Josiah > Recent Status Updates

I almost chose to call Animal Rescue, but if my dog is right outside and being killed by a Burmese python—and I can stop the attack—I'll never stop asking "What if?" should my phone delay be the difference between life and death. Let's go, Jack, with that baseball bat!

This is (to date) the last of three books in the Chooseco Choose Your Own Nightmare reboot, inaugurated in 2014. Snake Invasion, released in 2016, is by Choose Your Own Adventure veteran Doug Wilhelm. The book is illustrated by Vladimir Semionov, but for whatever reason Gabhor Utomo was retained to do the cover art. It's a pretty good depiction of you immersed in snakes.

You and Zora Belladonna have the power to defeat Prudence Deadly, it seems. You get her in both of these endings. And with this one on page 119, I am finally done with Eighth Grade Witch.

Turned into a cockroach by Prudence Deadly, huh? It's not the weirdest ending in these pages.

I like this double-page drawing of the cats (good work, Gabhor Utomo), but once again the story just...stops. No resolution is even attempted.

It's astonishing how confusing this book is. Why wasn't a proper editor assigned to overhaul C.E. Simpson's narrative work?

Can we please get a coherent ending? I want to like this book, but it's trying hard to render that an impossibility.

Not only is every part of this story disjointed, but most of the endings leave off before any real resolution is brought. I hate to say this may be the worst Choose Your Own Nightmare in either iteration of the series, but...

Probably the book's most nightmarish ending, but the graphic horror can't make it into an actual ending. It offers zero closure to the storyline.

Will the police be able to help, or are they in on the paranormal corruption like most everyone else in Graves End, Brooklyn?

Mr. Ramsey doesn't come across as a trustworthy museum curator. We may be better off not returning the amulet to him.

The ins and outs of this chase adventure are at times confusing, but this book feels more like a detective story than mummy horror. So far, at least.

I doubt the museum guards will be much help. Let's look for the mummy and see if we can fix the exhibit ourselves. After all, Josh didn't steal the amulet in the first place.

Crushed to death in Ancient Egypt. This book has some weird twists and turns, though I wish they were more entertaining.

Can we avoid the evil librarian and all the other minions at this school by just using the Internet to research Astrid and her ilk?

This story is a hard to follow mess for the most part. I wonder if we can still find a way to counteract the junior coven of witches without Peter's direct help.

Maybe we can bypass being harassed by Ramsey if we return the amulet directly to the exhibit. I do wonder, though, how it wound up in Josh's pocket.

This ending doesn't give enough story information in a vacuum. I wonder why the mummies eliminated Ramsey that way...

On to our ninth Choose Your Own Nightmare this month. This read-aloud is the second series entry by E.A.M. Jakab, and though I prefer The Halloween Party, we'll see what this one has to offer. It's been years since I sat down with The Mummy Who Wouldn't Die for a read.

What if we ditch the witch angle and follow these two apparent grave robbers, Marty and Trix?

Wild stuff. I fear the author has next to no regard for maintaining internal consistency in her story.

Original Choose Your Own Nightmare had plenty of bad books, but perhaps none were as unreadable as this one.

I guess at that previous decision juncture, no hope was left for a non-horrifying end.

This is one of the most herky-jerky gamebooks I've read. One could get whiplash from some of these sudden, extreme endings such as this one.

We're on my property, so I guess I owe it to Fang to try to save her from the massive, pulsating green spider.

All's well that ends well. I guess if you'd waited all along, you'd have received Uncle Bill's package with the antidote for your transformation into a fly. Of course, you had no way of knowing that.

Can we find another solution, since Mr. Scully won't listen to Emily's pleas to hear us out right now during his science class?

Another super-cohesive ending with a solution that makes sense. Bangarang for you, Laban Carrick Hill!

If we show some patience and wait with Emily in the hospital, can the medical staff restore our human form?

I love the attention this book pays to complex continuity between story paths. Laban Carrick Hill hit a home run with Bugged Out!, the first major objective success of Choose Your Own Nightmare. What a gamebook.