Last week after work, I took the train from Manhattan back to Jersey City and popped into my local independent book store, Word, for a talk and Q&A with my favorite author growing up, R.L. Stine. As I mentioned in my Bookprint, GoosebumpsTM was the first series I connected with as a young reader. Growing up, I couldn’t get enough of Stine’s scary stories. I amassed nearly all of the original Goosebumps books before my pre-teen eyes wandered toward other authors, so when I heard R.L. Stine was going to be speaking less than 10 minutes away from my house, I knew I had to be there.
As I grabbed a seat in the front row about an hour before start time, I noticed most of the people already waiting were around my age – late 20s, early 30s. But then, slowly but surely, the room began to fill up, not only with other adults, but with young boys and girls clutching stacks of Goosebumps and Rotten School books.
Suddenly, 15 minutes before the event was supposed to start, I heard a bunch of little kids sitting behind me begin to murmur excitedly. R.L. Stine was here! As employees prepped the stage, Mr. Stine walked around the room, greeting all the young children individually and shaking hands with parents. You could tell that everyone, no matter how old, was a huge fan and super excited to see him in person.
As he took the stage, Stine commented that although he was in Jersey City to promote his newest Fear Street book, he would be giving a kids talk instead, since there usually aren’t as many little ones at his events. (This made all of us “old people” in the audience laugh quite a bit.) Stine shared with the audience the kind of fan mail he gets (“Dear R.L. Stine – Do you have hair?”), told us a “true” ghost story, talked about casting the Goosebumps movie (he wanted to be portrayed by Morgan Freeman), and answered everyone’s questions before the time was up.
Finally it was time for the signing. I ended up in the first group along with all the eager kids who had been sitting behind me. I held back and let them get in line in front of me, and I watched them frantically pull books out of backpacks and decide which ones to get signed. Although I was totally playing it cool, inside I was just as excited and nervous as them. I was finally going to meet the author that set the stage for my passion of reading!
I watched kid after kid adorably pose for photos. Stine signed every book placed in front of him, and shook hands with excited parents – some of whom even brought their old-school copies of his books! When it was my turn, I shook his hand, introduced myself, and we briefly chatted about our respective careers at Scholastic. (Did you know R.L. Stine used to write Scholastic’s humor magazine?) It lasted only a few minutes, but it was AMAZING.
Seeing R.L. Stine at Word showed me just how long an author’s work can stick with you. I’m nearly 30 (shh!), and I was just as thrilled to meet Stine as the elementary and middle school kids that were there. I also found it interesting to see how R.L. Stine continues to write new stories for today’s kids, while still remaining a literary hero for people my age – no doubt due to his warmth, humor and passion for telling scary stories.
You can all the latest updates on R.L. Stine (including in-person events) via his personal Twitter account @RL_Stine, and be sure to follow @Scholastic and @Goosebumps all October long for the #31DaysofGoosebumps!
