COVER STORY
This may honestly be one of Tim's scariest covers in a long time, not to mention one of the most beautiful. The hazy dark colors of the sky, the creepy looking trees, the gathering fog and the main attraction, the creepy skeletal face emerging from the water (the work on the reflection is perfect). It's generally a scary concept drawn perfectly. I ragged on Say Cheese and Die - Again! for the addition of eyeballs on skeletons, but in this case it actually works with the creepy bloodshot eyes staring into your soul. This one is definitely Tim Jacobus in top form.
STORY
Our protagonist is Sarah, who is going to Camp Cold Lake with her younger brother Aaron. We get a good grasp as to what Sarah's main characteristic is by the first chapter and that's a massive complainer. She hates going to camp, she hates being called grasshopper by her dad, when people tell her camp will be fun, she just whines some more. So this is going to be a fun read, I can already tell. When she gets to her bunk for example, she throws a hissy fit about needing a bottom bunk and not wanting the one in front of the window with bugs on it. One of her bunk mates, an African American girl named Briana lets her royal highness get the bed she needs.
Despite this, Sarah seems to hit it off well with her bunk mates. The aforementioned Briana, Meg, a short, chubby girl, and Jan, a girl with a blonde ponytail and a raspy voice due to having asthma. Of course this doesn't last as she seems to embarrass the others by pointing out the things that make them feel easily humiliated. At the first campfire of the summer, Briana tricks Sarah into thinking that some boys threw fireworks in the campfire, which puts Sarah in a panic. But it was all a prank. She returns to the campfire feeling humiliated, as we get introduced to Liz, the waterfront counselor, which Stine tries to sexy up as much as possible. She mentions a bunch of rules about the lake, with the biggest rule being not to swim there at night, especially without a counselor on hand.
Briana and the others tell Sarah that they want a fresh start, which results in them stuffing a snake down her shirt. Well that escalated quickly. Aaron, who since this book started has shown genuine concern for his older sister's well-being, tries to help, but Sarah just tells him to leave her alone. Can we just focus on Aaron already instead? Sarah decides to fight potential poisonous creature with potential poisonous creature, as she scoops up a bunch of spiders and throws them on Briana and Meg. The next day, during partner canoeing, Jan leaves Sarah high and dry in the middle of the lake because of the asthma thing and putting spiders on Briana and Meg. YOU GUYS THREW A SNAKE AT HER FIRST THOUGH!
Sick of this whole place, Sarah first plans to run away, but then comes up with a brilliant idea to get back at everyone. She's just going to pretend to drown is all! Surely this will be enough to guilt trip everyone and they'll all be the best of friends. But that doesn't quite work when nobody shows up to help her. When she surfaces, there's nobody around at all. And even stranger, a fog has been cast over the lake. It's snowing. Even the leaves are all gone from the trees. She returns to camp, and there's no sign of life. Everyone and their belongings have vanished. Sarah begins to panic when suddenly she hears the sound of singing.
She finds a young girl with curly white-blonde hair and pale skin. She introduces herself as Della and seems focused on Sarah being her buddy. But Sarah is more concerned with the fact that Della is a ghost, completely see-through. Fearing she might be dead too, Sarah runs off, but Della tells her that she can't go into the afterlife without a buddy. She makes it back to the water as Della confronts her, only for Sarah to suddenly wake up, surrounded by the campers who are trying to resuscitate her. Sarah seems to be a lot happier to be alive, even if the other girls are still mocking her for her ploy for attention. But that night at the campfire, she sees Della sitting on a log, still wanting to be her buddy. Sarah panics, despite no other camper being able to see Della at all.
Sarah begins to think she's seeing Della everywhere, which makes her panic more and more. The other girls decide to finally have a non-snake on back fresh start with Sarah and the next day everyone sets out for the lake to swim. Sarah partners with Jan, but when they get in the water, Jan transforms into Della. She then sees Liz come to save her, but Liz's face turns into Della's. This goes on for a while until Della manages to drag Sarah into the water and tries to run her down with a boat. We actually get a tense scene where Della is about to chop Sarah to bits with the motor of the boat, only for Sarah's life vest to save her in time.
Sarah is sick of all of this and finally starts to run off. Briana tells her good luck, and seems to give off a look like she knows something. However, she still gets caught by Della, who is sitting in a tree branch. She then reveals that she never drowned at Camp Cold Lake. She died of a snakebite. And as they talk, a snake begins to crawl Sarah's leg, ready to bite.
TWIST ENDING
Suddenly Briana shows up and saves Sarah from the snake. She then reveals that Della tried to do this to her last year, but Briana stayed at the camp to make sure the next victim would be saved. Della then falls off the branch and vanishes. We learn that Della actually did kill Briana last year and tried the buddy stuff on her, but Briana didn't like Della, so no dice. But now Briana needs a buddy, and Sarah seems like the perfect choice. She grabs the snake and advances on Sarah.
CONCLUSION
The Curse of Camp Cold Lake is okay at best. Sarah starts as a pretty unlikable protagonist, but by book's end, she isn't too bad. Especially compared to some of the jerks at the camp. So when she's all you got to root for, she'll do. The book paces itself well, and tells an okay enough ghost story with how much Sarah's increasing paranoia gets worse as the story goes on, even down to almost being killed by a motorboat due to Della trying to kill her. The book does feel like it kind of rushes to get finished though, and I do wish Briana had been portrayed as a more interesting character as we went along. They don't really hint to any history with her and Della until book's end. And the twist, once revealed, does feel pretty predictable. It does explain why Briana put the snake on Sarah early on in the book though. Overall, it was a fine enough book. My least favorite of the camp books, but still far from the worst of Goosebumps. A perfect average at best. The Curse Of Camp Cold Lake gets a C+.
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