The Headless Ghost
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The Headless Ghost is the 37th Goosebumps book by R. L. Stine.
[edit] Storyline
When Stephanie gets bored of terrorising the kids in her neighbourhood, Wheeler Falls, she tells her partner in crime Duane that she wants to go exploring around Hill House, a very old and creepy house. She wants to find a ghost. They sneak off of the tour (luckily they know the tour off by heart) and try to find Andrew (a ghost with no head who haunts the house looking for his head).
When they leave the house they meet a mysterious boy called Seth who says he can show them a real ghost. They arrange to meet the following day at midnight. That night he locks them in the butlers pantry and pretends to be Andrew, he then tells Duane he has to return the head, but will take his, Duane's, in its place. After running away the two discover that Seth isn't Andrew but the nephew of Otto, a tour guide. The real Andrew also finds his head, thanks to Duane and Stephanie. The two then decide to give up scaring the neighbourhood. Duane joined the basketball team at school he became a forward player, Stephanie joined the theatre arts club.
Months later Duane wants to take the Hill House tour, they get Edna and Otto to take them round. After this a police car asks Duane and Stephanie where they've been and they explain. The police men then tell them that the house shut down 3 months ago. Looking through the window they see that Edna and Otto were in fact...Ghosts
[edit] Notes
- The book is written in first person with Duane telling the story.
- The protagonists' favorite tour guide is Otto and second favorite is Edna. Both of these turn out to be ghosts at the end of the book.
- In the TV show version of this episode, there was also mention of the ghost of a boy who liked ice cream and had it delivered to him every day via the dumb waiter. When the dumb waiter malfunctioned, the boy tried to reach down and get it, but fell through the dumb waiter shaft and died of massive head trauma.
- Both of the children have parents who are heavy sleepers.
