This is the third in R.L Stein's Nightmare Room series, which is a fine series of what I'll dub horror-lite, I believe the author is giving a tip of the hat to The Twilight Zone TV series, as each story begins with a very Twilight Zone-esque opening...which you can find in the publisher description on this same page. I rather like this about the series, and all three I have read thus far take a stab at recreating some of the startling, strange and just plain bizarre happenings (so Twilight Zone-ish...also like The Outer Limits, of more recent times) in the lives of the unfortunate soul who happens to be unlucky enough to enter the Nightmare Room.

This volume we encounter Maggie, a shy girl celebrating her 13th birthday with her three best friends in the whole world (the three J's) whom she has known since she was 4 years old. Maggie is just like any other 13 year old; she's trying on her newly minted teenage identity and just trying to have a good time. Her friends take her to the carnival to celebrate and there she encounters the boy she has a crush on (and who one of her friends played a vicious prank on last year) and then is told by a fortune teller that he is evil. The girls laugh it off, but as the story progresses, something terrible is starting to happen and just about everything Maggie touches turns out all wrong. We follow her through a rather bizarre series of "accidents" which lead more and more of Maggie's friends to really believe that she is EVIL! The story, like the others before it, always has a surprise waiting at the end...is Maggie truly evil and out to destroy her friend? Will Maggie survive her trip into the Nightmare Room?

This, for me, was the least subtle of the three I have read so far. It's pretty straight forward in the telling, the reader will find themselves unable to put the book down...each turn of events leaves us asking...it couldn't get WORSE, could it? But yes, it can...and does! The events just keep escalating in a series of accidents that keep us reading to see what's going to happen next. Aside from not being subtle at all, it's also got the least twisted ending...it does have what I think is turning into a "signature twist" at the end, but it's not all that surprising and it's certainly not subtle, you'd have to be pretty thick not to see this one coming, but still...it does have creep factor and the main character is more sympathetic than in the previous books...that is to say that I felt her pain at losing her friends more keenly than I felt the emotions of the main character in either of the other two, so that was a definite bonus! The first book remains my favorite...this one get a B+ from me, simply because it was a bit heavy handed in the building up to the climax and the ending wasn't all that much of a surprise to me. Looking forward to reading more of this series! ( )