Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-28171460-20181008160755/@comment-26440700-20181012141059

Welcome to Deadhouse still takes the cake for me. The backstory of the novel is like something taken out of one of the films in the Return of the Living Dead series. And while I know we've been desensitized by that type of plot, the way they described it's effects on the townspeople was just creepy all around. Stine merged some of the better aspects of a creepy ghost, vampire and zombie story all into one and it worked for how well it implied things instead of explaining too much like in some of the other books.

I still get jitters just thinking about what must have happened to that next family and how the ones they thought were killed....weren't.

Stine is right. He wouldn't write that kind of a book now for Goosebumps.

But yeah, if there were candidates to dethrone it, Stay out of the Basement and Ghost Next Door would be my vote. That cover image of Stay alone creeped me out. More on that later. Ghost Next Door doesn't bring out your typical Goosebumps fear. It's more about the fear of eventual abandonment, having to leave after knowing that you unknowingly caused the most horrid tragedy possible, and the fear that you'll eventually be forgotten. I agree with Troy, it sorta was Sixth Sense before Sixth Sense, but imo with a very different distinct focus.