Project Goosebumps: Book 5: Curse of The Mummy’s Tomb

The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb (Goosebumps, #5) by R.L. Stine
Published by Scholastic
Pages: 144
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Something dead has been here...
Gabe just got lost - in a pyramid. One minute, his crazy cousin Sari was right ahead of him in the pyramid tunnel. The next minute, she'd disappeared.
But Gabe isn't alone. Someone else is in the pyramid, too.
Someone. Or some thing.
Gabe doesn't believe in the curse of the mummy's tomb.
But that doesn't mean that the curse isn't real.
Does it?

Well hello once again…

*The lights burn brightly over Archer’s head as he looks around, the sandy heat sapping all the energy he has. Taneika is bouncing around excited to be at a pyramid, Nemo too is happy to be here.*

The heat is killing me but the backdrop of pyramids seems appropriate…

I’ve just finished reading Curse of The Mummy’s Tomb. The 5th of the Goosebumps books. And once again we visit a horror classic with The Mummy!

But this time it has been done differently, for once the supernatural element in this tale is not the threat, humans are. Which makes this tale far more chilling even as an adult. To quote Dean Winchester …

And it’s true. Demons, monsters, ghosts, bogeymen, bogeywomen, and things that generally go bump in the night come with a damned laundry list of rules… Crazy people, less so. And therein lies the point of this book, in its own roundabout way. Yes, it contains mummy’s yes, they rise from the dead and play a role in the narrative, but no it’s not what you’d expect. Which is a relief because if this added the mummy in the way I was expecting then this would be another boring semi-creepy tale that was obvious in its outcome.

But blessed be, it’s not. And for once it’s not set in sodding suburbia! no! Stine has branched out and has sent his readers to the furthest reaches of darkest Egypt! Well, where else would a cursed tomb end up? California?

The protagonist is a young boy of Egyptian descent by the name of Gabe. He is in Egypt over the summer break whilst his parents are working and is spending time with his archaeologist uncle and his cousin Sari. He’s eager to learn all he can baout his heritage, which is awesome, and gets to explore sections of the Great Pyramid that is normally off limits to tourists. Gee it must be great to have an uncle who is excavating sections of your ancient heritage…

All of this leads to Gabe getting a little bit lost in the tunnel and literally falling into the discovery of the preparation chamber where the mummys were made by the ancient egyptians all of those many years ago, where he himself is nearly mummified with his sister and uncle, by a mad man who believes he must do so under the orders of the curse… People are bloody crazy.

*Taneika explores the chamber and looks interested in all of this, Nemo however looks like she’s getting ideas, and I find myself nervous at the thought of being left here…*

And I have to be truly honest, Stine didn’t skimp on the details in this book. Gabe knows about how brains were removed for mummification. And about the use of canopic jars to store the internal organs, and the pace thunders along like a good Indiana Jones storyline. The use of a setting outside of the continental US works in the storys favour and lends itself to having the characters already be on edge in a strange place.

All in all I think this is probably the strongest of the series so far barring the first. I can’t wait to see how the sequels handle the mummy, but for now… LET’S GET INVISIBLE *poof*

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