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Let's Get Invisible! is the sixth book in the original Goosebumps book series. It was first published in 1993.

The original cover illustration features Max Thompson looking through a mirror in the attic. Half his body is invisible.

The Classic Goosebumps cover illustration features a boy whose head has vanished under the light of the mirror.

Blurb

Disappearances Can Be Deadly.

On Max's birthday, he finds a sort of magic mirror in the attic. It can make him become invisible. So Max and his friends start playing now you see me, now you don't. Until Max realizes that he's losing control. Staying invisible a little too long. Having a harder time coming back. Getting invisible is turning into a very dangerous game. The next time Max gets invisible, will it be... forever?

Plot

Max Thompson is hosting his birthday party at his home. Among the guests are Noah "Lefty" Thompson, Zack, Erin, and April. Noah is Max's brother, and he is called Lefty because he is left-handed. Zack is Max's best friend, and he has a strange hairstyle, buzzed short on the left, and combed real long on the right. Erin is a loud-voiced girl, while April is incredibly shy. The party is almost finished when Whitey, Max's dog, runs to the attic. While the kids (minus Zack) look for him, they find a large, old mirror. Max pulls the chain of an overhead light. As soon as he does this, he disappears.

When the lights go out, Max reappears. Erin, April, and Lefty insist that he became invisible, although he refuses to believe the group. That night, Max returns to the attic to inspect the mirror. Lefty joins Max on this exploration. Both boys want to make themselves invisible. The boys turn on the light and disappear. After a few minutes, they begin to feel weak. They turn off the light, but it takes slightly longer for them to become visible. Max decides he wants to use the mirror once more to prank Zack.

The next day, Max uses the mirror and becomes invisible on Zack, although it takes even longer to become visible afterwards. Erin and April arrive a moment later, and Erin suggests that they hold a contest to see who can be invisible the longest. April, wanting to stay visible, chooses to time her friends. Before Lefty gets a chance to go invisible, his grandparents arrive for dinner. The kids decide to postpone the contest until another day. During dinner, Lefty does not show up, until Max sees a floating fork and deduces that Lefty made himself invisible. Thankfully, Max's parents don't notice. Lefty later reappears declaring he managed ten minutes.

That night, Erin calls Max by telephone. Erin tells Max to take the mirror to school for the science fair, but he refuses, fearing it will be confiscated. Max goes to the attic and looks at his reflection in the mirror. He hears his name being whispered from the mirror, but isn't sure if it's coming from the mirror, or if he's imagining it. Frightened, Max runs back to his room and locks himself in until the next morning. When he wakes up, Max discovers that Lefty became invisible again. Max is furious, but then becomes horrified when Lefty suddenly becomes genuinely unresponsive. In a panic, Max hurries to the mirror to make Lefty become visible again. Once visible again, Lefty begins acting strangely, and Max senses something about Lefty's appearance is not right.

Deciding that the mirror could be dangerous, Max call his friends and cancels the contest. However, Zack, Erin, and April return to Max's house because Lefty agrees to revive the contest. April also decides to become invisible for a short time, but Whitey the dog also becomes invisible with her, by accident. Max quickly forces both of them to become visible again. During Erin's turn, Erin remains invisible for over twelve minutes, and becomes unresponsive, because she went downstairs to get a Coke. She becomes completely unresponsive a second time, so Max forces her to become visible again. When she does, Max also notices that something has changed in both Erin's behavior and appearance.

Zack wants to remain invisible for fifteen minutes. During this time, he leaves the house and play a prank on a neighbor, juggling his tomatoes. Like the others, Zack then becomes completely unresponsive, and Max runs to the attic and forces him to become visible again. Zack is still pleased to have the record time of thirteen minutes forty seconds. Strangely, Max discovers that Zack's hairstyle has seemingly been reversed, and he too is behaving strangely. Max decides to forfeit the contest, and let Zack win, but Erin and Zack force him to use the mirror to make him invisible. As the minutes roll by, Max begins to feel weak. He asks to be made visible again, but Zack and Erin don't pay attention to him. A haze appears, followed by a white light and a figure approaching Max; it's his own reflection.

Max's reflection tells him that Zack and Erin have been replaced by their reflections. Zack and Erin are now locked in the mirror. Before Max's reflection can swap places with him, Max escapes, and the duplicates of Erin and Zack have made Max visible again, assuming that the change has already been completed. Suddenly, Max's reflection appears in the mirror. He tells them that the real Max escaped. The duplicates of Erin and Zack try to make Max invisible again. Max tries to flee the attic, but he is caught by the reflections. He asks April for help, but she is also caught and confused.

Unexpectedly, Lefty enters the attic and, thinking the reflection is Max, throws the softball at the mirror, breaking it. The reflections are sucked into the mirror's pieces, and the real Erin and Zack are brought back into the real world. Later, Max and his brother decide to play catch. But to his horror, Max notices that Lefty is throwing with his right hand.

Reprints and rereleases

Differences

  • The Classic Goosebumps reprint was released as a tie-in to the Goosebumps film.

International releases

Differences

  • In Russia, this is the first book in the original Goosebumps series.
  • In Portugal, this is the seventeenth book in the original Goosebumps series.

Merchandise

Television adaptation

Let's Get Invisible! was adapted into an episode of the Goosebumps TV series, as the thirteenth episode of season two. The exclamation mark was omitted from the title.

Artwork

Trivia

  • The cover artist, Tim Jacobus, did not add the cobwebs or spider in the original painting. It was added in post by an unknown artist, presumably a Scholastic employee. The 2003 reprint did not include these changes.
  • Stine has said he's fond of this book — and that parts of it were inspired by the 1990 film Flatliners.[1]
  • Although it isn't a sequel to Let's Get Invisible!, the Goosebumps Series 2000 book Ghost in the Mirror follows a similar plot with children being switched with creatures from an evil mirror.
  • This book references The Terminator, Super Nintendo, X-Force, and Saturday Night Live.
  • The title of this book may be a spoof of the 1981 song, Physical.
  • At 139 pages, this is the longest book in the original series.
  • First editions of this book do not feature a number on the spine. This would be the final book to do so.
  • The concept of the mirror reflections trying to take over people's lives may have taken inspiration from Mirror Image, an episode from the 1959 TV show The Twilight Zone.
  • Whitey was likely named after a dog of the same name that R.L. Stine's family owned when he was a child and was mentioned in It Came From Ohio!.

References in other Goosebumps media

Goosebumps The Game - Mirror Demon

The mirror and mirror demon as it appears in the game.

  • In Goosebumps: The Game, the mirror appears with a mirror demon. After the demon's defeat, a copy of the book itself appears and can then be collected as an item in the player's inventory. The book's manuscript also appears later. 

References

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