Horror Review: Terror Academy #3- Sixteen Candles by Nicholas Pine (1993, Berkley)

Kelly Langdon's always been something of an outsider. Skipping third grade means she's always been the youngest one in her class. Her parents died in a tragic car accident when she was younger. Fortunately her aunt Doris was there to take her in, but times are tough: her aunt works a low-wage job in the hospital cafeteria, and Kelly doesn't get the sorts of things other girls take for granted, like new outfits for school, timely delivery of her yearbook, or even her senior class ring. What's more, Kelly's diet isn't the healthiest, and she's packed nearly a hundred and fifty pounds into her five-foot-five-inch frame. Combined with the cheapest glasses possible to correct her vision, and her incredible intelligence, she's got far too many strikes against her to be anything but a reject, the lowest rung on Central Academy's social ladder, and the target of constant harassment by Liza Brown and her jerk-ass boyfriend Jeremy Rice.

Kelly's fortunes are about to change however. When the school counselor gets her a full-time summer job which puts her on the fast-track to fitness with a cushy $7.50/hour wage (at a time when minimum in the US was $4.25), Kelly starts eating better, working out, and pushing herself towards a goal of running two miles at a stretch before the end of the summer. Her best friend Rachel can't believe the change: Kelly's gone from frumpy to fashion plate, with a whole new wardrobe, long hair, and contact lenses. Day one, she's turning all the boys' heads.

But her new-found popularity doesn't come without a price, as her friends from last year are squeezed out now that she's dating smart and sexy Brad and has ditched the Computer Club in lieu of some extra-curricular smooching. So who could possibly wish so much ill on Kelly that they're willing to kill everyone around her to ruin her new life? Kelly better figure out out fast, because as far as the police are concerned, she's the prime suspect as the bodies hit the floor.

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I don't have the second book in the "Terror Academy" series, but I have to say Sixteen Candles is superior to Lights Out in every way imaginable. That's not to say it's a particularly great book, because let's face it, 90's teen horror rarely sets the roof on fire, but everything about Sixteen Candles, except for possibly the initial set-up for the mystery, blows Lights Out out of the water.

Everybody in high school either was Kelly or knew Kelly. I was never part of the "in" crowd, being a socially-awkward and highly-introverted geek about twenty years before such a thing as 'nerd cred' was worth putting on your resume. I knew what it was like to endure the whispers and the teasing, the eye-rolls and rejections, any time I dared poke my head out of the box where I'd been placed by others or wandered outside my mandated group of nerd friends. It's refreshing to see a protagonist in one of these books who had suffered a similar fate. I know the feeling of never having the latest fashions, of shopping at thrift stores for pre-owned clothing, of watching my peers arrive at school behind the wheels of their new car when I didn't even have my driver's license.

Unlike Kelly though, I never moved between social strata, though I often dreamed about being popular and wondering what it would be like to roam in those higher circles, if only for a day. Well, if it would have been anything like Pine's story, I suppose I should be glad I didn't, since it means I dodged a psycho hell-bent on ensuring my abject misery. Growing up can be hell, but Sixteen Candles takes that to a completely new level of nasty. :)

The writing is vastly improved from Pine's first effort here--characters are better-defined, the story's flow and pacing are on point, and pretty much everyone behaves in a rational, believable way. Pine might be ripping off Stine and Fear Street, but he's only borrowing the good bits and leaving the not-so-great stuff (like the fake cliffhanger chapter endings for which Stine was infamous) on the chopping block. The setup is superior, and best of all, the protagonist is someone you feel inclined to root for. Mandy Roberts from Lights Out was one of the least-likable main characters in a teen horror novel I've ever encountered. Kelly changes with her summer transformation as well, but it's understood that she's trying to straddle the lanes between her old world and her new, and she hasn't quite worked out all the rules yet.

My only real complaint? I latched on to the identity of the killer way early, although I feel that comes mostly from experience with these stories over the past twenty-some years. After a while, you start picking the clues out from the red herrings automatically. I didn't suss out the 'why' (at least not entirely) before the big reveal, but the reasoning behind the killer's actions makes a perverse sort of sense. The ending feels rushed, but with only 174 pages of story that's not shocking. I will say I was a little disappointed in the final revelation of the book having to do with Kelly's life's improvement--no spoilers, and I understand that it's every kid's fantasy (because, hey, it was mine too), but it makes everything a little bit too 'happily ever after' for the genre. Finally, if you're looking for a high body count or over-the-top method of execution, Sixteen Candles is likely to disappoint. Considering just how horribly Mandy's dad meets his end in Lights Out, this feels a bit pedestrian. Still, it's not like Pine could open every book with a guy getting electrocuted and then crushed under sabotaged bleachers.

Despite these few flaws. I can't be too mad. Sixteen Candles kept my attention for the couple hours it took me to burn through it in a single sitting. It's better than book one by far, and after reading it, I can see why this series managed to last through fifteen installments.

Three knife-stabbed birthday cakes out of five.