Thursday 15 July 2010

R L Stine - Beach Party

Well, here is my first actual “Point Horror” review. For any of my reviews, I'm not really going to go through the story explaining it all. What happens and who says what and why. I'm just going to comment and respond. You can read the book if you want to know exactly what happens!

“Beach Party” is one of the Point Horrors I read in my early 20s. I think a visit back to your childhood is essential every so often! Although, I never read this at the “correct” age, so maybe a childhood revisit is bit of a misnomer in this case. Then again, so is the title of the book. No real “Beach Party” takes place! Karen and Ann Marie are planning a summer of beach parties but they never happen.

I suppose this is a kind of half sister book to “Beach House” as they both have beach in the title and are by R L Stine. Or is that too far fetched a link?!

I have to admit, that as an adult, I had a hard time finding the horror initially in this book. The horror is stereotypical. The bad guys are the bikers around Venice Beach. Bikes, black and leather equal bad here. Mind you, in the summer temperatures of California, you would probably need a screw loose to be wearing black leathers! It reminds me of the good old Aussie soap “Home and Away” where all the weird male characters would wear lots of black and usually leather and their colouring would often be dark hair and pale complexion, tending to the gothic. You just knew trouble was afoot!

Thinking about it a bit more, it is a valid horror. I remember being a child and seeing gangs of older children standing on street corners was pretty scary and intimidating. There always were the intimidating groups wearing subversive clothing. In the 50s, it was the mods and rockers. In the 1990s when this book was written, it was bikers. In the noughties, it's hoodies. If you were in the proper age group, being whisked off on a bike at fast speeds probably is terrifying. Now at my ripe age of 31, I'd love something odd like that to happen! I have rather a penchant for long haired bikers.

The book takes a long time to get to the action and when it does arrive it is all wrapped up very quickly. You have the leading up events – Karen nearly drowning, jellyfish in Karen's bed – but the top notch horror action comes close to the end. Along the way, there are many decoys and sub plots – Renee who is dating Jerry and is threatened by Karen. Ann Marie who has changed since moving to New York and could have carried out the tricks on Karen. Vince, one of the bad boys who has a reputation and probably would kill for a joke. Ooooooooooooooh!

Gradually each are eliminated from suspicion and the actual culprit turns out to be the one you thought was a good guy all along – our Jerry. “Poor crazy Jerry.” I'm kind of baffled – if Jerry had been showing odd signs all along, why did his parents not get him help? Surely he would have exhibited the double Todd/Jerry personality and sister denial way before killing Renee? Oops, spoiler!

The characterization is a bit thin on the ground but I don't think this detracts from the story. It isn't really about the characters, apart from Jerry who does have the strongest characterization. Karen is probably your typical American teenager – wants to be on the beach all summer and par-tay! Renee is the jealous girlfriend. Jerry is the bad boy that you feel a strange attraction to even though you know it's probably not a good idea. Ann Marie – well, what can I say about Ann Marie? I suppose she is the girl who moved away and changed in the meantime. She really does seem to be outside the story for the most part and not much more than a method to get the story going and a pal for Karen.

Being English, “Beach Party” is actually a reasonably interesting look at being a teenager in Los Angeles and actually, being a US teenager. The characters drive – in the UK, although you can start driving at 17, you don't learn in school like you do in the USA. Well, maybe driver's ed has crossed the pond by now like proms. When I was at school you had discos not proms!

Diners feature heavily and therefore eating out. As a teenager here, it would be a burger van in the town centre or McDonalds on Saturday when shopping with your mates. We didn't really use cafes and/or restaurants. There certainly wasn't designated hangouts based on which school you went to. Again, maybe this has changed since I was a teenager. Or maybe it was just where I grew up.

In many ways, it's hard to know what to say about “Beach Party”. In 10 years, it's probably not one of the Point Horrors I'll remember immediately, but it's not one of the worst. The story is plausible, unlike many Point Horror plots which are impossible or border on the barking mad.

All questions are answered and the story is wrapped up well. Apart from why did no-one do anything about Jerry's mental health previously? Could this whole situation have been avoided with proper medical and psychological care? Maybe this is the unintended horror of the story: that without the proper care and support after an incident we could end up like poor crazy Jerry. And maybe in the USA where healthcare is primarily private, perhaps this sort of horror is more plausible to an American.

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