What kid didn’t love the Goosebumps series as a kid?  I was 8 years old when the first book in the series, Welcome to Dead House, was released in 1992, so I was a prime target for these things.  Scary but not too scary, funny, and thrilling, these books had it all for a young kid with a love of the creepy.

My favorites were Return of the Mummy, Say Cheese and Die!, One Day at Horrorland, The Werewolf of Fever Swamp, and – of course – Night of the Living Dummy.

Every time I think of Goosebumps, I think of the cover with the creepy ventriloquist dummy.  Not the one pictured above, but the original.  I wanted a dummy so badly after I read that story.  Sadly, I never got one, but it’s okay.  I don’t know what I would have done if it had come to life anyway.

After reading a little bit about the newer parts of the series, I realize I grew out of them way earlier than I thought.  I guess I transitioned to Stine’s Fear Street series and forgot about good ol’ Goosebumps.  I feel like I need to go back and read some more.  I hear the Goosebumps movie was really fun, but I haven’t been able to watch it yet.  It’s on my list of things to do.

It’s amazing how many different versions of Goosebumps there are now.  I was surprised to see the variety after I took a quick peek at the selection of our local bookstore.  Just look at these:

They’ve got the HorrorLand series, Goosebumps Gold, Goosebumps Most Wanted, Goosebumps, Hall of Horrors, and the classic Goosebumps books.  Of course, there are also movie tie-in books, but since I haven’t seen the movie, I’m not sure how cool they’d be.

If you have children of your own that are in the right age range for these, I’d recommend getting them to read these books now.  Reading is important for any age, and I think these books are fun enough to get any kid interested.