Tagline: Chrissy was perfect – perfectly evil.
Back tagline: Help! Wanted
Summary: Summer at the beach and Amanda Conklin’s stuck in summer school. Well, at least she doesn’t have to take care of her little brother and sister. That’s Chrissy’s job.
Chrissy seems like the perfect babysitter – so kind and trustworthy. But Amanda soon discovers Chrissy’s terrible secret. Babysitting is Chrissy’s job – but killing is what she does best!
First impressions: I have no idea what I’m looking at with this cover. What is she doing with that cat? Is she laughing maniacally or is that how she normally looks? [Note from the future: once again, this scene doesn’t happen which is super annoying because I would have loved to have known what the hell is going on! Also, I discussed this book on the Fear Street Book Club Podcast, if you’d like to listen!]
Recap
Roll call:
Amanda – Our protagonist, who might be going crazy.
Chrissy – The hired help who might be evil.
Dave – The hunky love interest.
There’s a few more characters but no-one worth mentioning. Let’s read!
The first chapter takes place after the rest of the book and for the last three days, Amanda has been kept in the “psychologically disturbed offenders” ward in a juvenile detention centre. She’s in there for murder and isn’t looking forward to her upcoming session with Dr Miller, because she’s already explained what happened and he didn’t believe her.
We then flashback to the beginning of summer as the Conklin family depart their Fear street home and head towards their rented beach house in Seahaven [OK so I guess we’re not even in Shadyside for this one! Booooooo]. Since Amanda failed algebra and will be attending summer school, and her parents will be working while away, they’ve placed an ad for a mother’s helper to assist with Amanda’s siblings, 8-year-old Kyle and 3-year-old Merry [That’s a stupid name!]. They’ve also brought along their two canaries, Salt and Pepper, and tabby cat, Mr. Jinx [And since this is a Fear Street book, at least one of these animals will be dead by the end. We’re not in Shadyside, though, so maybe there’s a chance they’ll all survive!].
After a few hours, they arrive at the beach house and Amanda is super excited about the boat and pool she’ll be able to use over the summer. Amanda stays behind while the fam heads out to get groceries and see some friends staying nearby, and not long after there’s a knock at the door.
It’s a beautiful teenage girl whose hair colour reminds Amanda of “the silk on the inside of fresh corn on the cob” [Hahahahaha what?!]. Her name is Chrissy Minor [Merry and Chrissy? Really?? Merry Christmas lol] and she’s there to enquire about the mother’s helper job. Mr. Jinx take an immediate disliking to Chrissy, hissing at her from across the room. Chrissy gives him a taste of his own medicine by baring her teeth and hissing back, which terrifies the cat and makes Amanda uneasy.
Amanda’s parents return to interview Chrissy and Amanda eavesdrops on the conversation. Chrissy lives with her aunt and is looking for a live-in job while her cousin is back home from college for the summer. Amanda’s parents find Chrissy super charming and despite getting no answer when they call the two references on her resume, they hire her.
“Mom, that’s totally irresponsible!” Amanda insisted.
“Amanda, it was totally irresponsible of you to fail Algebra,” her mother replied sharply. “If that hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t have to be making this decision.”
[Ooh, burn. But I hate that they were initially relying on Amanda to watch the kids. Why ruin her summer?]
Chrissy already has all her stuff with her, [Bit cocky, don’t you think?] so she’s ready to move in now! After she easily wins over Merry and Kyle, the family goes to help her collect her things from her car, while Amanda notices that Salt and Pepper, who usually sing nonstop all day, are silent and seem to be in some sort of trance. Ooky spooky!
After making sure they’re OK, Amanda heads upstairs to help Chrissy unpack, and some newspaper articles from two years ago fall out of her suitcase. After trying to hide them, Chrissy let’s Amanda read one. It’s about a girl named Lilith who’s in a coma after inhaling an almost lethal dose of monoxide poisoning. Chrissy casually reveals that Lilith is her twin sister and she’s still in a coma. Amanda offers her condolences, but Chrissy rejects doesn’t want them because Lilith is eeEeeEEeeeeEEeevil! [OK, so either Chrissy is actually Lilith, who poisoned the real Chrissy and took over her life, or they’re the same person and there’s no twin. I’m so tempted right now to skip to the end and find out if I’m right but I will resist those urges!].
It’s Monday now and at her first day at summer school, Amanda meets Dave, who’s super cute and has lived in Seahaven his whole life. Amanda asks if he knows Chrissy, but he’s never heard of Chrissy or anyone with the last name Minor. Amanda is even more suss now because it’s such a small town, so surely everyone would know each other. She also mentions her lack of trust in Chrissy because Mr. Jinx hates her, which I think is totally reasonable and so does Dave, so we like him.
After school, Amanda gets home to find Merry drowned in the pool. Except it’s just a classic fake-out and she hasn’t drowned at all, because Chrissy is underwater, holding Merry up to teach her to float [So over these pointless cliffhangers!]. Later, Amanda attempts to explain her concerns about Chrissy to her mum, but Mrs. Conklin is dismissive, suggesting Amanda misheard Chrissy about Lilith being evil. She wants Amanda to go easy on Chrissy since she’s had a hard life, what with her parents dying in a car crash and sister in a coma.
Afterwards, Amanda lets Mr. Jinx outside and munches on some Oreos in the kitchen while watching Chrissy play with Merry and Kyle out on the front lawn. A car suddenly speeds towards them, but the kids are saved by Chrissy. Mr. Jinx is not so lucky, however, [Those birds better not die too! :(], and Amanda thinks she sees Chrissy smiling about the poor, dead cat [Woooow, I’d be so mad if I was Amanda]. The driver is unhurt and explains it was like the car suddenly had a life of its own and he was unable to brake or steer.
That night, the family continue to bond with Chrissy while Amanda starts to feel like she’s being replaced. Poor thing. After waking from a nightmare later, Amanda heads to the kitchen for some water but notices Chrissy’s door open. Inside, Chrissy is floating off the ground and when she spots Amanda watching, she cackles [Maybe she’s a witch!]. Amanda faints and next thing she knows, her parents are waking her up in the hallway. She tries to tell them what she saw but they obviously don’t believe her, especially when Chrissy’s asleep in bed when Amanda tries to show them.
Chrissy wakes up and acts confused about Amanda’s accusations, so Amanda goes ape-shit at her. Her parents pull her down into the lounge and decide that she must have sleepwalked and dreamed of what she saw because of all the stress she’s going through. Amanda reluctantly agrees and goes back to bed.
She’s woken up again by someone stomping around the house and goes to investigate, but it’s just Chrissy in the kitchen. Heading back to her room, Amanda notices Chrissy’s door open again and spots the newspaper clippings on her bed. She heads on in to snoop but is quickly caught by a furious Chrissy before she can read anything worthwhile. A breeze suddenly rolls in through the open window and blows the clippings onto the floor, and Amanda suspects Chrissy made it happen somehow. Chrissy threatens Amanda to stay out of her room and kicks her out.
In the hallway, Amanda finds a stray clipping from a newspaper produced in Harrison County, a town not far from Shadyside. It’s dated from two years ago and reveals that Mr and Mrs Anton Minor died of carbon monoxide poisoning as they slept because their car was left on in the garage and the poisonous fumes went through the air duct [Not sure if that’d be possible but OK]. There’s no mention of Chrissy in the article, though, which is really weird. Amanda decides she’ll show it to her parents tomorrow, but as she goes to hide it somewhere safe, it bursts into flames. Then she hears Chrissy laughing… but it’s coming from inside Amanda’s head [I love when Fear Street gets supernatural!]!
The next morning, Amanda gets up super early and calls her neighbour from Shadyside, Suzi, asking her to check the back issues of newspapers in the library for anything related to anyone named Minor. Suzi is a bit sassy about it, but finally agrees when Amanda reminds her about all the times she’s covered for Suzi when she snuck out to meet boys [Naughty, naughty, Suzi!]. Before she hangs up, Suzi mentions that a blonde girl was asking about the Conklin’s not long after they left. Before she can give anymore specifics, the phone starts melting in her hand and Chrissy’s voice comes through instead, telling Amanda not to worry and that the blonde girl will find her when the time is right [We know you’re the blonde girl, Chrissy!].
Amanda scurries to her parents’ room, hoping they’ll believe Chrissy is evil when they see the melted phone [Because that is the only logical explanation, I guess], but they’re outside dealing with the tow truck driver about their car. Back downstairs, she notices the perfectly unmelted phone back in its cradle and questions her own sanity [Love a bit of gaslighting!] and deciding not to tell her parents in case they think she’s crazy.
After school that day, Amanda tells Dave everything that’s been happening, and he surprisingly believes her [This is a Fear Street book, so I’m kinda suspicious about, but we are Seahaven, so I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt because he seems great!]. Dave reveals he asked around town about the Minors and no-one has heard of them and points out that the address on Chrissy’s resume actually belongs to an abandoned house.
Dave rents a wave-runner at the beach and takes Amanda to a little island that has a shed, which he and his brothers use as a secret hideout. The shed used to belong to some hunters but was abandoned, with lots of dried food and furniture left behind. There’s also a hunting knife, and Dave encourages Amanda to plant it in Chrissy’s room so her parents will freak out and get rid of her [Can’t wait for this to backfire!]. They then kiss, but unfortunately it’s not detailed what his mouth tastes like [Hopefully not carrot cake, though].
When Dave brings Amanda home, Chrissy greets them at the door and is super flirty. Amanda tries to call her out about the phony address on her resume, but Chrissy keeps her cool and says it’s the house her aunt is looking at buying, and Chrissy thought they’d be living there by now. She actually lives in Seaport, the next town over from Seahaven. Chrissy is completely unbothered by Amanda’s attempts to catch her out, which only frustrates Amanda more.
Chrissy asks to see Dave’s fully sick, classic Mustang so he takes her outside to bask in it’s beauty while Amanda ventures upstairs to plant the hunting knife. In Chrissy’s room, the knife starts spraying blood all over Amanda so she throws it into Chrissy’s drawer and runs downstairs, where a grisly sight greets her. Salt and Pepper are dead in their cage with their throats slit [Omfg this book is brutal :(].
Amanda’s parents rush in, notice the blood all over Amanda and assume she killed the birds. It only makes her look worse when Chrissy bolts upstairs and returns with the bloody knife, claiming it was in her drawer and all her stuff is covered in blood. Amanda protests her innocence and accuses Chrissy, but the damage is already done and Amanda’s dad decides they need to call a doctor for Amanda [I’m not even mad at the parents for this because Stine’s done a good job blurring the lines between Chrissy being evil and the possibility of Amanda going crazy].
She meets with a doctor the next day who determines that she’s upset about failing algebra and disappointing her parents. He thinks Amanda’s taking her frustrations out on Chrissy because she’s feeling replaced by her [Makes sense, but me and Amanda aren’t buying it because Chrissy is eeeeEeEEEeeevil]. Amanda pretends to agree and fakes being asleep on the car ride home so she can eavesdrop on her parents talking about her. Apparently the doctor instructed them not to fire Chrissy because that would show Amanda that she can get her way by acting out [Lol brutal! I feel so sorry for Amanda].
Back home, Amanda apologises to Chrissy outside before a kitten approaches and has the same reaction to Chrissy as Mr. Jinx did. Scared for it’s welfare, Amanda hides it in her room for its own protection.
Later, Amanda gets a call from math exam cheater Carter Phillips, with some bad news about Suzi. She started bleeding from her nose and mouth while at the library and is unconscious in the hospital having tests run, and doctors are totally stumped.
That night is Chrissy’s night off, but she’s happy to stay and help Amanda look after the kids while her parents go out. Amanda declines the offer because it’ll give her a chance to snoop for more newspaper clippings in a Chrissy’s room. Chrissy heads upstairs to say goodnight to the kids and read Merry a book, so Amanda decides to phone her references. One number has no answer as usual, but the one belonging to the Harrimans is picked up straight away. It’s a girl named Rachel, the Harrimans’ neighbour, who stopped by because she hadn’t seen them for a while. She reveals something terrible has happened to the family and if Chrissy is at Amanda’s house, Amanda needs to get out now!
Then Chrissy enters the kitchen to get some milk for Kyle and Amanda thinks she sees her putting poison in the glass of milk, but it turns out to be chocolate powder [Didn’t see the packaging, Amanda?]. Dave arrives with today’s assignments since Amanda wasn’t in school [I love him!] and invites Chrissy to a movie so Amanda can play Nancy Drew.
Amanda finds a photo of her own father in a shoebox in Chrissy’s closet and discovers from the accompanying article that her father, a public defence lawyer, was representing a homeless man charged with arson at Anton Minor’s work building. Before she can read any more, Chrissy and Dave return home and Amanda is forced to hide under Chrissy’s bed, still holding the articles.
All except one, that is, which has fallen to the floor and is noticed by Chrissy. She heads to Amanda’s room to confront her, so Amanda bolts out of the house and catches Dave outside, ordering him to drive to the inn where the parents’ friends are staying so she can show them the articles [OK, one, the last clipping you wanted to show them spontaneously combusted; and two, you’ve left evil Chrissy alone in the house with your younger siblings???? You’re an idiot, Amanda!].
During the drive, Amanda reads another article and learns that her father got the homeless man acquitted and was trying to get Anton Minor charged for the fire. Dave and Amanda deduce that Chrissy is after revenge, but can’t figure out how her weird powers fit into it. Amanda looks at another article and is absolutely horrified when she sees a photo of Chrissy with the caption labelling her Lilith. Me and Dave are are like “Uhh, you already know they’re twins” and Amanda’s like “oh yeah, lol” [Amanda’s really testing my patience now].
Amanda finally remembers that the first article she stole burst into flames the other night and realises she has to hurry before something happens to these ones! She decides she should call the inn first, in case her parents and their friends had all gone out, so they search for a phone booth instead [OK but if you’re in that much of a hurry, wouldn’t you just go straight to the inn and if they weren’t there, ask the concierge? Not waste time going out of the way to a phone booth first? They’ve been banging on about how small this town is the whole book, surely finding a phone wouldn’t be that much quicker].
After parking at at phone booth near a cliff, Dave falls into a trance and pitches forward, hitting his head on the steering wheel as blood pours from his ears, mouth and nose. Chrissy appears outside and the car doors are flung upon as if by a powerful gust of wind before Amanda is dragged out by an invisible force.
Chrissy, floating in the air, reveals she’s unlocked her brain’s full potential and that’s why she has all these cool powers. She also confesses that her father tried to kill the whole family through carbon monoxide poisoning because their lives would have been destroyed by the charges against him. Chrissy has already murdered the judge, the assistant district attorney and their families [Whose phone numbers she had listed in her references] and now it’s the Conklin family’s turn to die.
Amanda is then thrown back into the car before it rolls over the cliff with her and Dave trapped inside [Drowning is one of my biggest fears so this is super intense for me!]. Instead of sinking into the ocean, the car lands on some boulders and Amanda is able to climb out. She checks for Dave’s pulse, but he’s already dead [Dave deserved better! >:(] and the car slips into the ocean.
Amanda passes out until the morning, then journeys home where she sneaks into the house and overhears Chrissy on the phone to Amanda’s parents. They’re in Shadyside, thinking Amanda might have headed back there, which Chrissy strongly encourages before promising to take care of Kyle and Merry until they return. After seeing that Merry and Kyle are OK, Amanda flees the house and returns to the beach, but Chrissy has sensed her presence already and her voice fills Amanda’s head, vowing to kill her first. She notices Chrissy coming through the woods and steals a nearby wave-runner, taking it to the island Dave had showed her.
At the shed, she arms herself with a knife before Chrissy gets into her head again, stating she’s got more important things to tend to than Amanda, like Merry. And just like that, Amanda’s back on the wave-runner and heading back to the house. When she gets close, though, she spots Chrissy in the small motorboat that came with the house, heading towards the island with Kyle and Merry bound and gagged onboard [Oof, this is getting intense].
Amanda steers towards the boat now, but Chrissy spots her and sends some headaches her way. Chrissy can’t steer the boat while doing this though, so as Amanda edges closer, Chrissy reaches for the sky before thrusting her hands toward Amanda’s wave-runner, shooting out lightning bolts [hahahahahahaha fuck me].
Amanda is jolted into the water but refuses to drown, surfacing just below Chrissy’s boat [How bloody convenient!]. She climbs aboard and Chrissy grabs Merry, holding a knife to her throat. Amanda tackles Chrissy and they have little scuffle before Chrissy sends Amanda up into the air and and flies her like a kite [omfg hahahahaha].
With a stroke of pure luck, the boat hits a rock and Chrissy goes tumbling into the air herself before falling back into the boat, cracking her head on the bow as she lands [If Chrissy’s dead this is such a damn cop-out from Stine and I won’t be happy!]. Amanda quickly unties her siblings and uses the ropes to restrain Chrissy before aiming the boat towards the house. It’s taking on water, though, and Kyle’s no help because he’s in complete shock. They make it to shallow waters in the boat and are able to drag Chrissy’s lifeless body up into the house.
Inside, Chrissy wakes up, freeing herself before sending furniture flying around the room and this is all I can think of:
Merry and Kyle escape outside as Chrissy starts a fire in the house, but Amanda remains trapped. As Chrissy moves in closer to kill Amanda, the kitten that Amanda had saved earlier darts between her feet, causing Chrissy to stumble and land face first into the fire. Amanda flees the house to where Merry and Kyle are waiting for her.
A few feet from the shed Amanda turned back to the house. And saw a huge fireball roll out the door.
“Ohhh.” She uttered a hoarse cry as she saw arms inside the fireball. And legs.
And realised the fireball was Chrissy. Chrissy in flames.
Chrissy raising her fiery arms to the sky. Then sinking to the deck floor.
[RIP Chrissy, what a great villain and what a horrible but well-deserved death! Imagine being taken out by a cute, little kitten, though, hahahaha]
We flash forward to a few days later again and Dr. Miller just wants to clarify Amanda’s story and make sure she understands why the police arrested her. She confirms it’s because they think she murdered Chrissy and since the boat had most likely washed away and Kyle is still in shock and can’t talk, they have no evidence to support her claims of innocence.
But it turns out Kyle started talking this morning and corroborated her story, so Amanda is getting out today. Woo! He then explains that Chrissy was indeed Lilith, who must have developed powers in her coma, woke up one day and escaped the hospital to get her revenge. Rachel, the neighbour of the judge who spoke with Amanda on the phone, also gave information about Chrissy that helped confirmed Amanda’s story. But why did Lilith choose the name Chrissy, I hear you all wonder? It was the name of her cat [Boring, lol].
Afterwards, the family then heads home with the kitten that saved their life, and as Amanda turns back to get one last look at the charred remains of the beach house, she sees Chrissy waving from the driveway [Ooky spooky!].
Final thoughts
I really liked this book! It was a lot darker than I expected and even though I mostly assumed Chrissy was causing everything, for a good chunk I was still considering that Amanda might really be going crazy. Mad props to Stine for killing off three pets and a love interest too, even though I wish they all survived. I really liked Dave, it was great to not have a rapey male character. We never found out if Suzi recovered, though, and it’s hard to determine if Dave was dead before or after the car went over the cliff. Oh well.
It got a bit crazy there at the end but it was never boring, and although Amanda made some questionable decisions, she was a pretty good heroine, but maybe that’s more because I felt sorry for her the whole time.
28 melting telephones out of 31!
