Escape from Camp Run-For-Your-Life is the nineteenth book in the Give Yourself Goosebumps gamebook series. It was published in 1997.
The cover shows three zombies sitting around a campfire in a forest, with a pink sky in the background. A camp counselor is in the middle with two zombie children on either side of him. He is holding a stick, that has spiders and worms skewered on it, while the other two hold sticks of rats and bugs over the campfire.
Blurb
On Your Mark. Get Set. Scream!
Heads up! You're on your way to sports camp! If only Uncle Ed can find the place. He’s the lamest driver ever. A sign up ahead says CAMP RUNNING LEAF. Hey! That's not the name of the camp you signed up for! But Uncle Ed is already driving away. Oh, well. Running Leaf is a sports camp too. Isn't that why the campers call it Camp Run-For-Your-Life?
You've got a choice of events. If you enter the athletic competition called the "Selection," you could be selected for a free trip... to be a slave on Plant Xentron! Yikes. Maybe you'd better choose the wilderness hike instead. Just look out for that mountain lion over there! Oh and try to steer clear of the Zombies with rotting limbs...
The choice is yours in this scary GOOSEBUMPS adventure that's packed with over 20 super-spooky endings!
Plot
You are due to attend a sports camp called Camp Pendleton. Your Uncle Ed is to drive you there, but gets lost and has to ask for directions. You end up at a camp called Camp Running Leaf (which, the head coach claims, is Camp Pendleton under a new name) and have to choose which of two activities to take part in: a hiking excursion or a sports tournament called "The Selection".
Story A
You go on the hiking trip but are alarmed to discover that Kim, a shallow girl you really don't like from your school, is also at the camp and coming on the trip. Coach Krump divides the campers into pairs, and you get stuck with Kim. Each pair has to hike up Zombie Mountain and bring back a bone as proof they were there, with a prize given to the first to return. Coach Krump warns you to beware of zombies, and you think it's a joke; but it isn't. You then have to escape from the zombies while finding a way to complete the challenge.
Story B
You go to breakfast before The Selection and are surprised to see blue eggs being served. You don't want to risk eating the eggs, so you hide them in your napkin; but you notice that your fellow campers who ate them are acting strangely and seem to be on auto-pilot. You head off to The Selection, where all the events turn out to be deadly: swimming in an alligator-infested lake, jumping over blades and more. You need to win The Selection and get the prize of a mountain bike, so that you can escape from the camp. But you're neck and neck with a bully called Brad, the only other person who hasn't eaten the eggs.
Side story C
From story B, rather than hide the eggs in your napkin, you start a food fight with them. Coach Rex decides you need to learn about "teamwork" and rather than letting you take part in The Selection, he makes you play some team sports. There are no good endings to this side story.
List of endings
There are eighteen bad endings and five good endings.
Bad endings
| Ending | Paths |
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A mountain goat butts you over the edge of a cliff. |
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Surrounded by a horde of zombies, you choose to check inside your provided survival kit to see what could save you, only to find a sewing kit. However, you get an idea and you and Kim sew back on all of the zombies' detached limbs to appease them. Shortly after you finally finished, the zombies then begin to fall apart again because of your lousy stitching and Kim loses her patience, abandoning you. The now enraged zombies rend you limb from limb. |
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Your boat is heading towards a waterfall. You jump out of the boat and try to swim to the shore, but the current sucks you in and you're swept over the falls. |
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The Cemetery Man unleashes zombies on you and Kim after you fall into a trap that he had set to catch human "food" for them. |
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Thinking it'll be more impressive to retrieve a skull for the scavenger hunt, you take it from the skeleton before it comes to life. Kim runs away screaming for help, but the skeleton immobilizes you and you both switch places (it turns into a human and you become a living skeleton) until someone else happens upon you and does the same mistake. |
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You insist Uncle Ed pretends to be a zombie and that you'll snag The Cemetery Man's water gun. However, the campers catch and bites into him, transforming him into a zombie and giving your hiding spot away. The Cemetery Man then transforms you, and now unopposed, then everyone on Earth, into zombies. |
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Coach Krump and the zombies catch you, and you are bitten and turn into a zombie. Coach Krump gives you your Outdoors Medal (which has "Kiss Me, I'm a Zombie" engraved on it). |
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You're eaten by a mountain lion. |
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You call Uncle Ed to pick you up, but he captures you for Coach Rex. Uncle Ed is working for the Xentronians and took you to Camp Running Leaf on purpose because they pay him to bring them child slaves. He drives you back to the camp, where Coach Rex will "transport" you to Xentron to slave in the mines. |
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You run away from the camp and go to the old man's house for help. The house is being used by government agents who have traced alien signals to Camp Running Leaf. You tell them what you know about the Xentron plot, and they swoop on the camp and arrest all the staff. This makes the Xentronians so angry that they invade earth and destroy humankind. |
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You overheard Coach Rex's plans to "transport" the campers to Xentron to slave away at the mines and so you wait for an opportunity to escape that night. But you're too exhausted from playing forward earlier that day in a soccer game, you eventually fall asleep. One of your fellow campers realizes you didn't eat the blue eggs, so he forces them down your throat while you're asleep. You become a brainwashed slave to the alien overlords. |
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You ignore an order from one of the coaches during baseball training. The coach realizes that you are not brainwashed. Your fellow campers surround you and apparently beat you to death with their bats. |
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Coach Rex and the nurse use you to test the "transporter" from Earth to Xentron. The transporter is not working properly, and instead sends you to the sun and you burn to a crisp. |
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You try to alert Coach Carla that one of the other swimmers disappeared under the water, but she dismisses you. You realize that it looked like they were being pulled under by something, such as an alligator. At this point, the alligator eats you too. |
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You're attacked by an alligator, and try to hold its jaws shut, but it easily overpowers you and gobbles you up. |
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Forced to do a gymnastic routine inside a ring of flames, you decide to fake an injury to get out of the competition. You slip off the bar, but fall too far and land in the flames. |
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You're sent as a slave to an alien overlord on the planet Xentron where you're told, slaves don't live long and an excruciating death awaits you. |
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You're caught by the aliens running the camp and literally brainwashed into obedience - they give you a direct transfusion of alien brain fluid through your ear. |
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Good endings
| Ending | Paths |
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Kim is attacked by a zombie, but you decide not to save her, so she dies. You run away and escape over the mountain. Then you find Camp Pendleton, the camp that you were supposed to go to earlier. |
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Uncle Ed uses the water pistol to turn the Cemetery Man into a zombie. You get to go to Camp Pendleton after all and receive an enormous reward for assisting in the Cemetery Man's capture. |
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You escape the camp and run to a nearby town to stay with your friend until Uncle Ed can pick you up. You decide to go to computer camp next year. |
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You steal the mountain bike, escape from the camp, and decide to go to the old man's house for help. It turns out he is Agent Driscoll, the head of a secret government team who have been monitoring the aliens in charge of the camp. But by the time the authorities get there, the place is deserted with no one and no evidence left. Agent Driscoll drives you home and is hopeful that he will soon catch the aliens (although it alarms you that they are still out there). |
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You get arrested by a cop and you tell him about Camp Run-For-Your-Life. A movie maker hears about it and you become the richest kid in America. You decide to start your own camp with the profits. |
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International releases
Gallery
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Artwork
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Trivia
- One choice-making method employed in the book is the requirement to point at a location on a map of the United States.
- There are no tests based on the original Goosebumps book series, despite the fact that there were many camp based stories in the series.
- The film producer in one of the good endings is named Vincent Vealberg. His name is likely an allusion to the famous film director, Steven Spielberg. Spielberg is referenced again in Into the Twister of Terror.
- This book references M&M's.
- Unlike most Give Yourself Goosebumps books, this book has a storyline where you aren't punished for abandoning a friend.
- It is very questionable if the good endings of the "selection" story choice are really all that good. In all of the endings, the Reader did manage to escape (and in one case, became incredibly rich), but he didn't actually stop the plans of coach Rex or the Xentronians, and one of the endings implies that he might just visit the camp once again.
- The book references M&Ms