R.L. Stine
Robert Lawrence Stine, famed author of the series of children's horror novels, Goosebumps, is frequently cited by Chris as a major literary influence. To be painfully honest, besides Of Mice and Men and The Giver (Which were probably definitely required reading in whatever English course he took) Mr. Stine is Chris's only literary influence. This means that all of Clyde's Fight Club references fly right over his greasy little head and out into the Time Void.
Why is it that Chris, unlike with so many other things in life, actually decided to read Stine's many mediocre paperbacks? Besides reading them to avoid paying attention in class, it isn't that far fetched. Ponder for a moment every other facet of Solid's miserable existence. Sonic, Pokémon, My Little Pony, Yu-Gi-Oh!, arts'n'crafts, Good Burger, Lego, video games completely lacking in adult themes, etc. Chris's interests consist of the most childish (Besides sex) collage of failure ever to be held by a human being, hence the epithet "man-child" that the internet has thus dubbed him. So it isn't a long shot that whatever slight thirst for the written word he possesses can be easily quenched by a bunch of grade-school kiddy novels. I sincerely doubt that autistic, sexually frustrated man-children are the demographic R.L. Stine was going for.
But it might be a deeper connection than simply bad taste.
| “ | I feel happy to terrify kids. | ” |
| R.L. Stine | ||
| “ | I guess I'm way too kind and generous, and a saint - if you can believe that! | ” |
| R.L. Stine | ||
| “ | I have a cheat-sheet for each one of my characters about their personality, the way they look, etc. So there is no possible way that I could have writer's block. | ” |
| R.L. Stine | ||
Literary Influence
Despite being 27, Chris still cites Stine as his favorite author. Worse, he seems to know R.L. Stine primarily or exclusively through the Goosebumps and Fear Street series and similar, as opposed to Stine's more gruesome, violent, and (very slightly) more realistic teenage novels. Stine's not the best novelist around by a long shot; if Chris had to choose one author to read forever, he backed the wrong horse. The Goosebumps and Fear Street books are full of bizarre deus/diabolus ex machinae to either spring characters out of trouble or get them in even deeper, nonsensical plot twists, simplistic characters, groaner puns, and so on, and so forth. Sound familiar?
Bear in mind, though, these books are aimed at grade schoolers who like goofy stuff like that, and most who kept reading after Goosebumps moved on to more challenging fare as they grew up. Chris, though, stayed with Stine through thick and thin well into high school and seemingly beyond. Through a combination of laziness and fanboy hostility (according to the Dark Christian Pokemon card, he hated Harry Potter purely because it was replacing Pokemon in popularity), he didn't bite any other literary hooks that came his way. Thus he has no familiarity with literature for grownups, nor any apparent interest. He thus has no grasp of symbolism, subtlety, foreshadowing, or any other literary technique or style. He might not even read anything outside of Sonic the Hedgehog comics and pornographic manga nowadays. As any published author can tell you, writing from such a severely restricted reference pool is a recipe for disaster.
R.L. Stine once extolled his readers to read all kinds of books from different authors and genres. This is yet another piece of good advice to fall deaf on Chris's ear.
In Summation
The HONEST TRUTH is that just as Chris thinks he relates to President Barrack Obama, he also subconsciously feels the kindred connection he shares with Mr. Stine.