Its opening pages reflect Grady’s narration from some point in the future, speaking of the nightly howls which plague him and the terrifying nature of the swamp, setting up the tone and thrust of the story from paragraph one. In the book, the Tucker’s new home is not ramshackle but well kept. Either way, Grady is quickly dispatched into the neighboring swamp to release a snake found nesting in Emily’s new medicine chest as his parents remind him that, “a little wildlife never hurt anybody!” Dilapidated and derelict, Grady and his older sister Emily think it’s “gross” while their mother insists that the place is “rustic”. Stine himself, the episode opens as a foggy collection of trees gives way to the Tucker family’s recently acquired home. A story about adjusting to change and facing the unknown with moral fortitude, the book delivers the reoccurring central themes of the Goosebumps franchise beautifully while offering up one of the series’ most formidable and distressing outings.Īfter a rousing introduction espousing the virtues of werewolf mythology by R.L. The story’s cover boasts hues of green, purple and blue, featuring a wolf as it howls in front of a large, full moon, sitting just beside a pile of abandoned clothes. The Werewolf of Fever Swamp hit shelves for the Christmas season in December of 1993, although its tale is anything but merry. The strange rumors of a werewolf that might be lurking in the swamp, a place known for its deadly fevers and bogs like quicksand. ![]() Of course there’s the insects and the animals too. Then there’s the old hermit who wanders the land, hunting and keeping to himself. Grady and his sister learn that right away, considering how quickly they get lost in its misty trees just after arriving at their new home. My predetermined assumptions may have broken one of the cardinal rules of childhood, but some covers speak for themselves- especially when Tim Jacobus, R.L. ![]() The story represents the series’ ability, both onscreen and on the page, to incorporate classic mythologies and genre tropes in a way that the average kid can digest, even if they might be terrified. In the end, The Werewolf of Fever Swamp emerged as one of my favorite episodes and books. Still, it maintained the book’s unique tone and crafted some truly terrifying moments, even elevating the danger in places and creating scenarios that were amongst the most frightening my young mind had ever encountered on screen. The adaptation was markedly different, excluding a major character and dramatically altering roles, events and plot points. When the story was adapted in the TV series’ first season as a two part special airing all in one night, I experienced that thrilled nervousness all over again. A palpable unease infused with excitement that I would go on to understand as one of the fundamental components of being a horror fan. There was something captivating about those handful of days that the book sat on my shelf, staring up at me, waiting for me to open it. Stine’s prolific series, offering a location as terrifying and harrowing as its villain, all the while maintaining a mystical sense of anxiety and dread that its cover so beautifully captures. The Werewolf of Fever Swamp went on to become one of my favorite entries in R.L. Something about the mood, the atmosphere and the carnality of that simple, striking image got to me, unnerved me well before I had read a single sentence. Generally I liked to absorb my Goosebumps in the evening, but not this one. It sat on my shelf for several days before I mustered up the courage to crack it open and even then I read it during the day. That’s when I spotted them stacked on a shelf, books imbued with a deep purple and lime green, featuring a howling wolf in a moonlit swamp. I had made my way over to the Goosebumps section and was on the hunt for something new. I was at the local library when one such image first imprinted itself upon my impressionable young mind. The images gripped and took hold in a way that the stories could then build upon and the art felt as intrinsic to the narrative as the words printed on the pages beneath it. I devoured The Haunted Mask dying to know what the monstrous latex mold clinging to the girl on the paperback might be capable of. I snatched up Say Cheese and Die! wanting to know everything I could about the skeletal crew enjoying a family barbecue on its cover. Tim Jacobus’ cover art was a gateway into the story, a textured, colorful window into what terrors might await otherwise unsuspecting readers on the pages within. The series adaptation aired on Friday, (runtime: 22 minutes and 26 minutes).Īs a kid I was always taught not to judge a book by its cover, but when it came to Goosebumps I did it all the time. ![]() The Werewolf of Fever Swamp was originally p ublished in December 1993 (Spine #14).
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