R.L. Stine
Robert Lawrence Stine, famed author of the children's horror series Goosebumps, is frequently cited by Chris as a major literary influence.[1] To be painfully honest, besides Of Mice and Men and Catcher in the Rye (which were definitely required reading in whatever English course he took, since there'd be no other way he'd have even heard of them), Mr. Stine's novels are Chris's only literary influence. This means that all of Clyde Cash's Fight Club references fly right over his greasy little head and out into the Time Void.
Why is it that Chris made the effort to actually read Stine's many mediocre paperbacks? Besides reading them to avoid paying attention in class, it's easily explained by his personality. Ponder for a moment the hypercommercialized fandoms that make up every other facet of Chris'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 form the most childish collage of failure ever to be held by a human being. It isn't hard to believe that whatever slight thirst for the written word he possesses can be easily quenched by a bunch of grade-school level novels — though autistic, sexually frustrated man-children are probably not 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 seems unaware or uninterested in Stine's more gruesome, violent, and slightly 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, nonsensical plot twists, simplistic characters, groaner puns, and ridiculous deus/diabolus ex machinae to either spring characters out of trouble or get them in even deeper. Sound familiar? Chris's favorite Goosebumps story is The Haunted Mask.[2] The reason why: Chris identifies himself with the protagonist Carly Beth, who is also easy troll bait. No surprise here.
Bear in mind, also, that these books are aimed at children no older than 10 who like goofy stuff like that and wouldn't understand anything deeper. Most who kept reading after grade school moved on to more challenging fare, like Harry Potter, 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 fanboyish hostility (according to the Dark Christian Pokémon card, he hated Harry Potter purely because it was replacing Pokémon in popularity), he didn't bite any other literary hooks that came his way. What is likely is that he may have tried to read Harry Potter, but the advanced writing style and literary devices were too complex for his autistic mind, so he condemned the series. Thus he has no familiarity with adult (let alone, adolescent) literature, nor any apparent interest. He 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 hentai manga nowadays, if he reads at all. 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 fans to read all kinds of books from different authors and genres. This is yet another piece of good advice to fall on Chris's deaf ears. Chris is so incapable of venturing outside his comfort zone that he couldn't even leave the fantasy world of Sonic the Hedgehog while reading the books. On page 24 of Sonichu 7, Chris revealed that while reading Goosebumps, he would imagine characters from the story being portrayed by figures from the Sonic video game series.
In summation
The HONEST TRUTH is that Chris is a 27 year old preteen who is either unable or unwilling to grow up and read big boy books.