Fear Street: First Date (R.L. Stine)

The book starts out with some guy killing a girl. Okay, so he parks with her, they make out for awhile and then go for a walk. He keeps comparing her to his mother, which seems to piss him off. She finds his wallet and notices that the name he gave her, doesn’t match the one on his license. It’s okay though because they take a walk and he strangles her with a wire cord.

First Date then jumps to the life of Chelsea Richards. She isn’t very interesting though. She lives on Fear Street and her family only moved to Shadyside a month ago, so her dad could take over some café in the Old Village. She plays saxophone in the school band and her mom rags on her. Her mom seems to rag on her for a lot of things actually.

Chelsea does have one friend, Nina. Unfortunately Nina only seems to care about her boyfriend Doug and whether or not he’s cheating on her. She tries to talk to Nina when things are rough, but she’s running off with the boyfriend. On the way home, some guys in a car tail her and ask her out. She gets a little sad because apparently, she’s never had a real date.

Luckily this new kid Will moves to town and sits right next to her in homeroom. They’re both too shy to even look at each other so the odds of them getting together are slim to none. Chelsea keeps thinking about him while she’s working, but gets distracted by some new, cute guy. His name is Tim “Call Me Sparks” Sparks and after five minutes, he asks her out. He ends up running away though before she answers.

That same night, a group of thugs come into the restaurant. They terrorize her dad and hit him over the head with a pipe. While he’s passed out and bleeding, they run off, without even taking the money from the register. Her dad goes to the hospital and ends up in intensive care. Chelsea calls Nina to stay with her that night, but she shows up with Doug and they start making out on the couch. Nice friends.

Killer guy from the beginning pops up. The only real point of him being there was for him to bitch about his mom some more. Oh yeah and kill a kitten. Thanks for giving me that image before bed you bastard.

Chelsea finally goes back to work and of course sees some guys come in. They look like they might rob the restaurant, but Sparks shows up and they run off. She waits for him to ask her out, but he just drinks his coffee and leaves. He gets his own chapter, where he freaks out about not asking her out and throws a telephone through a window.

Nina proves once again that she sucks as a friend. Chelsea tries to talk to her and she just moans about Doug flirting with Suki Thomas. She then runs off mid-sentence because she sees him walk by. Luckily Will happens by and asks Chelsea to take a walk with him. He then asks her out and when she reveals that it’s her first date, he says it’s his too and asks her to keep it a secret.

Chelsea goes to work again and sees Sparks again. He asks her out and she turns him down because she has a date with Will. She goes on her date with Will, a little sad because he goes to the next town over instead of staying in Shadyside. They go up to park and kiss a little bit. Then they go for a walk and *gasp* Will pulls a cord out. Of course when she sees it, he tells her that he found it on the ground.

They go home and start making out, but she decides to interrupt the mood and make some hot chocolate. Nina shows up and Chelsea gets all excited so she can introduce them, but Will has disappeared. He calls the next day and says he told her he’d call, but he had to leave unexpectedly.

Then we get a boring scene where Chelsea eats too much. She has a sandwich, chips and some other crap, while Nina has a banana or apple and yogurt, then bitches because she can never finish a whole yogurt on her own. She goes back to work and sees Sparks, who shows up drunk. He chases her around the restaurant, falls on the grill and burns his hand. She runs off and calls the FBI because an agent warned her about a guy matching Sparks’ description. The FBI show up and take him off to the hospital.

Will shows up at her house and they fool around a little. She confesses that she told Nina about him and he suggests she invite her over. Then he does a little happy dance because Chelsea is too stupid to realize that he’s the killer. Then he does some weird stuff and she realizes that he’s actually the guy the FBI wants. She tries to escape outside, but he chases her and chokes her to death.

Nina shows up and gets suspicious when he says Chelsea is upstairs, but she never says anything. Then he says that she went for ice cream and she gets more suspicious. He threatens to kill her, but Chelsea shows up. Then the FBI shows up. Turns out that Chelsea can hold her breath for a long time because of playing the saxophone and faked being dead. I’m just glad this is done.