OLD SCHOOL APRIL: WEEK ONE!

 ALREADY WE'RE A WEEK DOWN!!! 

Time flies like the wind . . . and fruit flies like bananas!!!  The first week of OSA '24 is in the record books and have I been a busy lil blue barracuda {CHOMP CHOMP}.  I'm a little surprised at myself for having read this many books in the first week; granted some of them were thin.  And I even managed to cram in a few host recs;

First read was a short novel/novella called BELOW by Laurel Hightower which was a Mothman book (as evidenced by the cover) without the word "Mothman" ever having been mentioned in the book itself.  This was a book I'm pretty sure was already read by our BB team leader Kelsi; at least I saw it on one of her videos and decided to read it.  It was pretty awesome sauce and actually there are a lot of other nasty, scary creatures in this book that are the REAL threat here.  I would recommend this one very much because it manages to pack a lot of unexpected twists and turns in it's brief page count.  Fulfills 4 host prompts: written by a woman, monster on the cover and/or in the story, novella and a book that will give you nightmares.

Next we have two books from my newest obsession:  the "Who Was" series of middle grade/YA books which they have about practically everything there is to make a book about.  I mean, they have a book about Travis Kelce, fer corn's sake!!!  These a short non-fiction books for kids and the two I read this week are "WHERE IS THE BERMUDA TRIANGLE?" and "WHAT WERE THE SALEM WITCH TRIALS?".  Most if not all of the books have that "big head" artwork on the covers which I love but inside every book there are line drawings on almost every page which are by different artists but all of which are very nice and descriptive of what the book is discussing.  I have to tell you I've become so addicted to these books that I've boughted myself about THIRTY of 'em!!!  So it's safe to say you'll be seeing more during Old School April.  As a matter of fact, I'm already reading "WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT THE LOCH NESS MONSTER?" as we speak.  Both books fulfill the prompts for written by a woman, non-fiction, Middle Grade/YA Book and the Salem Witch Trial one also fulfills "a book with witches".   

FIVE-MINUTE MYSTERIES was next and this one I saw on Cameron Chaney's Library Macabre youtuber video.  Cameron pulled it from his shelf saying he was gonna read it so I decided to pick up a used copy and read it too because it's gonna fulfill a HELLUVA lotta prompts.  Kelsi also had the same idea because, after watching Cameron's video, she ALSO pulled this book off her shelf to read for OSA.  And since we're all on the Blue Barracuda's team, that's gonna mean a TON of points for us CHOMP CHOMP!!!!  I was actually surprised how well these were written.  I thought, being a bunch of short stories taking 5 minutes to read, would mean they were throw-aways but no indeed they're all pretty great!  This whopper fulfilled ELEVEN prompts, yo!  This is owing to each short story featuring a different kind of monster.

Speaking of Cameron Chaney, the next book I read was a host rec from Kelsi of Cameron Chaney's own novel AUTUMNCROW HIGH: FRESH HELL and I absolutely loved this one.  This one I gave 5 stars and it wasn't even because I've watched the guy's youtuber channel for years and was being nice.  No, this is one incredibly good book in the style of those YA horror series like FEAR STREET of POINT HORROR etc.  Seriously, this is one terrific book and I can't wait till Cameron comes out with the next volume in the series.  Besides being a host rec, it fulfilled 5 other prompts!

The next book I devoured was another host recommendation called SHIT, ACTUALLY by Lindy West.  This is a non-fiction book which is quite hilarious.  West, the author of SHRILL, evaluates a lot of big big BIG movies of recent decades including SPEED, TWILIGHT, HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE, FORREST GUMP, THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION and makes a case for why THE FUGITIVE is the greatest film ever made and there was no need to make any more movies after that because well they already made THE FUGITIVE.  This one fulfills 6 other prompts besides getting points for being a host rec.

Next is another book I read because I saw Cameron Chaney pull it offa his shelf in his "Shopping My Shelves" video for OSA.  It's a total GOOSEBUMPS knock-off called SPINE CHILLERS MYSTERIES:  PIZZA WITH EXTRA CREEPS.  Now this little puppy fulfills 10 prompts.  You heard me.  10 prompts in it's 116 pages and it's damn lucky it does because I hated hated HATED this one.  I wasn't paying strict attention, I guess, to Cameron's video because somewhere he must've said it's not only a GOOSEBUMPS knock-off but it's a CHRISTIAN GOOSEBUMPS knock-off.  So yeah, the main kid in the story -- the one who eats too much pizza with extra cheese which gives him an over-active imagination -- is constantly asking God what the Bible thinks about ghosts.  Now, this is not a problem in itself but the very concept of a CHRISTIAN kids horror book means that, by definition, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING SUPERNATURAL can happen in the book.  The kid and his family move into a haunted house which used to belong to a witch.  But the Bible does not allow for the existence of ghosts or werewolves or any other type of monster which is the bread-and-butter of every single GOOSEBUMPS knock-off as well as the R.L. Stine series itself.  Therefore, the entire book is a series of "Oh, there's a sinister figure in the attic gonna get me . . . oh, it's a dress dummy", "Oh, there's a scary ghost materializing in the corner of the attic . . . oh, it's a window curtain blowing in the wind", "Oh, in the darkened room, something grabbed my arm!!!! . . . oh, it's just the girl standing next to me.", "OH, there's a terrifying creature with yellow glowing eyes that lurks in shadows of the coal cellar . . . oh, it's a cat."  Literally NOTHING AT ALL happens.  Every so-called scare is just a misunderstanding or a BOO prank played by one of the kid's friends.  This is tres tres weak and I advise you to stay well clear of this series.  Pick up a GOOSEBUMPS instead.  I'm tellin' ya, I nearly DNF'ed this one and it's only 116 pages of big print.  Thankfully, it earned my team a lot of points.  Sheesh!  Guess they can't ALL be winners!

Then we come to the movies and telly watched for OSA. 

So this week I watched 3 count 'em THREE host recommendation movies:  THE GREAT MOUSE DETECTIVE, EVERYTHING IS TERRIBLE! THE MOVIE and THE HIDDEN and all three of demz wuz 4 outta 5 stars.  Awesome sauce and totally tubular each and every one of them!!!!  And point points points!  Then I watched the 90's made-for-cable-TV adaptation of the Stephen King short story (which I read when it came out in the PRIME EVIL paperback in 1988) THE NIGHT FLIER and that was much better than I thought it was going to be.  I really enjoyed that one.  Next came 4 rewatches of old school 90's-early 2000's (all before the year 2005 per the rulez) movies:  the three Dark Castle remakes of William Castle movies HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL (1999), THIRT3EN GHOSTS  (2001) and GHOST SHIP (2002) -- all of which I'm a big fan of, you haters -- and the classic SPEED this time on a beautiful 4K.  Wow, remember when Sandra Bullock was so charming before she started taking herself too seriously???

And for the nostalgic telly, I watched 6 episodes of CHEERS, 4 episodes of CLARISSA EXPLAINS IT ALL (Naaaaa naaaaa na naa naaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhh), 2 episodes of TALES FROM THE CRYPTKEEPER, 2 episodes of DARKWING DUCK and 1 episode of FRIDAY THE 13TH: THE SERIES.

Oh yeah, I also fulfilled three activity prompts:  I attended 1 official OSA Sprint, I ate 4 Eggos (actually since I'm diabetic I ate high protein waffles which is allowed under the rulez) and I wore a nostalgic outfit (i.e. my Blue Barracuda T-Shirt, CHOMP CHOMP!).  So I'll see ya back here for week two.