Content Warning: Please be advised that this review discusses a book that contains themes of animal abuse, which some readers may find disturbing.
Hello pet lovers and horror aficionados! Welcome back to a thrilling exploration into the world of young adult horror fiction. Today, we’re sinking our teeth into a classic series that often gets mentioned alongside the ever-popular Goosebumps – Bone Chillers! For many, Bone Chillers represents the quintessential 90s kids’ horror experience, and it all started in February 1994, boasting an impressive run of 24 books. Adding to its legacy, Bone Chillers even spawned a TV show during its peak popularity, a rare feat in the realm of children’s book series adaptations.
While I’ve previously touched upon the Bone Chillers TV show, it’s worth noting that the television adaptation took considerable liberties with the source material. The books are structured as anthologies, each telling a unique, self-contained story, whereas the TV series featured a recurring cast and only loosely adapted a handful of books across its 13 episodes. Interestingly, in a twist, one of the books was actually based on a TV episode, blurring the lines between adaptation and original content.
Speaking of television, Bone Chillers aired on ABC, a network under the Disney umbrella. This naturally begs the question – shouldn’t Bone Chillers be available on Disney+? It seems like a perfect fit for their library of nostalgic content!
The Bone Chillers series was penned by Betsy Haynes, an author who, unlike some of her contemporaries in the genre who opted for pen names, used her real name. Haynes stands out as perhaps the most established author among those writing these Goosebumps-esque series, having been actively publishing since the 1970s with several successful series already under her belt. This background was subtly acknowledged with tiny print on some of the Bone Chillers covers.
Intriguingly, the latter part of the Bone Chillers series saw the introduction of ghostwriters. However, unlike even the Ghosts of Fear Street series, which credited the actual author on the copyright page, Bone Chillers presented a slightly different approach. It maintained Betsy Haynes’ name prominently, but on the same page where her name would typically appear alone, it read “Created by Betsy Haynes, Written by X,” acknowledging the ghostwriter’s contribution. It’s a nuanced approach to authorship transparency in ghostwritten series. (For those curious, there’s an engaging podcast interview with one of these ghostwriters, offering insights into the process: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mq6byol14p4&t=676s ).
But enough about the series in general, let’s delve into one of the books. For this review, my selection was limited by availability. While titles like “Why I Quit The Babysitter’s Club” or “Blowtorch @ Psycho.com” piqued my interest, I landed on Little Pet Shop of Horrors. My choice was admittedly swayed by the cover art, which seemed ripe for some playful, albeit perhaps slightly dark, humor. Let’s see how that pans out.
So, without further ado, let’s jump into the spine-tingling world of Little Pet Shop of Horrors.
Little Pet Shop of Horrors Book Cover featuring a young girl looking scared at various monstrous pets in cages with a menacing shop owner in the background
The cover art, instantly recognizable as the work of Tim Jacobus, although uncredited on the book itself, perfectly captures the eerie vibe of the story. Jacobus, known for his distinctive style, reportedly illustrated most, if not all, of the Bone Chillers covers. While this particular cover is decent in conveying the concept, his more realistic depictions of children’s faces aren’t always my personal favorite.
Unveiling the Custom Pets Mystery
The story kicks off with our protagonist, Cassidy Cavanaugh, and her friend Suki Chen, biking down their street when they stumble upon a pet shop that seemingly materialized overnight. In a town where new businesses don’t pop up instantaneously, this immediately raises red flags. Cassie, a self-proclaimed animal lover, is naturally drawn to investigate this mysterious establishment, because who can resist a shop that appears out of thin air?
Venturing inside, they are greeted by the shop’s enigmatic owner, Mr. Willard. The shop, named Custom Pets, boasts the extraordinary ability to procure any pet imaginable, catering to the most specific desires. However, their initial visit is cut short when a wary Suki urges them to leave, promising a more thorough exploration later.
“You’ll be back,” Mr. Willard ominously states as they depart, followed by a chilling laugh. Subtlety is clearly not his strong suit.
Emerging from the shop, they encounter David Ferrante, the neighborhood bully.
“It’s Hopalong Cassidy! Hey everybody, say hi to Hopalong!” David jeers, revealing Cassie’s unfortunate nickname. This line served as my introduction to Hopalong Cassidy, which I had previously (and incorrectly) assumed was a fictional creation for a Goosebumps book. David brandishes a white box, revealing its житель – a tarantula, which he menacingly waves at a clearly terrified Cassie.
David reveals that he acquired the spider from none other than Custom Pets, further solidifying the shop’s unsettling nature. Escalating his bullying, David throws the tarantula directly at Cassie. Move over, Courtney from Goosebumps; we have a new contender for bully of the year! Understandably, the girls flee to the sanctuary of Suki’s house.
A Puppy and a Suspicious Pet Shop Owner
At Suki’s, the conversation naturally revolves around the peculiar pet shop. Cassie expresses her longing for a puppy, a dream thwarted by her severe allergies. However, a glimmer of hope sparks as she wonders if Custom Pets could perhaps conjure up a hypoallergenic dog breed. Driven by this possibility, she decides to revisit the shop, this time solo, to inquire about Mr. Willard’s capabilities.
Mr. Willard confidently assures her that he can indeed order a hypoallergenic dog, no problem at all. He does, however, with a sliver of responsibility, advise her to consult her parents before placing any orders. To Cassie’s credit, she actually acknowledges this sensible step, demonstrating a level of foresight that’s refreshing in young adult protagonists. It’s moments like these that prevent this review from devolving into a mere plot summary.
Suddenly, a large dog bursts into the shop, lunging aggressively towards Cassie. After Mr. Willard forcefully subdues the animal, the dog fixes Cassie with a deeply sorrowful gaze, almost as if pleading for help. This unsettling encounter culminates in Mr. Willard roughly dragging the dog back into a hidden room, intensifying Cassie’s unease about the shop and its owner. Perhaps trusting Mr. Willard implicitly wasn’t the wisest course of action.
Upon returning home, Cassie excitedly recounts her visit to Custom Pets to her parents, hoping for a chance to finally get a pet. However, her parents promptly dismiss the idea, cautioning her against businesses like Willard’s, which they perceive as predatory, driven solely by profit. “He just wants your money,” they reasonably argue, putting a swift end to Cassie’s pet aspirations. And with that parental logic, one might think this would be the end of a rather short and uneventful book.
Whispers of Distress and a Pink Drink
Days later, Cassie finds herself inexplicably drawn back to Custom Pets. As she approaches, she is met with the agonizing sounds of a cat’s desperate yowls emanating from the back room. The cries are clearly indicative of severe pain, adding to the shop’s sinister atmosphere. Mr. Willard, however, seems completely unfazed, nonchalantly ignoring the animal’s distress. Cassie, deeply disturbed, attempts to investigate the source of the suffering, but Willard sharply rebukes her, ordering her to stay out of the restricted area. This incident serves as the turning point for Cassie; she finally recognizes the shop as a place of ill-omen and declares she will never return.
Just as she’s about to leave, David appears at the entrance, interrupting her departure. David, in a display of clumsy misfortune, explains to Willard that he accidentally sat on his tarantula and needs a replacement pet. He’s accompanied by his parents, and they proceed to fill out a form to acquire a dog. In a moment of questionable empathy, Cassie internally laughs at the image of David squashing his spider, a rather callous reaction considering the implied suffering of the creature. The spider, after all, didn’t choose its fate as David’s pet.
With David and his family gone, Cassie prepares to finally leave, but Mr. Willard intercepts her once more. He offers her a glass of a peculiar pink liquid, and in a lapse of judgment that defies all logic, she accepts it. At this point, one could argue Cassie is almost inviting the impending doom. Predictably, everything soon fades to black. Cassie awakens to find Mr. Willard holding a dog collar directly in front of her face.
…This is definitely not going in a positive direction.
To cut to the chase, Cassie has been transformed into a dog, or some canine-like creature. This bizarre turn of events makes me wonder if Mr. Willard is somehow connected to Dr. Murkin, the antagonist from another children’s horror series, although Dr. Murkin’s specialty was human-to-animal transformations, the opposite of what seems to be happening here. (Let’s just roll with the Murkin joke for now). Regardless, Cassie is destined to become the next pet to be sold, and it becomes chillingly clear that all the “pets” in this shop are, in fact, former humans. If that’s the case, then the tarantula David inadvertently crushed was actually a transformed child.
…That took a dark turn.
Life as a Dog and a Cruel Twist of Fate
After an unsuccessful attempt to escape her confinement, Cassie succumbs to sleep. She awakens to a cruel twist of fate: David, her tormentor, is the one who will be adopting her. Oh, the irony. David and his parents take “Cassie,” the dog, home. She desperately tries to communicate her true identity, but to the Ferrante family, her attempts are merely the annoying barks of a dog acting out.
This seems like an opportune moment to pause and ponder whether there have been any missing child reports in the vicinity, considering the spider incident and the implication of other human-turned-pets in the shop. Just putting it out there.
Back at the Ferrante residence, we witness a surprising development. David actually displays a genuine desire to care for his new dog, a surprisingly tender side to the bully persona. It’s almost…cute. Though, one has to wonder if his kindness would persist if he knew the dog was actually Cassie. Cassie tries to nap, choosing the couch as her resting spot, which immediately incurs the wrath of David’s father.
“Let me at that dog! I’ll make her shut up for good!” David’s father roars, revealing a disturbingly aggressive temperament. Yikes. David intervenes, shielding Cassie from his father’s anger. Honestly, witnessing David’s dad’s volatile behavior throughout this episode, it becomes clearer where David’s bullying tendencies might stem from.
David takes Cassie for a walk, and she begins to experience the everyday inconveniences of canine existence, like fleas. The book offers amusing observations of ordinary things that might seem frightening or confusing to a dog, providing a unique perspective shift. They encounter the sad-eyed dog from the pet shop at the park, along with his incredibly rude owner. We’re left to wonder if Cassie can understand other dogs, but the rude owner yanks Cuda (the sad dog) away before any inter-species communication can occur.
Ironically, David, the bully, is arguably the most well-intentioned pet owner in this narrative.
David meets up with friends, eager to show off his new dog. Cassie refuses to fetch, which visibly annoys David. Perhaps Cassie should just play along, I mean, come on. Even after briefly considering compliance, she stubbornly refuses anyway. David’s frustration escalates, and he raises his foot to kick her when, in a convenient plot device, Suki magically appears to intervene.
Well, so much for David being a reformed pet owner, but to be fair, he’s clearly learned aggression from his father. Cassie instinctively runs towards Suki, somehow hoping her best friend will recognize her canine form as Cassie. Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t work.
“Suki Chen had been her best friend forever. And even she didn’t recognize Cassie. Even worse, Suki was afraid of her!”
Cassie, bless her heart, is not the sharpest tool in the shed.
The narrative skims over the next few days, implying that Cassie’s parents have undoubtedly noticed her absence and likely filed a missing person’s report by now. Yes, there’s no logical way to prove that this dog is their missing daughter, but the thought persists.
One evening, David’s dad launches into a nostalgic rant about how dogs were superior “back in his day,” expressing his preference for hunting dogs over “lazy” dogs like Cassie. This character becomes more endearing by the minute. David’s mom suggests taking Cassie hunting to “train” her, a suggestion Dad enthusiastically embraces. The next morning, they embark on this ill-conceived hunting trip.
Hunting Trip Horror and a Missing Child
David is also being initiated into the world of hunting, which means Dad has brought along a couple of shotguns. Well, that escalated quickly. Cassie is genuinely terrified by the sound of gunfire as they attempt to shoot birds. They manage to shoot some down and command Cassie to retrieve the fallen birds.
“She trembled as she stared down the gun barrel. Was he pointing it toward her on purpose? Would he actually shoot her if she didn’t get the birds?”
Firstly, Betsy, maybe dial it back a notch on the intense imagery in a children’s book. Secondly, at this point, I wouldn’t put it past David’s dad to actually harm the dog, which is deeply unsettling. She reluctantly retrieves a bird, but when Dad berates her for not placing it down “correctly,” she reaches her breaking point.
“What’s more, she wasn’t about to be part of killing animals just for sports.”
It seems Betsy Haynes might have a stance against hunting. And I’m perfectly okay with that. After a traumatizing morning of hunting “lessons,” Cassie is relegated to sleeping in the basement. The following day… well, remember my earlier missing persons report joke? It’s no longer a joke as Cassie overhears a news report explicitly mentioning a missing child – Cassidy Cavanaugh. Cassie is officially a missing person.
Her attempts to communicate her identity to the Ferrantes continue to fail, forcing her to devise a new strategy. Her brilliant plan? To destroy David’s prized baseball shoes and other possessions, believing this act of canine vandalism will somehow make him understand her plight. …Once again, Cassie’s decision-making skills are questionable at best. Unsurprisingly, David and his dad are enraged by the destruction. To add insult to injury, Cassie the dog is now sentenced to obedience school.
We transition to the dreaded obedience school, presided over by a man aptly named Bruiser. Cassie initially vows to simply obey human commands, but spots Cuda, the sad-eyed dog, during class. Her attempts to get Cuda’s attention predictably derail her obedience efforts. Bruiser, in a display of excessive force, yanks violently on her collar, choking her. In self-defense, Cassie bites him to make him release his grip. Needless to say, she’s expelled from obedience school. David, surprisingly, recognizes that Cassie acted in self-defense, but Dad is having none of it. For him, this is the final straw; Cassie is being returned to Custom Pets. David is visibly upset by this decision.
“To her surprise, she felt an unexpected rush of an affection for him. Maybe he isn’t a total jerk after all, she thought.”
D’aww, a flicker of connection amidst the horror.
David takes Cassie to the backyard while his parents finalize her return to the pet shop. In a moment of desperation, Cassie finds mud and spells out a message: “Help! Not Dog! Girl!”. This is arguably her most functional plan yet. Of course, it’s futile. When the parents emerge, they simply scold Cassie for being muddy and banish her to sleep outside.
The next morning, Cassie attempts to dig under the fence to escape, which predictably fails. Her fate is sealed: she’s going back to Custom Pets. As they drive to the shop, David expresses genuine sadness at parting with Cassie, and surprisingly, she reciprocates the sentiment, realizing he’s not entirely awful, as long as you obediently fetch, that is. She is returned to the clutches of Mr. Willard at Custom Pets, the Ferrantes driving away, leaving her to an uncertain fate.
A Close Call and a Canine Twist
Mr. Willard leads Cassie into the ominous back room she previously tried to enter. One might assume he intends to simply imprison her indefinitely, or something equally sinister.
“Since nobody wants you…I’m going to have to put you to sleep.”
…Oh. And yes, “put you to sleep” carries its full, horrifying implications. This aligns with the book’s dark themes, but it’s still a jolt.
“Was this what had caused that cat’s terrible wailing? Cassie wondered.”
If so, we essentially heard a child’s death cries earlier in the narrative. Bone Chillers takes an unexpectedly grim turn. Willard opens the cage to administer a lethal injection, prompting Cassie to desperately attempt escape.
In the ensuing struggle, Mr. Willard, described earlier as “a big boi,” falls and is momentarily incapacitated. Cassie seizes the opportunity to grab the syringe and hide it. She tries to conceal herself, but Willard recovers and locates her. He also, conveniently, has another syringe. Just when hope seems lost, Willard abruptly leaves, announcing he’s going to get help and ensure Cassie is “dead” upon his return. Just in case the point wasn’t clear enough.
Desperate, Cassie tries to escape through a window, failing and instead shattering a glass bottle filled with some unidentified liquid. Figuring it’s her last moments and embracing canine tendencies, she decides to drink the spilled liquid. This very liquid is what initiated her transformation, and… it turns out to be the antidote as well. Yes, she stumbles upon the reversal potion by sheer accident. Apparently, the transformation liquid works both ways? Logic takes a backseat at this point; we’re nearing the climax. However, there’s one immediate problem…
“Oh no! What did he do with my clothes?”
…And with that line, Betsy Haynes briefly flirts with FBI watchlist territory.
Thankfully, her clothes are quickly located, crisis averted. Mr. Willard returns, but Cassie is now human again and makes a swift escape. She returns home and concocts a story for her parents about amnesia, claiming she can’t remember where she’d been. They surprisingly buy it. Despite their previous pet refusal, they reveal they’ve acquired a pet Pekinese from a pet shop while she was gone, seemingly forgetting the allergy concerns. Anyway, Cassie is introduced to the new dog, but its behavior and appearance seem strangely familiar…
“Suki?!”
Dun dun dun! That’s arguably the most functional twist ending we’ve encountered this month in reviewing these series. The end!
Final Verdict: A Solidly Spooky Pet Shop Tale
Final Thoughts:
Overall, I found “Little Pet Shop of Horrors” to be a surprisingly enjoyable read. The premise, while inherently silly, is well-executed for this type of series. The book effectively mines the concept for a decent amount of suspense and entertainment, from the unsettling hunting scene to the bizarre obedience school escapade. The narrative effectively utilizes Cassie’s canine perspective to offer amusing observations about the human world as seen through a dog’s eyes.
Mr. Willard’s disturbing plan in the final act injects a genuine sense of danger, elevating the scare factor beyond the inherent silliness of the transformation concept. Willard, as a villain, proves surprisingly effective. Cassie, despite occasional lapses in judgment, is a generally likable protagonist. The nuanced portrayal of David, the bully, allowing for a degree of character growth, is also a welcome element.
However, the repetitive scenes of Cassie frustrating humans by refusing to act like a “normal” dog do become somewhat tiresome. And yes, the recurring threats of animal abuse are undeniably uncomfortable to read. While some darker elements enhance the narrative, those instances felt excessive.
In a way, this book feels like a more realized and effective version of the third act of “The Barking Ghost” from Goosebumps, actually capitalizing on the “kid becomes a dog” premise and offering a (somewhat) more coherent explanation for the transformation. And considering “Little Pet Shop of Horrors” predates “The Barking Ghost,” kudos to Betsy Haynes for getting there first.
Uncomfortable moments aside, “Little Pet Shop of Horrors” is a solid entry in the Bone Chillers series, delivering a few genuine surprises. I’m now more inclined to explore other books in the series, hopefully with fewer animal abuse scenarios. Seriously, I stand by the content warning at the beginning of this review.
So yes, Bone Chillers scores a win with this one. The first four books in the series, including “Little Pet Shop of Horrors,” were made available on Amazon Kindle in 2016, making them readily accessible if you’re intrigued to read the full story.
Rating: Good
(Side note: The book blurb on the back cover incorrectly claims Cassie needs to stay overnight at the pet shop to get her pet, which is not at all what happens in the story. Also, imagine the potential, and likely toned-down, TV episode adaptation of this book.)
Next time, we conclude our exploration of Goosebumps-esque series with a look at Shivers.
See ya!
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