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Fear Street #6
The Sleepwalker
"Somebody help—don't let me sleepwalk again!"
One week after she starts her summer job on Fear Street with old Mrs. Cottler, Mayra Barnes begins to sleepwalk, waking up in the dead of night not knowing where she is. Mayra becomes even more terrified when she discovers Mrs. Cottler may be a witch...
Is the old woman casting spells on Mayra? To add to Mayra's horror, she is being followed by a menacing stranger who seems to recognize her—but she's never seen him in her life!
Mayra's sleepwalking is leading her into more and more peril. She soon realizes she must take action. She must find out what is happening to her—or she may never leave Fear Street alive!
One week after she starts her summer job on Fear Street with old Mrs. Cottler, Mayra Barnes begins to sleepwalk, waking up in the dead of night not knowing where she is. Mayra becomes even more terrified when she discovers Mrs. Cottler may be a witch...
Is the old woman casting spells on Mayra? To add to Mayra's horror, she is being followed by a menacing stranger who seems to recognize her—but she's never seen him in her life!
Mayra's sleepwalking is leading her into more and more peril. She soon realizes she must take action. She must find out what is happening to her—or she may never leave Fear Street alive!
164 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published May 1, 1990
38 people are currently reading
3265 people want to read
About the author
R.L. Stine
1,739 books18.8k followersRobert Lawrence Stine known as R. L. Stine and Jovial Bob Stine, is an American novelist and writer, well known for targeting younger audiences. Stine, who is often called the Stephen King of children's literature, is the author of dozens of popular horror fiction novellas, including the books in the Goosebumps, Rotten School, Mostly Ghostly, The Nightmare Room and Fear Street series.
R. L. Stine began his writing career when he was nine years old, and today he has achieved the position of the bestselling children's author in history. In the early 1990s, Stine was catapulted to fame when he wrote the unprecedented, bestselling Goosebumps® series, which sold more than 250 million copies and became a worldwide multimedia phenomenon. His other major series, Fear Street, has over 80 million copies sold.
Stine has received numerous awards of recognition, including several Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards and Disney Adventures Kids' Choice Awards, and he has been selected by kids as one of their favorite authors in the NEA's Read Across America program. He lives in New York, NY.
http://us.macmillan.com/itsthefirstda...
R. L. Stine began his writing career when he was nine years old, and today he has achieved the position of the bestselling children's author in history. In the early 1990s, Stine was catapulted to fame when he wrote the unprecedented, bestselling Goosebumps® series, which sold more than 250 million copies and became a worldwide multimedia phenomenon. His other major series, Fear Street, has over 80 million copies sold.
Stine has received numerous awards of recognition, including several Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards and Disney Adventures Kids' Choice Awards, and he has been selected by kids as one of their favorite authors in the NEA's Read Across America program. He lives in New York, NY.
http://us.macmillan.com/itsthefirstda...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 170 reviews
December 3, 2019
La calle del terror siempre me ha parecido una premisa muy interesante, que si eres curioso o fanático de todas las cosas que tienen que ver con ello, seguro te atrapa.
Cada tomo tiene una historia de algún miembro de la comunidad, en la que todos o la mayoría se conocen y esto le da un aderezo muy bueno a estas historias. Cada uno tiene la suya, y todas se van enredando con la famosa calle del terror.
Una chica con problemas a la hora de dormir, decide no darle importancia a esto, mientras pasa las vacaciones de verano haciéndole compañía a una anciana que reside en la calle del terror. Una vez ahí comenzará a conocer a esta singular señora, que al parecer siente una intensa atracción por la brujería, cosa que le heredó a su familia, pues sus nietos y de hecho amigos y ex de esta chica, podrían tener mucho que ver en su condición nocturna.
¿Ustedes también la visitarían en la calle del terror?
Una buena historia, con sus dosis de suspenso y miedo que solo R.L. Stine nos puede dar.
Cada tomo tiene una historia de algún miembro de la comunidad, en la que todos o la mayoría se conocen y esto le da un aderezo muy bueno a estas historias. Cada uno tiene la suya, y todas se van enredando con la famosa calle del terror.
Una chica con problemas a la hora de dormir, decide no darle importancia a esto, mientras pasa las vacaciones de verano haciéndole compañía a una anciana que reside en la calle del terror. Una vez ahí comenzará a conocer a esta singular señora, que al parecer siente una intensa atracción por la brujería, cosa que le heredó a su familia, pues sus nietos y de hecho amigos y ex de esta chica, podrían tener mucho que ver en su condición nocturna.
¿Ustedes también la visitarían en la calle del terror?
Una buena historia, con sus dosis de suspenso y miedo que solo R.L. Stine nos puede dar.
July 29, 2021
Sin duda uno de mis favoritos de la serie. A diferencia de los otros libros de la saga la trama está mucho mejor construída y hay varias pistas falsas que sirven para confundir al lector. ¿Qué se oculta detrás de los episodios de sonambulismo de Mayra? Entre su jefa que posiblemente sea una bruja, su ex novio intenso, su ex cuñada que es fan del ocultismo y su nuevo novio que sueña con convertirse en un mago, todos en esta historia son sospechosos. Puntos extra porque este es de los pocos libros que tiene un guiño hacia una ocurrencia sobrenatural.
August 16, 2018
There is more I could say about this book, and would love to, but I don't want to spoil it so it's just going to be short and vague.
There was a problematic element that is the reason it got 4 instead of 5 stars. There is a creepy dude, stalker-creep type, and that isn't handled well. Oh and a minor thing about a cane being the only thing to give away someone's age because they looked so young....young people and even kids have to use canes too you know...
I loved everything else about this book though! I was so worried at the beginning it was going to go in a direction that, for personal reasons, would irritate me, but it didn't go there and I loved the direction it took instead! It was creepy, a good pace, enjoyed the characters (or their characterization) and over-all it was a fun read.
There was a problematic element that is the reason it got 4 instead of 5 stars. There is a creepy dude, stalker-creep type, and that isn't handled well. Oh and a minor thing about a cane being the only thing to give away someone's age because they looked so young....young people and even kids have to use canes too you know...
I loved everything else about this book though! I was so worried at the beginning it was going to go in a direction that, for personal reasons, would irritate me, but it didn't go there and I loved the direction it took instead! It was creepy, a good pace, enjoyed the characters (or their characterization) and over-all it was a fun read.
August 18, 2018
Rereading this in my mid 30’s, this one has some real scary moments in it. Not supernatural scary but oh shit, this kinda stuff happens every day scary. Myra isn’t the smartest and it gets worse the more sleep deprived she becomes. She doesn’t make the smartest decisions. The story was good, I couldn’t remember a thing about it so I was clueless until the end. And thank god! The cat doesn’t die.
July 17, 2019
A novel for the Me Too era, this is not. Besides killing off animals, Stine has the unfortunate bad habit of crafting "persistent underdog" male characters and passing them off as cute, caring, and the one who wins the girl in the end (because if you just ask long enough, you get the girl! Don't you know?).
So I know firsthand what narcissistic assholes magicians can be. And soon our protagonist, Mayra, does too. Her current boyfriend, Walker, is a magician. He is away at the beginning of the book but comes home partway through. While he's gone this leaves the door wide open for Link, Mayra's former boyfriend, to constantly harass her for dumping him.
Mayra is working for Mrs. Cottler, an old lady who lives on Fear Street, for the summer (when she's not being harassed by Link, that is). Mrs. Cottler likes for Mayra to read to her. Mayra finds her okay enough, but she's put off by Mrs. Cottler's cat, Hazel. Mayra gradually finds a bunch of witch-related stuff in Mrs. Cottler's house. She has black candles everywhere. She also seems to enjoy holding onto possessions of others (which, as you probably know, are needed to cast spells). Hazel accidentally rips off Mayra's new necklace from Walker on her first day there. Mrs. Cottler offers to restring the beads for Mayra, but she seems to be keeping the beads a little too long in Mayra's opinion.
This book is busy, because in the midst of this summer job Mayra has yet ANOTHER crazy guy following her, and she begins sleepwalking. The guy's name is Cal, and he seems angry from the first time he spots Mayra. The problem is that Mayra has never seen him before in her life. There is also Mayra's best friend, Donna, who(m?) gets run off the road by a crazy driver and ends up in the hospital. She lives, but she's pretty banged up.
Mayra can't figure out why she's sleepwalking, but she soon grows suspicious of Mrs. Cottler, especially when she finds out that her mom, Brenda, once had Mrs. Cottler as a patient. Apparently Mrs. Cottler didn't like the treatment she received from Mayra's mom or something like that. It's not long, though, before Mayra is (rightfully) suspicious of everyone around her. Link's sister, Stephanie, also comes over to reveal that she, too, does not understand the concept of no means no. She and Mayra fight, and she's deeply disappointed that Mayra will not get back together with Link. Then Mayra sees Link's truck, a red Chevy, and recognizes it as the one that drove Donna off the road. However, his truck doesn't have a scratch on it. After her first confrontation with Mayra, Stephanie takes Mayra's favorite white scarf. It's never explained why she does this, but we can assume it's because she also does not understand boundaries or asking for permission. So when Mayra finds out a link between Mrs. Cottler and Stephanie, she decides to confront her, only to find Stephanie chanting in her (Stephanie's) bedroom and wearing Mayra's scarf on her head! Stephanie is positively incensed that Mayra wants her scarf back and doesn't understand what the big deal in all of this is (Link and Stephanie: two peas in a pod). Mayra accuses Stephanie of casting a spell on her, but then she starts to doubt herself.
In what is the best scene in the book, Brenda gets help for Mayra's sleepwalking in the form of a psychiatrist. Here, Stine gets things surprisingly right. The psychiatrist is not portrayed as dismissive or in the "tell me how you feel" way of most books when handling something like this. Instead, he listens to Mayra and encourages her to discover what she might be suppressing that could be causing her to sleepwalk. In the meantime, he gives her a nonaddictive sleep aid so she can finally get rest. This was also a great move on Stine's part, because he showed medicine as not something evil at all costs, yet he also acknowledged that often those types of meds can be addictive. I really appreciated that extra acknowledgement to Mayra that what she was taking was okay.
Buttt then Stine loses all points with the ending (though he would get major points if not for the way the boys in the book are portrayed. The twist is actually a good one). So first of all, you know by now the true guilty party is not Mrs. Cottler, right? Good.
After a harrowing sleepwalking incident down to the lake in which she almost drowns, Mayra decides to confront her demons once and for all. She realizes that each time she sleepwalks she ends up at the lake. She surmises that there is clearly something important about this, so she goes to visit the lake while she's awake and see what happens. She goes at night, and who should show up but Link? He gets seriously frightening in this scene when he tries to brush off following Mayra and then grabs her forcefully and demands that she tell him why she left him. Men: THIS. IS. NOT. OKAY. Mayra manages to escape and runs away from him.
Shortly after it all comes back to her. The lake was important in her dreams... because it's where she was involved in an accident with Walker where someone died and another person almost did. Mayra recalls a night when she was at the mall with Walker but he, for a reason not unexplained, completely changes his personality and decides he wants to joyride. He insists to Mayra that it's his mom's car, but once they are already on the road he reveals that actually he did steal a car. Why? "Because I felt like it." Mayra demands he turn around but, in keeping with the patterns of this book, Walker ignores her completely, and it ends badly. Walker accidentally runs another car off the road, and they land in the water below. Mayra is pleading for Walker to help them, but he won't listen. Mayra sees one passenger float to the surface but not the other. She screams and screams at him to do something but he does nothing.
Well, I take that back. He doesn't do nothing. What he actually does is hypnotize Mayra into not remembering the accident at all. Yes, you read that right. Gaslighting by way of hypnotism. The night of the accident, on the way home after Walker refuses to get help, Mayra apparently asked him to hypnotize her to calm her down. Walker, sweet peach that he is, obliged, but not without using that opportunity to his advantage. That very night he told a hypnotized Mayra that she would not remember the accident they had just been through. After all, he cannot have his future as a famous magician ruined (Barf. But he actually says this later in the book. It's way too close to home for me).
As she realizes this, Mayra also starts kicking ass and develops a plan to trick Walker. She gets him to come to the lake with her, and she tells him that after the stress of everything going on lately she needs him to hypnotize her. Only this time she is only pretending to be under his influence. And, sure enough, at the end of the session he also adds that she will continue to forget about the car accident. Mayra explodes spectacularly. She (hallelujah!) tells him what a horrible person he is for letting someone die and for letting her go crazy and go without sleep all this time. She's even sarcastic when he says, "You tricked me," and she immediately responds, "You catch on quickly." I had so much love for Mayra in that moment. Stine doesn't often write of women characters with any backbone.
Then, also adding to the spectacular ending, Mayra is saved by Hazel. Yes, Mrs. Cottler's cat comes down to the lake and scratches the shit out of Walker long enough for Mayra to escape. She gets to the house and calls 911. Which is fantastic... until Walker throws a stone at the window and comes inside like a regular Michael Myers. He tells Mayra the usual, how she "shouldn't have done that" and blah blah. And then the cat is back! Mayra can't figure out how in the world Hazel could have made it back to the house so quickly.
I am so, so happy to report that, for once in a Stine book, an animal does not die. We think that might be where it's headed, but then Cal comes to the door. He's the other other insane guy that's been after Mayra the whole book. But, to her shock, when he gets the door open he goes after Walker and not Mayra. Turns out that Cal is the brother of the man who died in the car accident. He thought Mayra was the killer. So he tried to run her off the road (this was Donna, but she was driving Mayra's car) and kept following her all over. But he hears the fight between Mayra and Walker at the lake, and he learns the truth: Walker was the killer, and Mayra had no idea what happened this whole time because of the hypnotism. Finally, the police show up and try and piece all of this together. You might want to sit down, fellas. It's gonna be a long night.
In the last chapter, it's one week later, and Mayra kills any of the goodwill I felt towards her (though, to be fair, it's hardly her fault she's taken in with these men). Link comes by to apologize for being a creep, but he clearly still doesn't think he's done anything wrong, especially when Mayra jokes that she must love creeps. It gets worse from there, with Link essentially brushing off what he did to her. They end up kissing and so it's like everything a lot of these romcoms have told us for years: if you just keep trying, you'll get the girl in the end. Even if she has another boyfriend. Even if she says no. Repeatedly.
It's an awful message, clearly. I hope no teenager is reading this book in 2019. The last thing we need is even more people confused about things that should be crystal clear. There are no blurred lines here. Walker was a gaslighter and Link is a stalker. Because stalking is the very definition of what he did. This book was shaping up to be great until the extremely problematic ending of the guy winning the girl because he was just pushy enough. No no no.
Please don't do this to anyone you like/love ever. Be better than Walker, Link, and even Stephanie, because I know we all can.
(Oh, and Mrs. Cottler wasn't a witch. She was an occultist professor. The mystery of Hazel saving Mayra isn't explained, however.)
So I know firsthand what narcissistic assholes magicians can be. And soon our protagonist, Mayra, does too. Her current boyfriend, Walker, is a magician. He is away at the beginning of the book but comes home partway through. While he's gone this leaves the door wide open for Link, Mayra's former boyfriend, to constantly harass her for dumping him.
Mayra is working for Mrs. Cottler, an old lady who lives on Fear Street, for the summer (when she's not being harassed by Link, that is). Mrs. Cottler likes for Mayra to read to her. Mayra finds her okay enough, but she's put off by Mrs. Cottler's cat, Hazel. Mayra gradually finds a bunch of witch-related stuff in Mrs. Cottler's house. She has black candles everywhere. She also seems to enjoy holding onto possessions of others (which, as you probably know, are needed to cast spells). Hazel accidentally rips off Mayra's new necklace from Walker on her first day there. Mrs. Cottler offers to restring the beads for Mayra, but she seems to be keeping the beads a little too long in Mayra's opinion.
This book is busy, because in the midst of this summer job Mayra has yet ANOTHER crazy guy following her, and she begins sleepwalking. The guy's name is Cal, and he seems angry from the first time he spots Mayra. The problem is that Mayra has never seen him before in her life. There is also Mayra's best friend, Donna, who(m?) gets run off the road by a crazy driver and ends up in the hospital. She lives, but she's pretty banged up.
Mayra can't figure out why she's sleepwalking, but she soon grows suspicious of Mrs. Cottler, especially when she finds out that her mom, Brenda, once had Mrs. Cottler as a patient. Apparently Mrs. Cottler didn't like the treatment she received from Mayra's mom or something like that. It's not long, though, before Mayra is (rightfully) suspicious of everyone around her. Link's sister, Stephanie, also comes over to reveal that she, too, does not understand the concept of no means no. She and Mayra fight, and she's deeply disappointed that Mayra will not get back together with Link. Then Mayra sees Link's truck, a red Chevy, and recognizes it as the one that drove Donna off the road. However, his truck doesn't have a scratch on it. After her first confrontation with Mayra, Stephanie takes Mayra's favorite white scarf. It's never explained why she does this, but we can assume it's because she also does not understand boundaries or asking for permission. So when Mayra finds out a link between Mrs. Cottler and Stephanie, she decides to confront her, only to find Stephanie chanting in her (Stephanie's) bedroom and wearing Mayra's scarf on her head! Stephanie is positively incensed that Mayra wants her scarf back and doesn't understand what the big deal in all of this is (Link and Stephanie: two peas in a pod). Mayra accuses Stephanie of casting a spell on her, but then she starts to doubt herself.
In what is the best scene in the book, Brenda gets help for Mayra's sleepwalking in the form of a psychiatrist. Here, Stine gets things surprisingly right. The psychiatrist is not portrayed as dismissive or in the "tell me how you feel" way of most books when handling something like this. Instead, he listens to Mayra and encourages her to discover what she might be suppressing that could be causing her to sleepwalk. In the meantime, he gives her a nonaddictive sleep aid so she can finally get rest. This was also a great move on Stine's part, because he showed medicine as not something evil at all costs, yet he also acknowledged that often those types of meds can be addictive. I really appreciated that extra acknowledgement to Mayra that what she was taking was okay.
Buttt then Stine loses all points with the ending (though he would get major points if not for the way the boys in the book are portrayed. The twist is actually a good one). So first of all, you know by now the true guilty party is not Mrs. Cottler, right? Good.
After a harrowing sleepwalking incident down to the lake in which she almost drowns, Mayra decides to confront her demons once and for all. She realizes that each time she sleepwalks she ends up at the lake. She surmises that there is clearly something important about this, so she goes to visit the lake while she's awake and see what happens. She goes at night, and who should show up but Link? He gets seriously frightening in this scene when he tries to brush off following Mayra and then grabs her forcefully and demands that she tell him why she left him. Men: THIS. IS. NOT. OKAY. Mayra manages to escape and runs away from him.
Shortly after it all comes back to her. The lake was important in her dreams... because it's where she was involved in an accident with Walker where someone died and another person almost did. Mayra recalls a night when she was at the mall with Walker but he, for a reason not unexplained, completely changes his personality and decides he wants to joyride. He insists to Mayra that it's his mom's car, but once they are already on the road he reveals that actually he did steal a car. Why? "Because I felt like it." Mayra demands he turn around but, in keeping with the patterns of this book, Walker ignores her completely, and it ends badly. Walker accidentally runs another car off the road, and they land in the water below. Mayra is pleading for Walker to help them, but he won't listen. Mayra sees one passenger float to the surface but not the other. She screams and screams at him to do something but he does nothing.
Well, I take that back. He doesn't do nothing. What he actually does is hypnotize Mayra into not remembering the accident at all. Yes, you read that right. Gaslighting by way of hypnotism. The night of the accident, on the way home after Walker refuses to get help, Mayra apparently asked him to hypnotize her to calm her down. Walker, sweet peach that he is, obliged, but not without using that opportunity to his advantage. That very night he told a hypnotized Mayra that she would not remember the accident they had just been through. After all, he cannot have his future as a famous magician ruined (Barf. But he actually says this later in the book. It's way too close to home for me).
As she realizes this, Mayra also starts kicking ass and develops a plan to trick Walker. She gets him to come to the lake with her, and she tells him that after the stress of everything going on lately she needs him to hypnotize her. Only this time she is only pretending to be under his influence. And, sure enough, at the end of the session he also adds that she will continue to forget about the car accident. Mayra explodes spectacularly. She (hallelujah!) tells him what a horrible person he is for letting someone die and for letting her go crazy and go without sleep all this time. She's even sarcastic when he says, "You tricked me," and she immediately responds, "You catch on quickly." I had so much love for Mayra in that moment. Stine doesn't often write of women characters with any backbone.
Then, also adding to the spectacular ending, Mayra is saved by Hazel. Yes, Mrs. Cottler's cat comes down to the lake and scratches the shit out of Walker long enough for Mayra to escape. She gets to the house and calls 911. Which is fantastic... until Walker throws a stone at the window and comes inside like a regular Michael Myers. He tells Mayra the usual, how she "shouldn't have done that" and blah blah. And then the cat is back! Mayra can't figure out how in the world Hazel could have made it back to the house so quickly.
I am so, so happy to report that, for once in a Stine book, an animal does not die. We think that might be where it's headed, but then Cal comes to the door. He's the other other insane guy that's been after Mayra the whole book. But, to her shock, when he gets the door open he goes after Walker and not Mayra. Turns out that Cal is the brother of the man who died in the car accident. He thought Mayra was the killer. So he tried to run her off the road (this was Donna, but she was driving Mayra's car) and kept following her all over. But he hears the fight between Mayra and Walker at the lake, and he learns the truth: Walker was the killer, and Mayra had no idea what happened this whole time because of the hypnotism. Finally, the police show up and try and piece all of this together. You might want to sit down, fellas. It's gonna be a long night.
In the last chapter, it's one week later, and Mayra kills any of the goodwill I felt towards her (though, to be fair, it's hardly her fault she's taken in with these men). Link comes by to apologize for being a creep, but he clearly still doesn't think he's done anything wrong, especially when Mayra jokes that she must love creeps. It gets worse from there, with Link essentially brushing off what he did to her. They end up kissing and so it's like everything a lot of these romcoms have told us for years: if you just keep trying, you'll get the girl in the end. Even if she has another boyfriend. Even if she says no. Repeatedly.
It's an awful message, clearly. I hope no teenager is reading this book in 2019. The last thing we need is even more people confused about things that should be crystal clear. There are no blurred lines here. Walker was a gaslighter and Link is a stalker. Because stalking is the very definition of what he did. This book was shaping up to be great until the extremely problematic ending of the guy winning the girl because he was just pushy enough. No no no.
Please don't do this to anyone you like/love ever. Be better than Walker, Link, and even Stephanie, because I know we all can.
(Oh, and Mrs. Cottler wasn't a witch. She was an occultist professor. The mystery of Hazel saving Mayra isn't explained, however.)
July 28, 2025
Mayra has been sleepwalking, something that she has never done before. Nobody can explain why, but the start of her sleepwalking coincides with her new job, helping the elderly Mrs. Cottler with her household chores. Mayra stumbles upon some weird objects and books of magic and the occult in Mrs. Cottler's house, leading Mayra to suspect that the old lady is a witch. Could Mrs. Cottler have placed a curse on Mayra? If so, why?
R.L. Stine's "The Sleepwalker" is the sixth book in his Fear Street series (although this is a series where it doesn't matter where one starts, as none of them are inter-related).
Suspense, humor, jump scares, and clever plot twists make this series of young adult books from the '80s and '90s a blast from the past.
R.L. Stine's "The Sleepwalker" is the sixth book in his Fear Street series (although this is a series where it doesn't matter where one starts, as none of them are inter-related).
Suspense, humor, jump scares, and clever plot twists make this series of young adult books from the '80s and '90s a blast from the past.
October 11, 2023
Un libro que me traslado al miedo y a la intriga desde sus primeras páginas.
Aquí les dejo mi opinión más amplia de esta novela :
https://youtu.be/LLZwcPbV9tk?si=pYArC...
Aquí les dejo mi opinión más amplia de esta novela :
https://youtu.be/LLZwcPbV9tk?si=pYArC...
December 1, 2021
When Mayra takes a job helping out an elderly woman on Fear Street, she has no idea just how badly her summer is about to go.
It's not only boy troubles that she has to deal with, she's also been Sleepwalking. If she isn't able to get to the bottom of her strange dreams and sleepwalking, she just might end up getting hurt. Or worse…
Well this one didn't turn out quite how I was expecting it too. It got off to a slower start and I was hoping for a bit more creepy dream / sleepwalking scenes.
To avoid any spoilers I'm not going to go into detail but I thought this one could have been better with a different ending.
It's not only boy troubles that she has to deal with, she's also been Sleepwalking. If she isn't able to get to the bottom of her strange dreams and sleepwalking, she just might end up getting hurt. Or worse…
Well this one didn't turn out quite how I was expecting it too. It got off to a slower start and I was hoping for a bit more creepy dream / sleepwalking scenes.
To avoid any spoilers I'm not going to go into detail but I thought this one could have been better with a different ending.
![Profile Image for julia ☆ [owls reads].](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.gr-assets.com%2Fimages%2FS%2Fcompressed.photo.goodreads.com%2Fusers%2F1636739475i%2F5520447._UX200_CR0%2C0%2C200%2C200_.jpg&w=128&q=75)
April 28, 2023
I know this is not what the series is about, but I wish the paranormal/supernatural elements had been real this time. The Sleepwalker was a lot different from what I expected it to be. It felt like a... "more serious" Fear Street novel due to some of the things it addressed. I wasn't expecting the reason behind the sleepwalking and really liked how that was executed! I did find this one a little bit too slow, though. And all boys were trash.
December 27, 2025
A bit slow going, but has an engaging mystery tinged with some supernatural elements... but then the reveal happens and while it's an unsuspecting twist it's not necessarily the most satisfying.
All in all this is a decent / mildly good Fear Street book that I give a flat 3⭐ to.
All in all this is a decent / mildly good Fear Street book that I give a flat 3⭐ to.
February 16, 2020
As I read the sixth book in the Fear Street series, I wondered if Stine came up with a formula to make a suspenseful YA story and just fills in the details. This of course doesn't matter to me since the formula works.
In The Sleepwalker, Mayra sleepwalks, obviously. This is condition comes on suddenly and worsens as the story goes on. She realizes that the sleepwalking starts when she begins her care taking job on Fear Street. Half convinced her employer is a witch, she investigates. In a time when pagan/wiccan religion among teens was gaining popularity, Stine paints witchcraft as evil. As a pagan adult, I find this crappy, however, I have to remember the time this was published and excuse some ignorance of the author.
As with most of Stine's previous stories, we have teenage romance that mirrors some forms of toxicity, however, mostly accurate. I seemed to find myself thinking of the Roxie of 92 and how she would have responded to situations with the wisdom of a 11 year old.
I enjoyed this story as a whole. Broken into pieces, its trash, especially for an adult, but as I stated before, these reads are for the nostalgia I feel with them, not the complexity and quality of the writing.
In The Sleepwalker, Mayra sleepwalks, obviously. This is condition comes on suddenly and worsens as the story goes on. She realizes that the sleepwalking starts when she begins her care taking job on Fear Street. Half convinced her employer is a witch, she investigates. In a time when pagan/wiccan religion among teens was gaining popularity, Stine paints witchcraft as evil. As a pagan adult, I find this crappy, however, I have to remember the time this was published and excuse some ignorance of the author.
As with most of Stine's previous stories, we have teenage romance that mirrors some forms of toxicity, however, mostly accurate. I seemed to find myself thinking of the Roxie of 92 and how she would have responded to situations with the wisdom of a 11 year old.
I enjoyed this story as a whole. Broken into pieces, its trash, especially for an adult, but as I stated before, these reads are for the nostalgia I feel with them, not the complexity and quality of the writing.
August 14, 2018
I really liked this one. I read it as a preteen, but I couldn't remember the plot twist. My only reason for not giving it 5 stars is how R L Stine always writes a male characters who think they are entitled to the girl character and how the boy treated the girl when she turned him down. Very problematic element. Rape vibes and abusive treatment.
August 22, 2021
When I first picked this book I thought "oh no alot of dream senquences" and they were alot of them ,but it wasn't bad. I just wished we learned more about the cat I'd still recommend if your a fear street fan .3outof5 stars for me.
April 7, 2024
Even though I have read this before it was again a very long time ago when I had to check it out of the library in middle school. I remembered the sleepwalking part and the possible witchcraft angle and of course, who can forget the name Mayra.
So Mayra Barnes is starting a job helping out a woman named Mrs. Cottler for the summer over on Fear Street. Some reading and cleaning but she isn't by means completely old except for her cane to help her walk but Mayra's mom says the woman is a handful.
Mrs. Barnes is a nurse and she had the pleasure of taking care of Mrs. Cottler when she was a patient at the hospital. She says the old woman complained, thought she was trying to kill her and even told Mrs. Barnes' boss that she was terrible.
Mayra assumes that she will recognize the name and give Mayra a hard time but the two of them get along quiet well. Mrs. Cottler has a black cat named Hazel and the animal seems to be really smart and temperamental as any cat when it swipes at Mayra's necklace and causes the beads to break apart.
Mrs. Cottler says she will be happy to restring them for Mayra and she agrees then goes to get the older woman a sweater to take a walk near the lake behind her property. Mayra searches some drawers and finds black candles before locating the sweaters after Hazel scares her to death with a meow that sounds indignant at Mayra snooping.
Heading home from the job later, Mayra is listening to her Walkman so loud that she doesn't hear someone calling her. The person happens to be her ex-boyfriend Link whom she broke up with a month ago due to him being a little too self-assure about himself.
Mayra admits that Link is good-looking but he also has become really clingy in trying to get back together with her despite the fact that Mayra has a new boyfriend. The same boy who gave her the bead necklace, Walker has been on vacation with his parents for the last two weeks but is soon coming home.
Mayra blows off Link to get home and he isn't too happy. Another complication with Link is that when Mayra broke up with him...it ruined her friendship with his sister, Stephanie. It also doesn't help that Mayra's mother thinks that Link hung the moon as well.
The following day when Mayra is at Mrs. Cottler's, her neighbor from next door shows up. He is a sweaty, bald man named Mr. Kleeg that Mrs. Cottler calls Mr. Clean on purpose and she doesn't take to kindly to him yelling at her about how her peach tree drops fruit into his yard. It is a calm sort of fury instead of going off and screaming as Mayra watches in silence.
Once he is gone, Mayra finds that Mr. Kleeg dropped his handkerchief but Mrs. Cottler tells her not to return it because he will probably be back to yell at her later and remember to ask for it. When she dismisses Mayra early because she is tired, the younger girl is getting ready to leave when she spots Mrs. Cottler's cane.
Being a nice person, Mayra heads upstairs to give it to her but Hazel hisses at Mayra. Ignoring the cat, Mayra sticks her head in to place the cane against the wall and finds the older woman holding the handkerchief. Mrs. Cottler is sitting at he edge of her bed as if in a trance and Mayra leaves.
Mayra can't help but tell her best friend Donna about the incident and her suspicions that she thinks Mrs. Cottler is a witch. The candles, the cat, her odd knickknacks about the house, the old books on witchcraft on her library shelf but Donna can't help but laugh at it good-naturedly.
She blames all of this on Mayra dating Walker because he is fascinated with magic and telepathy and all sorts of weird things despite being cute but not tall, dark and handsome like Link. Mayra also mentions to Donna the fact that Stephanie use to be big into magic too so it isn't that unusual to have weird hobbies and interests.
Mayra can't help but think the worse as she heads to Fear Street for another day at Mrs. Cottler's and sees an ambulance turn onto the street! It isn't for the older woman but her neighbor, Mr. Kleeg, and Mayra learns that he only broke his hip and isn't dead. She is relieved but imagines seeing a happy gleam in Mrs. Cottler's eye before she gives Mayra a concerned shake of her head.
A week into her job, Mayra starts having dreams about walking about the lake that is in the back of Fear Street going up to Mrs. Cottler's property. Soon, Mayra finds she is walking across the water as the wind starts to blow at her nightgown with the feeling that someone is watching her.
When the dream is over, Mayra wakes up but finds that she is outside on her own front lawn looking up at her house in her nightgown.
Mayra's mom doesn't take the sleepwalking incident too seriously and her little sister Kim gets to make fun of Mayra like she were a zombie but Mayra isn't laughing. She asks Mrs. Cottler if she knows anything about sleepwalking but the older woman isn't much help, either being vague on purpose or just being a tired, old woman.
Mayra leaves the job to go to the mall on an errand for her mother and as she gets closer to the Fear Street Cemetery, a man comes out of a house across the street. He is a big man with a thick neck and at first he seems shocked to see Mayra and then...his face goes a scarlet red in anger.
He calls out to Mayra and when she tries to get away, he chases her down the street for a bit but Mayra is able to lose him once she is near the mall. Confused and scared, Mayra is shocked to find Walker at Ray's Pizza with Suki Thomas, the Shadyside punk rocker girl with the worst reputation among her female peers.
Mayra thinks Walker is too much of a shy guy for Suki so she believes that they just ran into each other but a part of her is wise enough to not ask Walker about sleepwalking while Suki is there yet she does mention the guy coming after her. Walker seems concerned but still...
Mayra's day only gets better once she gets home and receives a visit from Link's sister Stephanie.
She wants to talk to Mayra about how miserable her brother is since the two of them broke up but with every thing going on, Mayra tells Stephanie she is not interested in the subject and the other girl leaves in a hurry.
That night, Mayra has her dream again and this time she wakes up on Fear Street. Alarmed, Mayra walking about in her nightgown gets the attention of a police officer and he kindly gets her home.
Mayra's mother isn't laughing this time...
The twists that come about in this story make it a good mystery thriller with a touch of paranormal undertones. You are there with Mayra wondering if you are going crazy or if some witch has really cast a spell on you and with this being a Fear Street book, you aren't really that far off even for an earlier book...
The Sleepwalker is a nostalgic stroll down the creepiness of Fear Street and one I can recommend if you have yet to enjoy it for yourself.
So Mayra Barnes is starting a job helping out a woman named Mrs. Cottler for the summer over on Fear Street. Some reading and cleaning but she isn't by means completely old except for her cane to help her walk but Mayra's mom says the woman is a handful.
Mrs. Barnes is a nurse and she had the pleasure of taking care of Mrs. Cottler when she was a patient at the hospital. She says the old woman complained, thought she was trying to kill her and even told Mrs. Barnes' boss that she was terrible.
Mayra assumes that she will recognize the name and give Mayra a hard time but the two of them get along quiet well. Mrs. Cottler has a black cat named Hazel and the animal seems to be really smart and temperamental as any cat when it swipes at Mayra's necklace and causes the beads to break apart.
Mrs. Cottler says she will be happy to restring them for Mayra and she agrees then goes to get the older woman a sweater to take a walk near the lake behind her property. Mayra searches some drawers and finds black candles before locating the sweaters after Hazel scares her to death with a meow that sounds indignant at Mayra snooping.
Heading home from the job later, Mayra is listening to her Walkman so loud that she doesn't hear someone calling her. The person happens to be her ex-boyfriend Link whom she broke up with a month ago due to him being a little too self-assure about himself.
Mayra admits that Link is good-looking but he also has become really clingy in trying to get back together with her despite the fact that Mayra has a new boyfriend. The same boy who gave her the bead necklace, Walker has been on vacation with his parents for the last two weeks but is soon coming home.
Mayra blows off Link to get home and he isn't too happy. Another complication with Link is that when Mayra broke up with him...it ruined her friendship with his sister, Stephanie. It also doesn't help that Mayra's mother thinks that Link hung the moon as well.
The following day when Mayra is at Mrs. Cottler's, her neighbor from next door shows up. He is a sweaty, bald man named Mr. Kleeg that Mrs. Cottler calls Mr. Clean on purpose and she doesn't take to kindly to him yelling at her about how her peach tree drops fruit into his yard. It is a calm sort of fury instead of going off and screaming as Mayra watches in silence.
Once he is gone, Mayra finds that Mr. Kleeg dropped his handkerchief but Mrs. Cottler tells her not to return it because he will probably be back to yell at her later and remember to ask for it. When she dismisses Mayra early because she is tired, the younger girl is getting ready to leave when she spots Mrs. Cottler's cane.
Being a nice person, Mayra heads upstairs to give it to her but Hazel hisses at Mayra. Ignoring the cat, Mayra sticks her head in to place the cane against the wall and finds the older woman holding the handkerchief. Mrs. Cottler is sitting at he edge of her bed as if in a trance and Mayra leaves.
Mayra can't help but tell her best friend Donna about the incident and her suspicions that she thinks Mrs. Cottler is a witch. The candles, the cat, her odd knickknacks about the house, the old books on witchcraft on her library shelf but Donna can't help but laugh at it good-naturedly.
She blames all of this on Mayra dating Walker because he is fascinated with magic and telepathy and all sorts of weird things despite being cute but not tall, dark and handsome like Link. Mayra also mentions to Donna the fact that Stephanie use to be big into magic too so it isn't that unusual to have weird hobbies and interests.
Mayra can't help but think the worse as she heads to Fear Street for another day at Mrs. Cottler's and sees an ambulance turn onto the street! It isn't for the older woman but her neighbor, Mr. Kleeg, and Mayra learns that he only broke his hip and isn't dead. She is relieved but imagines seeing a happy gleam in Mrs. Cottler's eye before she gives Mayra a concerned shake of her head.
A week into her job, Mayra starts having dreams about walking about the lake that is in the back of Fear Street going up to Mrs. Cottler's property. Soon, Mayra finds she is walking across the water as the wind starts to blow at her nightgown with the feeling that someone is watching her.
When the dream is over, Mayra wakes up but finds that she is outside on her own front lawn looking up at her house in her nightgown.
Mayra's mom doesn't take the sleepwalking incident too seriously and her little sister Kim gets to make fun of Mayra like she were a zombie but Mayra isn't laughing. She asks Mrs. Cottler if she knows anything about sleepwalking but the older woman isn't much help, either being vague on purpose or just being a tired, old woman.
Mayra leaves the job to go to the mall on an errand for her mother and as she gets closer to the Fear Street Cemetery, a man comes out of a house across the street. He is a big man with a thick neck and at first he seems shocked to see Mayra and then...his face goes a scarlet red in anger.
He calls out to Mayra and when she tries to get away, he chases her down the street for a bit but Mayra is able to lose him once she is near the mall. Confused and scared, Mayra is shocked to find Walker at Ray's Pizza with Suki Thomas, the Shadyside punk rocker girl with the worst reputation among her female peers.
Mayra thinks Walker is too much of a shy guy for Suki so she believes that they just ran into each other but a part of her is wise enough to not ask Walker about sleepwalking while Suki is there yet she does mention the guy coming after her. Walker seems concerned but still...
Mayra's day only gets better once she gets home and receives a visit from Link's sister Stephanie.
She wants to talk to Mayra about how miserable her brother is since the two of them broke up but with every thing going on, Mayra tells Stephanie she is not interested in the subject and the other girl leaves in a hurry.
That night, Mayra has her dream again and this time she wakes up on Fear Street. Alarmed, Mayra walking about in her nightgown gets the attention of a police officer and he kindly gets her home.
Mayra's mother isn't laughing this time...
The twists that come about in this story make it a good mystery thriller with a touch of paranormal undertones. You are there with Mayra wondering if you are going crazy or if some witch has really cast a spell on you and with this being a Fear Street book, you aren't really that far off even for an earlier book...
The Sleepwalker is a nostalgic stroll down the creepiness of Fear Street and one I can recommend if you have yet to enjoy it for yourself.
January 7, 2015
The first half is duller than I would have expected from Stine, since it deals with very unremarkable conflict; the protagonist is not driven enough, hasn't real emotional challenge; but later the story picks up and makes a fairly well-handled recovery, though the book is still not among R.L.'s best.
December 16, 2021
Mayra Barnes got a job working for Mrs. Cottler on Fear Street. The job is pretty cushy - just a lot of reading and making food for the old lady. It's keeping her company, really, which suits Mayra fine. The only trouble is... there's something strange going on. Mrs. Cottler has this black cat that seems to know when Mayra is snooping or doing something otherwise untowards. Then there's the black candles. And the sleepwalking. She's never sleepwalked before...
Is Mrs. Cottler a witch? Is her former best friend a witch, out for revenge since she broke up with her brother? Who is the Big Necked stranger chasing her and yelling at her?
This was an odd Fear Street entry, a bit more reliant on supernatural than I'm used to in Fear Street. There were so many toxic relationship details in this one; them being believable details still didn't make them sit too well with me. I did laugh out loud when Suki came into play - once more with the protagonist thinking about what a punk piece of trash she is. Come on, guys, Suki doesn't seem that bad.
Man, Link and Walker were both terrifying, though. I hope Mayra gets better taste in boys at some point.
Is Mrs. Cottler a witch? Is her former best friend a witch, out for revenge since she broke up with her brother? Who is the Big Necked stranger chasing her and yelling at her?
This was an odd Fear Street entry, a bit more reliant on supernatural than I'm used to in Fear Street. There were so many toxic relationship details in this one; them being believable details still didn't make them sit too well with me. I did laugh out loud when Suki came into play - once more with the protagonist thinking about what a punk piece of trash she is. Come on, guys, Suki doesn't seem that bad.
Man, Link and Walker were both terrifying, though. I hope Mayra gets better taste in boys at some point.
August 18, 2021
This was an interesting read, but it was not what I expected. Some of the characters seemed totally pointless in the end. I wish it would have gone in the direction it originally eluded to because that would have made it more interesting and fun. Despite that, it was still an overall good read and I would recommend it to others. The ending was unexpected, which I have come to enjoy from Stine. You never know what you will get.
June 19, 2017
za dobra stara vremena :) za ciljanu populaciju - taman. mene je razveselila.
April 16, 2021
First read through of this book. I never read it when it originally released. However it has a pretty good story line and the usual twist ending that most YA Horror of this era do. I did kind of figure out The ’who’ of the twist, but not the ‘what’.
May 2, 2025
While still predictable, it was at least a bit less so than the last book. I like how we're left wondering about Hazel the Cat, though...
October 11, 2021
3.5 stars (reread- originally 2 stars). I HAVE thoughts. I guess I rated this 2 stars when I first joined GR because I couldn't remember how I felt about it. Even while rereading it, I couldn't remember the plot, so it felt like reading a book again for the first time. I was really enjoying it all the way through even though there are issues with pacing. Mayra and her family and friends are incredibly fleshed out and have backstory compared to most Fear Street families. My issue lies with Full review to come.
November 27, 2024
I really enjoyed this one. It dove right into some really creepy shit and then delivered with its ending. It was exactly the sort of creepy atmospheric horror story that I live for; the kind that sticks around for awhile long after you’ve finished the book. The characters were well-developed, and the themes of mental health and trauma were well-executed. The only thing that really brought this book down for me was the last few pages and the portrayal of one particular male character as having demonstrated acceptable behavior. I can’t comment on the specifics without tons of spoilers, but I’m beginning to see a pattern here with these books. That aside, this was probably my favorite book in the series so far. I just wish it had a slightly different denouement.
Score: 4.5
Full review with gifs, spoilers, and snark:
https://www.danstalter.com/the-sleepw...
Score: 4.5
Full review with gifs, spoilers, and snark:
https://www.danstalter.com/the-sleepw...
June 1, 2022
Never read this one when I was in school. This was probably one of the best Fear Streets I've read thus far and has me excited even more than I initially was when I first set out to read this series. I think Stine has found his footing with the series at this point, because as I recall, I read the later installments out of series order, and I couldn't get enough of them.
Five out of five for a couple reasons. The story line was extremely interesting and I had fun following along with Mayra. Basically, I had so much fun reading this! I felt that the ending was satisfactory while at the same time leaving you wondering about Mrs. Cottler's black cat. I won't say what is revealed at the end, but it makes you wonder if the cat is more than just a cat, if you catch my drift 😉
Five out of five for a couple reasons. The story line was extremely interesting and I had fun following along with Mayra. Basically, I had so much fun reading this! I felt that the ending was satisfactory while at the same time leaving you wondering about Mrs. Cottler's black cat. I won't say what is revealed at the end, but it makes you wonder if the cat is more than just a cat, if you catch my drift 😉
November 13, 2014
This book is fantastic! This book has very good details. I could really imagine in my head the characters' actions. The genre is realistic fiction. This is when Mayra Barnes mysteriously starts sleepwalking. She feels that Mrs.Cottler is behind all this, but Mayra finds out otherwise. Someone who she would have never thought was the one making her sleepwalk. This book has 164 pages. I will give this book 4 stars out of 5. I really like the mystery of Mayra trying to find out who is making her sleepwalk.Will Mayra be able to find out who is making her sleepwalk? Who is it and why are they doing it?
August 21, 2021
RL Stine loves excusing male violence. This book does not disappoint. It’s also very stupid.
March 25, 2024
TW/CW: drowning and near-death of MC and side-characters, death, mentions of occults.
I wasn't a fan of the beginning of this book as it took me a while to seriously get into it, but once the mystery started rolling it was much easier to read. Not my favorite out of all the fear street books but also not the worse. Truthfully, I think what irked me the most had to do with the characters. Maybe I'm just getting to that point in life where I'm forgetting what it's like being 16 but I swear the ages don't match the characters. It felt more like they were 10 or 13, give or take. Could just be me though, other than that the story is great.
I wasn't a fan of the beginning of this book as it took me a while to seriously get into it, but once the mystery started rolling it was much easier to read. Not my favorite out of all the fear street books but also not the worse. Truthfully, I think what irked me the most had to do with the characters. Maybe I'm just getting to that point in life where I'm forgetting what it's like being 16 but I swear the ages don't match the characters. It felt more like they were 10 or 13, give or take. Could just be me though, other than that the story is great.
February 27, 2019
Aunque todos los libros de esta colección me entretienen muchísimo, algunos son bastante malos. Justamente como este.
En éste vemos un grupo de personajes más reducido de los que estoy acostumbrada, además de ser más chatos también. La historia en sí no me ha gustado, siento que fue muy predecible y en general fue bastante tonto.
Todo ocurre rápido sin profundizar tampoco. No sabría explicar en palabras realmente qué fue lo que no me gustó del todo, pero me pareció un libro llano, se podría decir desabrido tal vez.
En éste vemos un grupo de personajes más reducido de los que estoy acostumbrada, además de ser más chatos también. La historia en sí no me ha gustado, siento que fue muy predecible y en general fue bastante tonto.
Todo ocurre rápido sin profundizar tampoco. No sabría explicar en palabras realmente qué fue lo que no me gustó del todo, pero me pareció un libro llano, se podría decir desabrido tal vez.
December 1, 2025
Good murder mystery but I didn’t know it was a murder story until the last 3 chapters:
Mayra is sleepwalking and thinks the woman she house sits for and takes care of named Mrs. Cottler is a witch and casting spells on her. We are lead to think this is what’s happening but in all reality it’s her ex boyfriend walker who hypnotized her into forgetting about a hit and run accident where 2 men were in the lake and one drowned. Pretty good book in my opinion RL Stine comes up with fun stories
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 8, 2018
Nostalgie jak blázen! Ve svých třiceti se ke Stopám hrůzy vracím, ba dokonce je začínám sbírat pro budoucí generaci. Doufám, že je Karolínka/Magdalénka/Toník jednou bude číst tajně s baterkou pod peřinou.
November 1, 2020
3.5-4 stars? ☆ this wasn't bad! I'm a bit surprised this is young adult horror, as it wasn't very horror-y....uh. It is also in children's so I have no idea? The last few pages really redeemed the book as I wasn't the biggest fan of it early on. I didn't hate it in the beginning, but I wasn't exactly super invested lol. I'm excited for the adaptation!!
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