The Bookworm: 'Truth or Dare'
Truth or Dare, by R.L. Stine. 146 pages. Pocket Books/Archway Paperback. February 1995.
But we couldn’t leave the house. The snow was too deep and coming down too hard. The winds were freezing and nearly strong enough to blow us over.
We had no car. No phone. No neighbors.
We were trapped. (p. 78)
I’ve been busy lately. Not only have I been doing the three-job shuffle again, working my usual full-time gig with the journals and painting with my uncle, I’m reading the draft of Bobblehead’s third novel. Add in working out, attending Iowa men’s basketball games (which sometimes feels like another job), and the daily chores of what people call adulting, I don’t have much time to relax. However, I took a break recently and made time to curl up with a wintertime Fear Street novel, Truth or Dare.
April is looking forward to a ski weekend (but unrelated to Ski Weekend, another Fear Street book) with friends at Dara’s ski condo. However, not only do they find a couple crashing there already, a game of Truth or Dare turns deadly. Snowed in with a murderer in their midst’s, April and her friends hope they’ll be alive when help arrives.
Truth or Dare is an entertaining and suspenseful whodunit. Almost every chapter ends on a cliffhanger, which is exponentially more than usual for the series and makes the book hard to put down. It features the usual misdirection and is convincing and realistic. The twist at the end is very surprising, though it is partially predictable. I suspected it was who it was, but not why.
The characters are engaging and believable. The characterization is not deep, but it doesn’t need to be; one learns everything necessary. Dara and Tony are very convincing snobs. They are both egoistic and unempathetic, which I think is the definition of a psychopath.
Of course, the book does have some confusing and endearing shortcomings.
First off, there is no sex, drugs, or rock and roll at this luxury ski condo despite there being no adult supervision. One couple cannot keep their hands off each other, but they stay in rooms on opposite sides of the condo, which is more like a giant log cabin. There is some music, but Truth or Dare falls flat on its face in the realism category in this way; I find it hard to believe there are no extra-curricular activities in a house with seven teenagers, including two couples. I know, I know: the Fear Street series purposely lacks that realism. But I can’t help knocking the book for it. It elicits a “yeah, right.”
It’s hard to imagine the area around the condo. It’s at the top of a hill, but there are contradictory descriptions about its surroundings and the distance to the closest town and ski resort. For much of the book, the condo is in the middle of nowhere and very secluded, the nearest neighbors and towns very far away; the teens are unable to walk for help. Later, April and another character reach ski slopes and a ski lift easily, though they do ski there. Regardless, the area is described as being a picturesque winter getaway reminiscent of places in Colorado. So close to Shadyside? Apparently!
On that note, I don’t think there is a single mention to Fear Street in the book.
Speaking of skiing, the cover raises an interesting question: How does one get in and out of that chair? The safety bar appears immobile; I can’t see any way it can be moved to allow riders to sit or stand. Not only that, the scene depicted on the cover never happens. I was unsure if a lift would make an appearance in the book at all, but one is featured at the end.
During the epic snow storm that traps the teens at the condo, April describes the midday sky having “darkened to evening charcoal” (p. 73). It does not get that dark during a snow storm!
Though the proofreading is not horrible, it is on the poor side. I noticed only small things, usually a missing comma (at least where I would put one), but Truth or Dare is not as clean as others in the series. (Speaking of proofreading, I was informed by an author that the publisher of one of my journals started using artificial intelligence to copyedit accepted manuscripts. That probably explains the weird things I notice in the proofs now, especially downcased proper nouns.)
Truth or Dare features a couple things worth noting in the outdated category. First, the teens are unable to contact others because the phone lines have been knocked down by the storm. To get information about the weather and cancellations, and to listen to music, they listen to the radio. They play cards to pass the time, and board games are found in one of the rooms, though board games are not necessarily outdated (aren’t they making a comeback?). Also, someone leaves a note for Dara. Would modern teens write notes to each other or just send a text?
Truth or Dare has a dedication, the first I think I’ve encountered in the old series: “For Stuart, World’s best telephone ski instructor.” It had me laughing out loud. It’s funny because there is not much skiing in the book, so I wonder if there was more in an early draft, and it brings to mind a term I learned in a high school journalism class: butt journalism. It’s when one does all the interviews and reporting over the phone while sitting on his butt.
