Review: Switched (Fear Street #31) by R.L. Stine

Title: Switched

Series: Fear Street #31

Author: R.L. Stine

Genre: YA, horror, mystery thriller

Publication date: May 1995

Published by: Archway Paperback

Source: Purchased paperback

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Synopsis: She traded places with a killer...

There’s a little cabin in the Fear Street woods where a girl can really lose her mind. In fact, she can change it into someone else’s. That’s what happened to Nicole and Lucy. Now Lucy is in Nicole’s body, and Nicole is in Lucy’s. What a trip!

But for Nicole, what a trap! Because Lucy is using Nicole’s body to get away with murder!

My rating: ★★★★☆

Right off the bat, this girl Nicole is a piece of work. She cried because she broke a nail and I could not help but roll my eyes. I do admit that over the years I have become that girl that gets upset when I break a nail, but NOT to the point of crying. Look, a broken nail means I have to file down ALL of my nails so they match, which means less space for nail art. And I love my nail art. Lol.

Although, now that I think about it, maybe she cried because it hurt? Maybe she broke it toward the nail bed, which OWW. That would definitely hurt. But I don’t know.

That’s not the only thing that put me off of this character. This poor girl’s life is a mess. She broke a nail, she didn’t do her homework which she fully admitted to being her own fault (she literally had no excuse), and now her boyfriend broke up with her. Oh no! AND THEN her parents “smother” her! AKA her parents just worry about their kid 🙄 Yes, I am being extremely sarcastic. Lol. I’m sorry but all her whining was getting on my nerves!

But anyway, this is why she decided to switch bodies with her friend Lucy. Unfortunately for Nicole, her friend is now using her body to do some murders 😈

As the book went on, I went from disliking Nicole to really feeling for her, surprisingly.

Nicole was having a mental break, you guys. It turns out that Lucy had been in a car accident and well, you can imagine what happened from there. Nicole, unable to accept her friend’s death, has a mental break and she imagines this whole thing with the switching bodies and all the murders! I felt so bad for her! I legitimately wanted to cry. This was my theory all along, that she was just having some sort of mental break, and I was right. In this case, that was not a bad thing. It just made me incredibly sad for the girl.

And then that ending with Nicole saying how well she’s doing, I was like, “Good for her!” BUT THEN she adds that LUCY coming to visit every day was helping 😩 Nicole, sweetie, no 😭

So even though I guessed the plot twist, I really enjoyed this book! There were some grisly murder scenes, which I really enjoyed. The number of decapitations was absolutely crazy! But it was also incredibly sad and not for the reason you might think. This was one of the rare books where me having figured out the plot twist ahead of time didn’t affect my enjoyment of the book.

I actually would've loved to see the alternate of this book where they DID switch bodies and Lucy WAS a psychopathic killer and Nicole WAS stuck inside said killer’s body. That would’ve been cool too. But that being said, I liked what we got too.

The Fear Street connection: Nicole and Lucy switch bodies in the Fear Street woods.

Alternate cover:

Have you read this book? If so, what did you think about it? If not, what do you think? Does it sound like something you might want to read? Leave me a link to your review or comment below! 😊