin, long flowing hair that hid much of a gaunt face , and where the eyes should have been, only a pair of dark glasses. Oh, yeah, and his hair and his beard are both grey. (cough cough, *Dumbledore* cough)


He’s the immediately obvious contender to be the stalker, ordering a honey muffin from Trisha and then saying stuff like this: “the way that honey looks on your fingers…one could almost…taste it.” Yeah, it's definitely him.

The Muffin Man makes a couple of weird phone calls to Trish (on a payphone, natch, this is the 90s baby) – coming out with more gems like, “I’m eating the muffin. It tastes just like you.” she knows it’s him cos she recognises his weird, womanish voice, also his reference to the muffin, I guess that’s like their ‘thing’. When Trish tries to get a security guard to help her out he inexplicably becomes enraged, muttering about kids playing pranks on each other. Security guards and policemen of the world, I beseech you – when will you learn? It’s never just kids playing pranks on each other. Do your job, damn it.

Trish goes to visit Nita in her store, and she finds a dress she likes from the Purely Passion range: “long and flowing, it was all white satin and lace, like a gauzy cloud, with delicate trimming of ribbon and velvet…..a low cut neckline (with) a tiny row of pearl buttons down the front of the soft, full skirt”

Whilst trying it on, Trish gets the feeling that someone is watching her. Yeah Trish, it’s the fashion police and you’re looking at 15 years to life.

Leaving with Nita for the day, Trish finds Wyatt fiddling around by her car – weird. He makes up some lame excuse and the girls take him with them to a diner. Wyatt acts shifty throughout. For some reason he asks to be taken back to the mall, claiming he has a friend that lives nearby and Trish agrees. After dropping him off, her car suddenly dies. Uh Oh.


Trish heads towards the mall, hoping there are some security guards about that can help her. She finds a weird side door, and meets a security guard with long black curly hair, sunglasses and a scar down his face. This must be a disguise if I ever heard of one. In another Deus Ex Machina, Trish cuts herself on a bottle and the security guard invites her in so he can first aid her. Whilst being first aided, Trish stumbles across a mutilated corpse with an ice pick in her throat. The security guard says he will call for help, but Trish has to leave now, and not tell anyone about this, or else he could lose his job for letting her inside. He calls her a cab, finding out her address and home alone status in the process. What a kindly old security guard, thinks Trish.

The next day, it slooooooowly dawns in Trish that this security guard might have been up to no good, so she tries to figure out who he is. Based on her description of him, she’s directed to a security guard called Roger. He has the curly black hair, but not the sunglasses or the scars and, so Trish reasons that it can’t have been him. She also finds out that there are no night security guards. Trish realises that she was chilling with a murderer last night, a murderer who now knows her home address. Trish pretty much spends this point on until the end in a state of perpetual panic.

Trish visits Imogene in her book shop and agrees to go down to the loading bay with her. The bay is like, ridiculously deep in the ground, they have to get into about 20 (okay, two) different elevators going down and down and down until they can reach it.

Down in the stock rooms, Trish bumps into some familiar looking creep with slicked back hair who’s wearing dark sunglasses: “As Trish stared in cold, creeping terror, his mouth formed a crooked smile. Some of his teeth were black.”


Upstairs, Imogene finds a long grey wig and wispy beard in a bin. Trish thinks that the Muffin Man and the Security Guard and this guy she bumped into are all the same person donning different disguises. She still doesn’t mention anything about any of this this to anyone though.

Trish basically runs around the mall freaking out and falls off an escalator or something, waking up in hospital having had chin stitches. That night she wakes up to find a creepy visitor standing at the foot of her bed– it’s Muffin Man/Security Guard stalker guy. Somebody needs to teach this guy about boundaries. We find out that his name is Athan, and although Trish is upset and scared by his appearance, he insists that he would never do anything to hurt her, as Trish is ‘his life.’ He admits that he’s been watching her for ages – including that time she was in the changing room trying on the white dress and felt eyes all over her. He also threatens to hurt Nita and Imogene if she tells anyone about him, and also warns her of speaking to ‘him’, telling Trish not to trust ‘him’, but rather unhelpfully, won’t specify who ‘him’ is. Thanks a bunch Athan.

Trish drives herself crazy trying to figure out who ‘him’ is – Storm? Wyatt? Some other guy from the mall? I think it’s a pretty safe bet that it won’t be some other guy at the mall, unless RTC takes the unprecedented step of flying in the face of Point Horror structure and tradition and gives us a wildcard baddie. Relax, I’m sure she would never be so unprofessional.


Out of hospital, Trish spots Wyatt in a car outside her house. She has another freakout and heads to the library where there will be lots of people. Storm shows up there, and he’s nice to Trish but she's mega-suspicious, with Athan’s warning still ringing in her ears. I don’t know about you, but I’m not sure that id trust my ice pick murderer stalker to tell me which of my friends may or may not be bad news. Storm is worried by Trish’s freak-out and drags her out to the car even though she’s crying and begging him to leave her alone, well this guy is certainly a keeper, who says romance is dead.

Storm decides to show her something – a special place in the woods. Trish is massively uncomfortable with this, but Storm seems to think its ok to just ignore her protests and drive on. Trish manages to leap out of his car and run into the woods. Storm chases after her, pins her down and yells in her face for her to calm down. I do tend to find that that is the best technique for calming people.

Once Trish has been cowed into submission, Storm acts shocked that she would think he could ever hurt her. Well, let’s break it down Einstein shall we. First of all, you basically abduct her in the library, then you drive her into a thick wood, then you chase after her and pin her to the ground. Gee, what’s not to love about this guy.

Storm calms Trish down, and for some reason she agrees to go see ‘his special place’. It’s an empty ghost house in the woods. Wow, will this guy’s incredible calming techniques never end? I sure know who I’d want to hang out with if I was of a nervous disposition. This house has some stupid legend attached to it that echoes Trish’s own story, blah blah blah. Storm makes a lunge for Trish and kisses her hard. Thankfully, she slaps him in the face and makes him take her home.

Skipping forward past some pointless stuff: Trish decides to go back to work (umm why). She picks up her fixed car and, and finds a mystery cassette inside it. On the tape is Athan’s whispery womanish voice, saying “you’re a naughty girl Trish…a naughty girl. I told you not to tell anyone...I did try to warn you, didn’t I? But you wouldn’t listen. So now…now I have to show you how serious I am. You’d better be at the mall today Trish” OK, this stalker is officially my hero, he gets top marks for imagination and thinking outside the box.


At the mall, Nita gives Trish back her flashlight. I don’t remember when she borrowed it in the first place, but im guessing its going to be important to the plot so I’m clumsily shoving it in here, much like RTC did in the original.


At the end of Trish’s shift, one of her co workers passes on a message to Trish – a girl tried calling her who sounded like Imogene with a cold, but she’s hung up now. The message is:

“something about – I don’t know – a matter of life and death?...And she said for you to hurry - …She didn’t say where – she just said….’tell her to come now – before it’s too late.’”

Are you KIDDING me you dumbass. What the hell kind of a message is that to just pass on to someone, that’s like if you called somebody up going “fire! there’s a fire! I’m trapped in a fire and my head is on fire and I’m going to die from being burned alive in the fire!” and they’re just all , “ugh, well I can certainly pass on .the message.” WHAT. THE. FUCK.

Anyway – NOT IMPORTANT. Trish goes down to the creepy loading dock to find Imogene, but all she sees is a bloody hand reaching round a corner and holding an icepick. Scared that the murderer is attached to the hand, Trish hops back into the lift, and a chirpy little interlude follows that I like to call ‘The Elevator Diaries’. Here is a brief synopsis.

The elevator goes up.
The doors won’t open.
The elevator goes down.
The doors won’t open.

Repeat x 10. I am not joking. At first, I was like, whoa, this is seriously creepy, she’s trapped in an elevator. By the end of ‘The Elevator Diaries’ I was like, seriously, what is it with Point Horror writers and overkill? The monotony is finally broken when Bethany The Bitchy Boss’s corpse is stuffed through a gap in the elevator (don’t ask). She was killed with an ice pick, and there's a note attached to her neck saying "you're lucky this isn't Imogene." Oh okay, what was that phone call about then? I guess that will have to join my list of Life's Great Mysteries.

Then the elevator starts hurtling down and Trish gets sad that she’s going to die but I know she’s going to live because there’s still about 30 pages left.

She does black out though, and when she wakes up (and gets out of the elevator hurrah!) the mall is totally empty, and it’s night time. Trish ends up in Nita’s store, where she finds a panel missing from one of the changing rooms. Wyatt shows up and Trish throws a bunch of paperweights at him thinking he must be the killer before escaping through the hole in the wall. Oh, Trish, you still have so much to learn.

She follows a passage way for many many words until she reaches a tunnel. Hey, I wonder what the technical difference is between a passageway and a tunnel? She walks for many more words until she reaches a massive door. Inside the door is another door. I know I said this before, but sometimes I really do get the feeling that these Point Horror writers are just padding to reach a minimum word count.

So, Trish goes through the second door, and inside is a room filled with cobwebs and huge spiders. The spiders run all over Trish and even down her throat (gross). Trish grabs onto something – argh it's a foot, relax it belongs to a mannequin,. She notices the whole room is filled with mannequins, more mannequins than you would ever want to be in a room with. I really HATE mannequins. Also in the room: a candlelit table, a wedding cake and a “a huge wooden bed with white canopy and snowy bed curtains”

Her stalker turns up – and guess what, it’s not Wyatt. It turns out that Athan is actually Roger. You know, Roger. Remember Roger the security guard? No? Me neither. Oh my God, I cant believe RTC went and did this, after all the faith I put in her – I promised you she wouldn’t make the baddie turn out to be some random guy we haven’t really heard of. And what did she go and do? She turned me into a liar.

I’m sure you can guess what Roger/Athan’s intentions are. He tells Trish that he’s got rid of the competition, eg killed Storm with an ice pick, and leaves Trish to slip into her wedding dress whilst he goes to take care of some business. Luckily, Wyatt arrives to rescue her. For some reason Wyatt gets Trish to help him put out all the lights in the room instead of just, y’know, escaping.

The door opens again, someone else enters and there’s a but of a tussle, a gun goes off and Wyatt is all “Stop! Police!” And the other guy is all "get off me doofus", and it turns out the other guy is actually Storm and he and Wyatt are undercover police officers who’ve been following Roger. Storm has been hurt by the ice pick, but as we learned in The Train, ice pick injuries are not always fatal.

Anyway, fuck all that, how old are these dudes? Wyatt helpfully informs us that Storm is “much older than he looks.” This makes the whole kissy face scene at the ghost house in the woods take on an even more sinister turn. See what I mean about RTC and inappropriate relationships? I think somebody has some Daddy issues.

So, Roger busts in as well, and grabs Trish, but she remembers that handy flashlight and uses it to escape from Roger's clutches by shining it into his eyes, so Storm and Wyatt can shoot Roger dead.

Storm and Wyatt sheepishly admit that they’ve been following Roger for a while and they basically used Trish as bait. Nice. Roger had been kidnapping and killing girls for years, the reason nobody heard about it was because there was never concrete enough evidence to put him away and “the mall wanted to keep it quiet.” That’s pretty gross.

The book ends with the happy threesome waiting for back up to arrive and Trish and Storm flirting in a way that frankly makes me feel slightly uncomfortable.

I was pretty disappointed with this book by the end, it had so much potential. I had all these crazy theories the whole way through about there being a kind of Morlock-y race of people living in the mall, or the perps being weird evil shadow versions of real people. When Trish found the mannequin room I started praying that Athan would be turning humans into mannequins, even though I knew I only had a few pages left to go. So when it turned out to just be this one dude we’ve known about from the start, it left me kind of…flat.

Oh well, over to Amazon. A worrying number of readers want to know more about Trish and Storm’s relationship, there are even calls for a sequel to be written concerning this. May I recommend reading ‘Lolita’ instead.

I like this description of The Mall a lot, I think it really does it justice:

“This book is about a woman that thinks that she is not pretty, and she works in a mall that is haunted. There are strange things happening like: the manager of the store got a call in the morning when the mall wasn't even open. There is a guy that is foolowing her, everywhere she is, there is him watching her. He whispered her name in the crow, his eyes are looking for her evrywhere. That man at first he was just a customer, but then he appears everywhere. With his thousands faces making her crazy. He knows everything about her secrets. “


I don’t think any of this stuff actually happened – a) the mall isn’t haunted, b) what’s with this phone call stuff and c)he whispered her name in the crow? That’s clearly a typo but I can’t even begin to guess what it might mean. Having said that, this sounds like it would be a hell of a lot better book than the one that RTC actually wrote. I’m going to go to sleep now, and I’ll dream of someone whispering my name in the crow.

Next time: I thought I’d break free of this RTC/Ho/Cooney cycle I’m currently trapped in, and go with Sinclair Smith for Amnesia.

Teacher's Pet - Richie Tankersley Cusick

So, are you ready for….Teacher’s Pet?

I took a bit longer with my second post than I would have liked to, I blame TV. Particularly Dead Set, which is bloody brilliant.





So, the first half of this book is not terribly exciting, and is basically clumsy exposition and set up. Kate goes to a writer’s camp with her teacher (coooollll.) Supposedly, Kate is really good at writing horror stories – it’s too bad Kate couldn’t give Richie Tankersely Cusick a helping hand.

Kate is meant to be attending a number of seminars held by a legendary horror author called William Drew – but Billy D hasn’t turned up and nowhere knows where he is. Nobody’s too worried though, by all accounts this guy is kind of a douchebag.

At camp, Kate meets a whole host lovely and vaguely threatening characters, so readers can play the fun game of spot-the-killer. Point Horror books with this kind of blatant set-up are not my favourites. To throw the reader off the scent, the writer has to give us about 5 incredibly creepy characters who commit at least one horribly deranged act apiece, but 4 out of these will turn out to be perfectly innocent. Now, just because those other 4 potential psychos haven’t killed yet, it doesn’t mean they never will. Umm, I feel that I’ve lost my thread here – point is, characters are unrealistic and over the top. And surely we all turn to Point Horror for gritty realism and breathtakingly lifelike characterisations.

Anyway, the Teacher’s Pet creep count includes (in order of introduction):

The wonderfully named Pearce Cronan. His eyes are piercing and “black as smoke.” Hmmm, last time I checked , smoke was kind of a see through dirty white colour. Oh well. He’s the camp caretaker, and his family were the caretakers for the Drew family. Caretaking's what the Cronan's do, yo. His parents died with the Drew parents in one big smooshy car accident. Everything he says is crammed with pregnant pauses and delivered in a vaguely threatening manner. If you were to ask him the time he’d probably say something like ‘perhaps…..it is time….for….the sand of time in you hourglass of life and time…..to run out of time…..’ and then slip away into the shadows. You know, poetic shit like that.

Denzil Doyle – Denzil looks 13 but is 18. He’s also something of a sex pest, and there’s something very shrill about his character. Every time he had a line I’d instinctively clap my hands over my ears to block him out. If he was a cartoon character he’d be Artie Zipp (or is it Ziff?) from the Simpsons (my references are nothing if not current. And also accurate. Very, very accurate.)

Tawney is a beautiful but rather simple-minded girl. She’s basically written as a retard, which is something the other characters are terribly un-empathetic about, and they spend their time making cuckoo symbols at her behind her back and making her the butt of jokes that she has too many extra chromosomes to be able to understand.

Giedon Drewe – is teaching his brother’s class for him….. OMFG, typing out the name Gideon has just reminded me of something incredible – to go completely off track, when I was a kid I read this HILARIOUS series of books about a goose detective called Gideon who solved fairy tale crimes, like who pushed Humpty Dumpty off the wall but in a really snarky way? Anyone with me? Man, I wish I was reading those goose detective books instead of Teacher’s Pet. Oh well, back to work.

Gideon Drewe – is teaching his brother’s class for him Gideon hates his brother, and to prove he's sensitive, he says stuff like, ““I love autumn, I love children and animals, and kindnesses make me cry.” Yeah? Well guess what I love? Punching nerds like you in the face is what. Gideon Drewe is as creepy as Pearce. In fact, the readings that I'm getting from their creep-o-meters are so similar that I found it nearly impossible to distinguish them from each other, except by, you know, reading their names.

A cat – this is a cat that has a knack for furrowing out hunks of meat. At one point, it kindly delivers Kate the gift that keeps on giving – a severed hand in a glove. What does Kate do? She freaks out and runs away. Then brings her friends back to look. Natch, when they get back both the cat and the severed hand have vamoosed. Well, I’m not surprised that the poor little puss decide not to hang around if a shriek of disgust was all the thanks he was going to get. That’s humans for you I guess.

Enough with the shoddy characters, on with the highly derivative plot! Kate and Tawney go skinny dipping, and someone steals their clothes and ummm, hangs around in a shadow with an axe. What’s so bad about that? I’m just chillin’ with my axe, don't be hatin'. I think this scene is supposed to ratchet up the tension. It only succeeded in ratcheting up my headache. BOO YA! Take that, Tankersely Cusick!

Kate finds a creepy old house in the woods, and meets the delightful Rowena. Rowena’s emo-ing around dressed in a black veil and long black dress and has a kanck for writing poetry that is just....awful. Here’s an example of her poetry: “scream, scream , trapped in a dream.” “Kate, Kate, doomed to your fate.” This understandably freaks Kate out as she is a) confused and worried as to how Rowena could know her name and b) appalled at the poor quality of Rowena’s poetry. Rowena also mentions a man who talks about Kate. This makes Rowena jealous and angrym, and I have a sneaking suspicion that making Rowena jealous and angry would be a Very Bad Thing. Hmmm, what creepy men do we know of who’ve displayed an unhealthy interest in Kate’s lovely young flesh?

So, like, OMG, Kate totally has a crush on Gideon yeah? Even though he’s, like her teacher yeah? And he takes her for a walk in the woods and pervs all over her and they get it on. When I say they get it on, you need to bear in mind that this is a Point Horror book and is thus limited to a fairly chaste kiss.

OK, now we’re in the mood for romance, I’m going to put on some music, lower the lights, and take a little break from telling the story to hit you with an innuendo I’ve plucked from earlier in the book and I’ve just been saving up for the right moment :

“Denzil skewered a fat marshmallow onto the end of her stick and gave her a wink.”

Phew, is it just me or is it getting kind of hot in here?

Onwards! Tawney, Kate and Denzil go food shopping and spot Pearce:

“I think he's handsome,” Tawney sighed, “even if he does make me feel creepy.”

And there, ladies and gentleman, is Point Horror in a nutshell.

Anyway, there are a bunch of clues and shit that point to William Drewe being dead and Pearce being his murderer, but the clues and the manner in which they’re discovered are just so boring and contrived that I’ll spare you that. Have another innuendo instead:
“’You’ll have… to pull,’ his breath choked out. ‘You’ll have – to – pull hard.”

Someone leaves messages written in blood for Kate In her cabin, Writing in blood? For realz? Didn’t people stop doing that in, like, the 70s? For sure the Amityville films should have killed that off. Pearce arrives and acts a bit threatening.

Gideon sends Kate off into a ‘writing assignment’ into the woods. Yeeehhhhh, a writing assignment, I’ve heard that one before. Pearce does his usual creepy appearing out of nowhere trick but this time…something actually happens. He gets caught in a steel man trap trap. And yes, the innuendo above does come from this scene, well spotted. Kate and Pearce bond, and Pearce basically tells her that he knows this trap was meant for her and she’s in danger. Before the rescue party arrives, they kiss. Nothing hotter than some steel man trap action, baby.

Incapable of staying out of trouble, Kate later ventures back into the man-trap axe murderer woods in search of the creepy house where she met even creepier Rowena, to try to find creepiest Gideon.

Oh man, she finds the house and I find the winner of the highly sought after Innuendo of the Book award:

“she lifted her hand….curled her fingers around the knob…”

*Ahem*, so Kate opens the door and inside it’s all black and crappy and it looks like a funeral parlour. Gideon’s there and he’s none too pleased to see Kate breaking and entering into his home. He tells her that Rowena is his sister….but she died a year ago. Kate tells him all about her little encounter with his dearly departed sister, and Gideon seems more than a little shaken by her revelations, chucking Kate out of the house.

The next night, there’s a Horror Hunt scheduled…like a scavenger hunt but more…horrific, I guess. Kate goes to visit Pearce in hospital, and eavesdrops on a conversation between him and Gideon about Rowena. From this conversation, the discerning reader can infer that there was a fire about a year or so ago in which William was burned a leetle bit and Rowena was burned to death. Gideon speculates that Rowena’s ghost has returned and killed William. Pearce, sensibly, thinks that’s sort of stupid.

Kate asks Pearce about Rowena, and he tells her that she was beautiful, but weird. At this point the book starts getting boring again with Kate and her little friends playing detective, blah blah blah, skip to the end….

Gideon tells Kate that Rowena was Pearce’s adopted sister but they were in love, gross, incest, and William was really mean to them about the whole kind-of-but-not-technically-incest-thing, so Rowena set fire to the house, presumably to try to kill William but only succeeded in killing herself.

Pearce admits to Kate and Gideon that Rowena really is alive, but her face is, like, all burnt off. More home truths revealed: Rowena was actually Gideon’s biological twin….his INSANE biological twin. Yes! This book suddenly got a hell of a lot better, it only took 178 pages. And Rowena did kill William, she chopped him up good.

Big climax: Kate’s cabin is set on fire. Gideon appears wearing a veil and spouting crazy Rowena-style shit about how if she can’t have Pearace noone else can either. Double yes!!! Gideon is, in fact, a mentalist, and is all dressed up like Rowena and is totally trying to kill Kate. And THEN the actual Rowena appears!! WTF?! And her hand is all hideous and rotting. And the Rowena-thing kind of switches back and forth between being crazy Gideon and being a zombie ghost thing. Kate passes out, possibly from sheer confusion.

Kate wakes up and Rowena has her tied spread-eagled to a four poster bed, I’m not sure if it’s Zombie Rowena or cross-dressing Rowena at this point, but who cares, either one’s a winner right? Rowena’s motivation for all her hate for Kate is jealousy that Pearce fancies her.

Umm, OK, and then the zombie-Rowena thing becomes PEARCE under the veil. And my mind is officially blown. I don’t mean that as a compliment, I am actually terribly confused. And Pearce-Rowena starts spraying gasoline everywhere and has kind of a confessional moment in which he reveals that Pearce started the fire (“we didn’t light it, we tried to fight it.”) all those years ago to kill William, not realising that Rowena was locked in a room, thus accidentally killing his kind-of-sister-ladylove. Haven’t we all, Pearce, haven't we all.

Jesus Christ, then GIDEON comes into the room (in his normal clothes) with the REAL ROWENA all dressed in black kind of propped in front of him, and he stops Pearce lighting the fire with the threat that he’ll kill Rowena again if he does. Pearce cuts and runs, and it’s actually TAWNEY dressed up as Rowena. Phew. I think that’s the last of the oh –it’s –her-no-it’s-really-him-no-it’s-that-other-dude-moment. Gideon is a good guy! Yay! And he's saved Kate's life! Double yay!

I’m not entirely sure my description makes any sense. I hope it does, but it’s not really my fault if it is nonsense, I didn’t have great source material to work with. And I’m so very very tired.

The end: Pearce is in the loony bin, turns out accidentally killing your sister/lover is a surefire way to send you nuts. Kate and Gideon share a little kiss, and Kate heads back home from camp.

The moral of the story is: man-traps are the perfect setting for sharing a first kiss with your psychotic cross dressing murderous love interest.

Phew, I’m really glad that’s over. Teacher’s Pet is NOT my favourite. I will admit that it gets pretty awesome towards the end but the first 150 pages or so are just so tedious.

Let’s hear what an Amazon reader thinks:

“Buy this book for your child. Don’t subject them to the garbage that you find in the ‘Goosebumps’ collection. This will help them grow into a person who appreciates literacy of all kinds. It has a good storyline and I honestly believe that this could be the greatest book ever written when considering the demograph (sic)”

Ooooh, did you hear that R.L. Stine? Did ya? She just said that your ghost-writers write rubbish, that’s smack talk if I ever I heard it.

Also, I honestly believe that this could be the worst book ever written when considering the demograph(ic), but I’m happy to agree to disagree. It kind of scares me that this comment was written by somebody of child bearing age.

I’m not sure which Point Horror I’ll be delving into next time…it kinds of depends what’s available at my library. I love browsing the kids’ and teenagers’ sections like a simpleton.

So I’ll be back soon with a mystery book, stay spooky.