Slappy in Dreamland

Goosebumps SlappyWorld #16

by R.L. Stine

Goosebumps available soon on Disney+! Richard Hsieh's life is about to become a total nightmare. His dad studies dreams and they hook his new Slappy doll up to the dream machine as a joke. All of a sudden, Richard's dreams are becoming scarier and scarier. Each time, seeing Slappy, his birthday present, come to life and wreak havoc. But they're only dreams, right? When his cousin Willow comes to spend a few days with him, she, too, begins to dream of Slappy. It's impossible! But when Slappy threatens to invade more kids' dreams, they’ll have to figure out how to defeat him before he becomes a dream master.

Genres: Horror, Middle Grade, Fantasy, Fiction, Childrens

121 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2022

About the author

Robert 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...

Reviews

[Justin Tate · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chilling! Slappy takes a dark turn in this genuinely scary Goosebumps entry. I would describe it as Freddy Kreuger for 8-12 year-olds. After Slappy is connected to a brain wave machine that monitors dream activity, he possesses the power to hypnotize children and invade their dreams. And that's BEFORE the magic words are spoken! Terrors only escalate from there as the story builds to a nail-biting conclusion.

Many of Stine's Goosebumps books were adapted for short television episodes in the '90s, however this book deserves a full-length film all to itself. The characters actually have unique personalities and the foggy, sleep-filmed imagery of Slappy's sinister face as he becomes the Pied Piper of Hamelin, leading masses of children to their doom, is all too deliciously terrifying not to put on screen.

A superb SlappyWorld entry that will delight even those with Slappy fatigue. Can't get it out of my dreams! ;)

[Josiah · Rating 1 out of 5]

I suppose it makes sense for a high percentage of books in a Goosebumps series called SlappyWorld to feature Slappy the ventriloquist dummy as primary antagonist. We have him again for Slappy in Dreamland, a story with the potential to blow up the "Slappy-verse" as we know it. Twelve-year-old Richard Hsieh received Slappy as a birthday gift, and with how painfully shy he is around other kids, he considers the inanimate dummy a friend. Things change when Richard's mother takes them both to the sleep clinic she works at, and hooks Slappy to a set of electrodes. Wait...how could a wooden doll have brain activity like a human patient? She dismisses it as equipment malfunction, but soon Richard begins having daily nightmares in which Slappy is stalking him.

Richard's cousin Willow, his same age, is spending a few days with the family while her parents are out of town. She, too, claims her dreams are being invaded by Slappy, but what can Richard's mom or dad do about it? The trouble ramps up as the awful things Slappy does in "dreamland" start occurring in real life, and Richard is blamed. From a ruined school mural to an appalling performance at Richard's friend Brandy's birthday party, the situation is degrading rapidly, and no one but Willow believes Richard's proclamations of innocence. Can things get worse? They can...if Slappy becomes animated in real life. Can two kids stave off a wooden doll whose supernatural power over humans keeps increasing?

By the end, Slappy in Dreamland is a disappointment. It's not far off average for the SlappyWorld series, but the early chapters are so intriguing, teasing something new and potentially shocking, that the muddled conclusion is a big letdown. 1990s R.L. Stine would never have allowed such an interesting premise to fall by the wayside without multiple iconic twists, yet that's what happens here. Slappy in Dreamland isn't a bad read, though; I'll rate it one and a half stars and would have rounded to two if the ending weren't riddled with logic holes. The book will appeal more to fans of contemporary Goosebumps than fans of the classic series.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hey everyone I'm here to talk about another Slappyworld book this one is called Slappy In Dreamland.The story starts off with our main protagonist Richard who were informed has gotten Slappy for his 12th birthday.Richard is a shy kid without a ton of friends, so he kinda uses Slappy as a friend to talk to.We learn that Richard is going to take your kid to work day with his mom who is a sleep study analysis person.Richard goes but only if he can bring Slappy. They go to the sleep study thing and Richard talks his mom into letting Slappy on the sleep study thing and she sees brain activity in Slappy.She brushes it off though as the machine not working properly .That night Richard has his first nightmare and it's awesome!Slappy basically gets up and bites him and when Richard wakes up he has a mark on his arm.We learn that Richards cousin Willow is coming to stay with him while her parents are away.Richard has another nightmare this time Slappy is a nurse at the sleep study thing .Richard tells blank that he's having nightmares and Willow conforms that shes having nightmares as well.Her first nightmare is about Slappy driving a bus, basically the Nightmare On Elm Street scene.In fact the nurse scene happens in the series as well,or  im pretty sure it does.It doesn't take long for Richard and Willow to start having the same dreams ,one about a murial that there painting for school.They have a dream where they draw Slappy's face on the murial and when they go back to school ,sure enough it happens.There is also a scene where Richard falls asleep in class and slappy basically makes him eat a dead frog that there going to dissect covered in flormeldihyde.Things do turn into  a classic Slappy book though when a friend of his invites him to a birthday party/talent show and she wants Richard to bring the dummy , only Slappy hypnotizes everyone and wrecks the birthday cake and gets Richard to unwrap all of the presents.We then get to the climax of the book and this has to be the most random Slappy scene ever.The class gets to go to a zoo overnight thing and Slappy basically invades all of the kids dreams and almost get them eaten by tigers.Yes.Slappy In dreamland was honestly a mixed bag for me but a good mixed bag I think.I thought the dream sequences were good and didn't over expose Slappy to much.As I've said in previous reviews I like Slappy when is more mysterious.I didn't however love the randomness of the book.This felt like alot of Slappy ideas put together. We get a zoo a sleep study place and a birthday party, not to mention the atrocious ending that i hated. I'll probably give Slappy In Dreamland a four out of five stars but mostly because of the danger involved in this book also I have to give a slight nod to this book managing to give me an actual nightmare.

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

My library website got this yesterday-ish, and I figured I'd get it out of the way now. I'll have a long version someday but the short version is I thought this was fairly good. The concept has Slappy being able to invade dreams and that is used well.

It feels like the baby version of I live in your basement, as that kind of feel as we don't always know when it's a dream as Slappy does his thing. It's not nearly as creative and scary as that one was, but I think it has decent suspense. This feels more scare focused than other Slappy outings, making him a better threat than usual. The dreamscape allows for more to be done. The dreams aren't as memorable as in something like It's only a Nightmare, but it has its moments.

It can dip into feeling similar to to others tho, despite the wild premise, it has shades of Son of Slappy. This isn't a bad thing per say, but it could have pushed the unique aspects more. It can be wild but not quite wild enough to be anything too special. I was hoping for just straight up mayhem, like the books I mentioned but even at the end as they tease, it doesn't get there.

The ending is odd. I like the twist on its but it could have been a book of its own, and it has the lack of false victor problem Son had. It leaves the whole thing feeling a bit empty. Which is a shame, as this largley works. For the things you can nitpick, it flows well and used that idea solidly.

It may not everything you'd want but it's a solid one. There's better Slappy stories in Slappyworld as of late but it's still on the upper end for his tales, at least in some regards. I'm hoping for more out of Slappy beware though.

There's, that's that. Next non-animorphs read will be that Galaxy of Fear, and I have a Fear Street blog review coming up next week,so look forward to that. See ya then.

[Austin Smith · Rating 2 out of 5]

Slappy in Dreamland... R.L. Stine's take on a kids version of Nightmare on Elm Street. There was some promising ideas in this one - Stine puts a unique spin on the Slappy/Night of the Living Dummy books by having Slappy invading the dreams of kids... unfortunately the plodding pace and unexplored ideas left me feeling rather drowsy. Sad to say, this is a Goosebumps book that you can sleep on and won't be missing too much.

[Abril GC · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book follows Richard Hseih, a 12-year-old boy who got gifted Slappy for his 12th birthday and they become best friends. One day, Richard takes the dummy to his mom's sleep lab, where they find brain activity in Slappy. I really liked this book because it didn't feel like I was reading a children's book, it actually felt suitable for anyone to read. In some parts of the book, you might even feel Goosebumps! The only thing I disliked about this book is that it felt like it wasn't complete; it could've been longer. Overall, it was a very fun book and I would definitely read more of Stine's works.

[Alex =) · Rating 4 out of 5]

The only thing I did not like about this book was the ending where Richard turned into slappy? And I could not really picture Richard and Willow as cousins , they seem more like siblings to me .But overall this was a good read. And I really like R.L. Stine’s writing

[Hamish Weston · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve read goosebumps 3 times and this book was great and this was the first time I’ve read a slappy world book. Great book loved so much. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️🌟

[Lani · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was cool. It gave me Freddy Kruger vibes, with SLAPPY instead!

[Clover · Rating 4 out of 5]

TLDR;
Slappy meets Nightmare on Elm Street. Richard and his cousin, Willow, have to battle Slappy in their dreams and while they’re awake. This had decent pacing and it was enjoyable. The ending was a bit tacked on, but it was a good ending. Not as good as the last two installments of SlappyWorld: Fifth-Grade Zombies and Judy and the Beast, but it was better than some others. I enjoyed seeing Slappy terrorize multiple kids in their dreams and do some more mind control.

A Sleepy Review:
“Maybe you’ll think I’m weird. But that ventriloquist dummy is my best friend.”
Richard Hsieh is twelve and very shy. He is allergic to cats and dogs so Slappy—a birthday gift from dear old Dad—has “take[n] the place of a pet” for him. His dad is the manager of the local hardware store and his mom runs a sleep lab. Richard goes with her for Bring Your Kid to Work Day and brings Slappy too. He is pretty interested in everything and asks his Mom to hook Slappy up to her machines too. She does and is amazed—Slappy has brain activity! In typical parent fashion, she determines something is wrong with her machine and takes Richard home.
His first cousin Willow is going to be staying with them for a bit while her parents are away on business. Willow and Richard “don’t really get along.” Willow is “always trying to get [Richard] to be more like her. . . . Always trying to make [him] braver and bolder and less shy.” Richard finds this “seriously annoying”. Their class is going to spend the night in the local zoo, so the two are preparing for the trip. They paint a mural and Richard is doing a report on the history of zoos. Both Richard and Willow start having horrible nightmares with Slappy in them. Richard starts losing a lot of sleep and starts drifting off in class. Slappy gets woken up with the magical words and things get increasingly worse for all the kids.

The ending was interesting, a good twist, but there was zero foreshadowing. I would have appreciated some foreshadowing or anything so I would have felt more satisfaction with the ending. It felt kind of tacked on at the end, there wasn’t any build up to make me feel that this was the best ending. It was good, but it just needed something to tie it into the story.

Willow is said to always push Richard to do things he doesn’t want to do, but that doesn’t happen often here. There’s one scene with the mural and that’s about it. It wasn’t a very well-developed character trait, but there is usually very little character growth in these books anyway. I liked the Goosebumps spin on the Freddy Kreuger/Nightmare on Elm Street idea with Slappy invading the dreams of everyone.

Another interesting thing to note is the actual blurb is very wrong, not just the online blurbs. It says that his dad runs the sleep lab. Who proofreads these? It’s pretty disappointing to see books being published with these glaring issues. Goosebumps is big enough to do better and has enough staff/money to be better quality. Lastly, in the sample chapters in Judy and the Beast, it was very interesting to see that Slappy was given a chip on the lower lip. He’s never had a chip there. It was edited properly in the actual published book. Is R.L. Stine’s age catching up to him and he’s forgetting details or are ghostwriters dropping the ball? I would just like to see a little more quality control in such a beloved series. Maybe I am asking for too much?

3.5/5

This is Day #11 of my October Goosebumps Challenge.
Day: 17/31
Books: 17/31

[Shawn Durham · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m 28 & have been reading Goosebumps since 2004. I think I’ve read all 62 of the original series plus several books from other spin-off series. With that said, I think this may have one of the best endings that I’ve read in a Goosebumps book.

The story centers around Richard, who visits his moms workplace (a sleep lab) accompanied by Slappy. While he is there he hooks up a pair of electrodes to Slappy, which causes both him and his mom discomfort seeing as the machine was showing that Slappy had brain waves.

Fast forward a few pages, & Slappy starts showing up in both Richard’s & his cousin Willow’s dreams. After this Slappy starts showing up at the foot of Richard’s bed, even though he has previously been placed elsewhere. Richard them finds a note in Slappy’s pocket, & reads the famous words Karru Marri Odonna Loma Molonu Karrano, bringing Slappy to life.

Richard then brings Slappy to a friends bday party where he intends to do a ventriloquist act, yet Slappy hypnotizes everyone, puts them to sleep, and destroys the bday cake.

Next Richard & Willow goes on an overnight field trip to a zoo where Slappy once again hypnotizes the students and tries to get them to walk in the tiger cage.

Richard has an idea on how to fix this situation: he takes Slappy back to his mothers sleep lab with the intention of hooking both Slappy & himself up to electrodes, falling asleep, & entering Slappy’s dreams. Richard does this and believes that he’s successful. Unfortunately, when Richard wakes up he noticed that his hands & forehead are wooden. After looking in a mirror he realizes that he is now in Slappy’s body. He then sees himself which has been posses by Slappy. Slappy looks at Richard and says “pleasant dreams, dummy”. The book then ends.

[Alejandro Joseph · Rating 3 out of 5]

Um… uh… yawn? Can I say that without making it a joke? Anywho, this book was plain and simply fine. Most SlappyWorld slappy books are anyways. The book has some strong positives, like the main character. He was really likable, and Slappy was pretty good here and not annoying. I liked the idea with Slappy being able to (ungodly large and unpredictable earth-shattering spoiler) invade dreams, and there’s some decent scenes that come from it. There’s some scarier bits here, like the tiger cage scene and Slappy’s first instance of being alive, and I really liked the shocking ending. For once, one of these Diary of a Dummy/Ghost of Slappy esc endings really landed. But, the book follows familiar tropes and is a bore in the second half particularly. The pacing is a bit slow at times and the story feels as if it isn’t going anywhere sometimes. The entire book is forgettable too, which I can say whole heartedly since I read this book around the same time as others like Return to HorrorLand and Diary of a Dummy, and I remembered WAY more about them than this pile of… lightly interesting and coherent pages. Overall, 7/10. I’m feeling sleepy all of the sudden. Might lie down and kiss Slappy goodnight (the usual).

[Remus · Rating 4 out of 5]

It has been a while since I read a Goosebumps (middle grade in general) book, because I'm about to graduate with my bachelors. I bought this at a book fair at my university, and it was a fun read.

I don't read books like this anymore, but I wish I did because it was fun to wonder what was going to happen next without worrying something horrendous was going to happen. I have several critiques about the book, because they come from a place of difference in writing style. The majority of what I get to read focuses on analyzing texts, which differs from middle grade books, where the point is to get children to enjoy reading.

It's a 4/5 because I felt like it needed to be longer. I know Goosebumps books are very fast pace and don't take place over an extremely extended period of time, but I wish this timeline was a little more. The ending itself is okay, not my favorite, but I would've preferred it if there had been more to build from. It was just a single page of confrontation and then the twist ending. Basically, it's a 4/5 because of what's not there.

[Jojo Holm · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought of this book as a nightmare on elm street but with Slappy and that premise got me hooked from page one. The book was that at first but then it devolved into just a normal Slappy book, with the Same things happening, I knew the ending from ten miles away and knew it was going to get there, and I was excited to see how it was going to happen. But as I approached finishing the book nothing had happened, and then the last THREE pages something happened and it was way too rushed to be a good ending. Overall the main problem I had with this book is that the kids did nothing at all the whole book to stop Slappy. 3 stars

[Semih Sen · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this edition to the famous Slappyworld series, Slappy is given to the Richard Hsieh by his father and everything from then on falls apart. The doll becomes Richard best friend, which is a mistake. Richard mom brings him to a bring your kid to work day. He hooks up Slappy as a joke to a machine that reads brain waves. When Richard detects Slappy’s brain waves the boy starts to be haunted by the ventriloquist doll in his nightmares. Find out if Richard can rid himself of Slappy or if Slappy will claim another victim.

[David Hoff · Rating 4 out of 5]

The twist at the end of the book was the beat part. The story was generally fun throughout and had a sort of nightmare on elm Street vibe with slappy invading Dreams. The twist at the end with him switching bodies with the main character was a solid dark ending. Thus is one I could see getting a sequel since slappy is no longer inhabiting his Dummy body.

[Jay · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading over 100 different Goosebumps stories, including 9 Slappy stories, you would think things would get stale. But this is the second Slappy book in a row that has been great. While the forumla is tried and true, this is a truly unique spin. A little bit of Goosebumps meets inception, all with a fun and interesting twist at the end.

[Christian · Rating 5 out of 5]

very good

[Wolverinefactor · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Freddy Krueger of Goosebumps books.

Anyone else notice the error in the plot description in the back of the book? Says Richards dad works at the sleek lab but it’s actually his mom.

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the "Nightmare on Elm Street" plot to this one!

[Jamie Uribe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Okay this book was so good.

It reminded me of Nightmare on Elm Street. Like if Slappy was Fredy. So just think about that.

[Pinky · Rating 3 out of 5]

Richard becomes a real dummy after meeting Slappy.

[Jd · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty good! I feel that some ideas were left out. I'll be honest, it's a great book. But I feel like it could've had more.

[Londyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked it because it was R.L Stine’s version
of nightmare on Elm street and I’m too young to watch it so I get a little taste of nightmare on Elm street.

[Erribella · Rating 3 out of 5]

The ending was no surprise.i was surprised that he got into everyone's dreams. I like willow. Is there a way to destroy slappy? I would like to know that

[Chris Seltzer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't understand the appeal of Slappy as a mascot for the series. The original books were good but he's so far overexposed at this point.

[Cj Otaw · Rating 1 out of 5]

Slappy In Dreamland: I didn't like it. It was lame, and the jokes were not funny. The ending was not satisfying either.

[R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book because it got my son really thinking outside the box about dreams possibly for the first time. It's fun watching a young mind start connecting dots and wondering about things.

[Christian Lenz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book really funny

[B.J. Burgess · Rating 5 out of 5]

Besides being a Goosebumps fan, I'm also A Nightmare on Elm Street fan, so I got a kick out of Slappy haunting kids in their nightmares. However, the dreamscape scenes weren't as frighting as they could have been. Yes, I know this is a kid's book, but the nightmares were a bit too babyish and needed less silliness and more suspense.

Maybe I'm behind on the times, but I don't understand how a middle-grade school would allow a class to sleep over at a zoo. I highly dought that would ever happen in reality. I guess that's why it's called fiction. Right?

That ending! LOL! The ending twist was unexpected and bizarre. Was it another nightmare? Or was it real?

Overall, Goosebumps SlappyWorld: Slappy in Dreamland is another fun entry in the series. Younger readers should have a frightfully good time reading about Slappy's newest antics.