Fear Street: What Holly Heard (R.L. Stine)

Seems like I’ve been reading a lot of Fear Street lately, mainly because I couldn’t handle going back through and re-reading all the Sweet Valley University crap after my old computer died. Luckily I have a few Sweet Valley High books coming soon.

So here we have a bunch of random characters, including Holly who serves as one of the most annoying characters in the history of Fear Street. Holly is a huge gossip, who’s friends with Miriam and Ruth. Ruth is all down because her dad died and I guess Miriam is our “heroine”.

Holly is dating Gary, who just so happens to be Ruth’s next door neighbor and quasai-best friend. She’s obsessed with this guy Noah, who Stine tries to make out to be some badass. Mainly that just means he has an earring or long hair…or plays in a band. Noah is dating Mei and Holly is sure that they’re about to break up and she can snatch him up.

Everyone is super excited because Mei’s having a party. Miriam asks her basketball playing boyfriend Jed about going together and he flips out. I can already see where this is going. Holly decides to find out what’s going on and see why he’s being an asshole. I know why he’s an asshole, it’s because he’s a 16 year old boy.

Miriam and Jed go to the party and she’s relieved because he’s back to his sweet self. She’s happy anyway until she spots Holly, who’s wearing some super tight black dress. All the guys are drooling on themselves, except for Noah. The lights go out and when they come back on, everyone sees Holly hanging on Noah. She claims she was scared, but no one buys it. Then some random guys show up with beer and our good girls clear out.

The girls go over to Ruth’s house the next day and hang out with her hamsters, seriously. Miriam finds a gruesome looking claw hammer in the closet and Ruth spazzes out because it was her dad’s hammer. Nice thing to hold onto. I could understand if her dad was a carpenter or something, but…Holly then tells everyone that Mei and Noah are breaking up. It was his friends who brought the beer, her parents found out and her mom is making them breakup.

Miriam then goes to the basketball game, where Jed freaks out again. He gets hit by another player and retaliates by trying to choke the poor guy out. She tries to make him feel better and he snaps. They fight, he grabs her arm and won’t let go until she cries because of the pain. Then, instead of getting a lesson on domestic abuse, Jed kinda apologizes and Miriam forgives him, saying that if he does it again, they’re done. Nice Stine, nice.

Holly pops up, saying she heard Mei threaten to kill her mom. Miriam laughs it off, until the next day when Mrs. Mei turns up dead. Noah tells Holly, in front of witnesses no less, that he knew she heard them the night before. Holly freaks out, but still decides to stay after school for some stupid project. She calls Miriam and begs her to meet her at the school, also saying that she knows Jed’s deal so naturally Miriam runs over there. Of course she finds Holly dead…finally.

The next day Ruth shows up with some stuff from Miriam. Miriam finds a threatening note on her book and takes it to the cops, also telling them about Noah and Mei. Jed then pops up, but he only shows up to make a rude comment about Holly dying because she was too nosey.

Mei kind of verbally attacks Miriam in school, telling her that she loved her mom and everything was a lie. She also says she didn’t want Holly dead, but then says she’d kill for Noah. What’s with all the psycho high school loves in this book?

Miriam tries to get on with her life, but she keeps fighting with Jed. She thinks he’s hiding something, but that doesn’t stop her from going to watch him play. He attacks another player and she freaks out when she realizes the chokehold is his go-to move and Holly was choked. Jed runs after her, but she manages to get into Ruth’s house.

Ruth shocks her by saying there were more murders, but it’s just her hamsters. Sorry, but I find hamsters creepy so I won’t be crying my eyes out. Ruth says that it’s proof it was Noah and Mei because it happened during the game. Miriam helps her calm down and while rummaging through her closets for some cloths, she finds the claw hammer with fur and blood on it.

Ruth pops up and goes crazy. She confesses that she killed Holly because she secretly loves Gary and didn’t like the way he was treated. They start struggling over the hammer and Jed runs into the house, how did he get inside? Ruth knocks him over the head with the hammer and starts fighting with Miriam again. Jed moves, Ruth gets distracted and Miriam hits her with the hamster cage.

It turns out that Jed’s been taking steroids. Gee, you think? He apologizes and she takes him back. I call bull shit. Jed needs like serious help, probably even rehab to get off the roids. Miriam should have run for the fucking hills.