Horror Hotel 1: The Vampire Checks in

Ghosts of Fear Street #34

by Golden Books, Emily James

When Joe and his family move to Fear Street to help run Grandpa Howie's hotel, Joe thinks his biggest problem will be fitting in at a new school.

But school is nothing compared to the hotel's eerie noises, its creepy old paintings, and its coffins in the attic.

Something evil lurks in the Hotel Howie, and it wants Joe to check out...permanently!

Genres: Horror, Young Adult

128 pages, Paperback

First published September 15, 1998

About the author

In 1942, the launch of Little Golden Books revolutionized children’s book publishing by making high-quality picture books available at affordable prices. More than 60 years later, many of the original Golden Book titles are still wildly popular, with The Poky Little Puppy topping the list of ten bestselling children’s books of all time. Golden Books’ backlist is teeming with classics such as Dorothy Kunhardt’s Pat the Bunny, and features the stories and artwork of children’s book legends Mary Blair, Margaret Wise Brown, Richard Scarry, Eloise Wilkins, Garth Williams, and many more. Today, the Golden Books imprint includes an array of storybooks, novelty books, and coloring and activity books featuring all of the most popular licenses, including Disney, Nickelodeon, Barbie, Thomas & Friends, The Cat in the Hat, Sesame Street, Marvel Super Heroes, and DC Super Friends. Golden Books continues to reissue the best of its backlist in a variety of formats, including ebooks and apps, as well as bringing out brand-new books in these evolving new formats.

Reviews

[Alex Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s time. The Ghosts of Fear Street series has been an interesting journey, and I am finally ready to close the book on this one—excluding some upcoming rereads and videos. The series was canned after its first and only duolgy titled Horror Hotel, rounding out 35 books. It was also, coincidentally, written by Emily James—author of Hide and Shriek, which began the series. For me, I really enjoyed this one. It’s not a vampire story as the cover and tagline might suggest though sets itself up as such for a bit of it. I liked the avenue this went down instead and how it actually (for once) referred to the lore of Fear Street and the Fear Family. It’s uncommon these books truly embrace Fear Street outside of the off mention or it being location, with some not even being in Shadyside. So it was nice seeing it refer to lore from the YA Fear Street since these are (in my eyes) canon. The ending leads into the second part nicely, the grandfather character was a nice add-on that was a bit of fresh air, being a competent and believing adult towards their kid (grandkid in this case), and the writing is solid. Good villains as well + genuine stakes. Negatives factor to the side-characters. The main’s father, near the end, makes the braindead choice of just not doing anything to help. He goes to bed and doesn’t try and help resolve the conflict of which could result in his son’s death. He’s actually a straight chud. And I feel that, whilst I enjoyed them, the monster club thing with all of the friend characters was basically useless at least in this volume alone. I expect them to play a role in the sequel, but even if so, they served little purpose here which was disappointing. Overall, 9/10. Great first part, hoping this story wraps up nicely in the sequel albeit kinda useless seeming as it stands. The Vampire DOESN’T check-in.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ah yes. The most expensive book in the Ghosts Of Fear Street series. I am of course talking about Horror Hotel Part One. Is it worth the 30 dollars I paid for it a few years ago ? For me yes. This book was actually really good and really surprisingly creepy . I will go on record to say this is the "scariest" book so far in the series. The boiling room scene and the seance scene both are written very well. this one also had a darker tone. Mostly in the second half. But still a fun read. The story starts off with this kid joe. He just moved to Fear Street to help his family run a hotel that their grandpa owns.The name of the hotel is Hotel Howie, named after their grandpa,who is a little different. He dresses funny,collects weird stuff for his hotels "atmosphere" such as bear skin rugs, tomahawks and armored nights.He is also rumored to know how to do magic. Most of the kids think he's weird for living on Fear Street. But one kid in particular really wants to meet Mr Howie. So one of the friends do and everything is going good,until one night he hears footsteps coming from the attic and finds a bat and a casket. So we automatically assume it's a vampire. Nick coincidentally informs joe that he has his own monster hunting club.He and his friend go around and track down monsters because there are plenty on Fear Street. I really liked this idea because these are the last two books in the series. It would've been perfect for some Easter eggs. unfortunately we get a story about catching a zombie.Joe at first thinks he's crazy but obliges to learn everything he can about vampires and things just in case.But first Joe has to pass initiation.Initiation is pretty predictable if you've read a lot of these type of books. But agian still fun. More things point to joe having a vampire in the house.Like getting attacked by the rug,tomahawk,knight combo with a stuffed rabbit on the side. Joe needs help. The kids end up doing a seance and bring a monster tracker, a stick with a bell tied to it. They eventually find what's doing all of this and it's .. something. We do get a little bit of body possessesion,which has been done a million times in Goosebumps, and other stuff. But I will say this one gets dark,dealing with guillotines and swords and roof jumping.As I said. This books great. It's not perfect but it's up there. I give Horror Hotel Part One a four out of five stars.

[Austin Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Far from perfect, but the setup and idea to this one is amazing. This is up there as one of, or possibly my favorite GOFS book.
I like that it actually dives into the Fear Street lore, has some scary moments, creative monster action, and an awesome setting.
Overall execution isn't perfect, again - pacing is a little off, with the first half being a bit slow and the second half moving at breakneck speed; and the ending isn't totally satisfactory with a weird and goofy cliffhanger - but overall this book is far better than the vast majority of this series.
3.5⭐ rounded up.

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars just for the Fear Street lore!

Sadly, I can't find a copy of the next book, so I guess I'll never know how it ends.

[LautiHans · Rating 4 out of 5]

Esta historia es escalofriante y entretenida, recomiendo leerla.

[Terri · Rating 2 out of 5]

Strange goings on and an unexpected twist make for a quick and fun read