Jackson is such a good drip that he never gets in trouble and even volunteers at the youth center. He's a typical Stine doormat who is even bullied by his younger sister. But then Jackson and Rachel are packed off to spend a week at their grandpa's isolated mansion, and grandpa is not only a collector of ventriloquist dummies, he has a scary butler who warns the kids to stay away from one in particular, the evil Slappy. Guess which one Jackson takes home to do an act for the youth center fundraiser?
This one got better as it progressed and had a creepy ending. ( )

This boy goes to his grandpa's house for a week and comes back and gets one of his dummies. This dummy's not normal, you know! I like this book because you never really know what's going to happen next (otherwise you can't wait to red it - so page turning) (Elise) ( )

Son of Slappy by RL Stine is the second of the recently launched Goosebumps, Most Wanted Series. My son and his friends have discovered their school's ratty (meaning, well-read) copies of Goosebumps so I was curious to see how the new series compares to the older ones.

The first Goosebumps series started well after I was out of the target age range but I heard of them through a younger cousin and read a few of the early ones, including Night of the Living Dummy (Goosebumps 7), the first of the Slappy books.

Slappy is an evil ventriloquist's dummy. Honestly, except for "The Puppet Show" episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (season 1, episode 9), all ventriloquist's dummies are evil. But Slappy is perhaps the worst of the worst.

Now for those who are complaining that Slappy was destroyed in a previous book; he's evil enough (and smart enough) to fake his own destruction. Now that he's been laying low in an old man's collection (quick — call for an intervention, this dude's a hoarder), Slappy has picked a Marty-Stu named Jackson who is so perfect no adult believes he's capable of doing any wrong. Little sister, though, with Slappy's help has her sights on his perfect reputation.

It was a fun read and very much in keeping with the spirit and formula of the earlier books. ( )