Reviews

Beach House by R.L. Stine

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I came across Beach House at a book swap at work and pure nostalgia made me reach out and pluck it from the shelf! Point Horror books were my first foray into thrillers when I was about 12 or 13 and definitely paved the way for book series I love now like the DI Helen Grace cases. What made me take it home was that it's written by the same author who wrote the "Goosebumps" series and I *loved* being creeped out by them (Say Cheese and Die - a classic!!)

ntharpta1's review

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1.0

This may be the worst Stine book. Dual time lines, bizarre characters, paranormal/fantasy element that wad both predictable bur also out of nowhere. And not a single halfway likeable character.

lynn_k's review

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2.0

Fun up until the end. Stine just doesn't understand how time travel works.

Spoiler

Why did Maria age when she went to the future but Buddy didn't?

liamunderwood's review against another edition

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2.5

It felt somewhat appropriate to follow R.L. Stine's Goosebumps book Ghost Beach with R.L. Stine's Point Horror book Beach House. Of course, this isn't the first Stine Point Horror book I've read that takes place at the beach, with Beach Party also promising to offer sun, sand, and scares. Except I found Beach Party to be terribly dull, and is currently my least favourite Point Horror book I've read so far. So I was optimistic that Beach House couldn't be any worse, and thankfully it isn't.

However, Beach House also isn't great. I do think that there's a good concept here, but I also think Stine somewhat squanders it. The book opens during the summer of 1956 with a group of kids trying to enjoy some sun, and allows for Stine to have a little bit of fun making 'wry' observations of the time, with characters commenting about how bikinis will never catch on and so on. Then someone starts attacking this group of kids. The book alternates between 1956 and 'this' summer, which appears to be a summer in the early '90s what with references to MTV blankets and so on. Sidenote - R.L. Stine is down with the kids, and there's a passage early in the book which unreservedly proves this when he describes the kids from 1956 as having "so much fun" when a group of guys start singing 'Shake, Rattle & Roll' and "dancing like wild men". So whilst I'd say it's fair to criticise Stine for many many things, his fingers are very firmly on the pulse of what kids find fun. Evidently.

Anyway I digress. Switching between the two time periods is a pretty effective choice which I think Stine handles well, for the most part. Although there isn't a great deal of effort put into distinguishing between the two groups of kids, I found it wasn't too difficult to differentiate between them. Beach House is a somewhat enjoyable book... until the climax. I won't give anything away, but I found a certain reveal towards the end to be utterly ludicrous. Also, following Hit and Run, I both love and dread Stine introducing wild animals into these books - love because it's usually so unexpected, and dread because it's often utterly nonsensical. Beach House took me on a wild ride and it's certainly memorable, but I couldn't honestly say it's particularly good. I'm finding Stine's Point Horror offerings to be erratic, to say the least.

2.5/5

Point Horror Ranked
1) The Girlfriend - 4/5
2) Trick or Treat - 3.5/5
3) Fatal Secrets - 3.5/5
4) Teacher's Pet - 3.5/5
5) The Baby-Sitter II - 3.5/5
6) The Cheerleader - 3.5/5
7) The Hitchhiker - 3.5/5
8) April Fools - 3.5/5
9) My Secret Admirer - 3.5/5
10) The Lifeguard - 3.5/5
11) Freeze Tag - 3/5
12) Thirteen Tales of Horror - 3/5
13) The Accident - 3/5
14) Funhouse - 3/5
15) The Window - 3/5
16) The Invitation - 2.5/5
17) The Train - 2.5/5
18) The Waitress - 2.5/5
19) The Snowman - 2.5/5
20) Beach House - 2.5/5
21) The Mall - 2.5/5
22) The Boyfriend - 2/5
23) The Cemetery - 2/5
24) Mother's Helper - 2/5
25) The Baby-Sitter - 1.5/5
26) Hit and Run - 1.5/5
27) The Return of the Vampire - 1/5
28) Beach Party - 1/5

thereadingknitter's review

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2.0

I started reading this book on 09/19/2009. I finished this book on 09/20/2009.

This book was not as predictable as the rest of Stine's books have become to me. I kept wondering what was up with the beach house, Brad, and Buddy. It was an okay book, could have been better if it'd of ended better.

gwendolyn_kensinger's review

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4.0

Summer 1956, a bunch of teens are hanging out at the beach: Maria, Amy, Stuart, Ronnie, and Buddy. They all decide to prank Buddy by stealing his trunks when he's in the water and forcing him to come out to the beach naked. Later Maria stands him up on their date for Stuart. Buddy is pissed and bad things happen.

In the "this summer" timeline, there's Ashley, Ross, Kip, Lucy, and Brad. All of them are summer visitors to the beach, except for Kip and Brad who live there. Lucy and Kip are together. Ashley and Ross are together.

The cool part of this story is there were things that are revealed that I had a hard time believing if they were made up, a dream, or if it was actually happening. I’m not sure that was the intent, but it added to my personal reading experience.

(Copied from another reader’s review) – what you can expect from Beach House

🏖 Some silly beach pranks

👫 MANY teenagers and the drama that goes with it

😦 A few creepy characters

👙 Many stylish (or not) summer outfits

🦈 SHARKS

🌫 Fog that’s coming out of nowhere

🩸 A couple of graphic scenes