The Goosebumps Series 2000 book where kids are turned into monsters by candy.
Robbie and his sister Alesha visit their Grandpa John at his cabin in the woods, where he always tells them scary stories, which they hate. One such story is about Full Moon Fever, an illness that turns its victims into snarling, ravenous beasts when they look at the full moon. The day after Halloween though, they discover they've apparently caught the illness, which has turned them into monsters, forcing them to go on the run to seek a cure... which may be closer to home than they thought.
This book provides examples of:
- Absurdly Spacious Sewer: In one chapter, Robbie and Alesha hide in one.
- Adults Are Useless: Subverted with Grandpa John, who at least tries to help the kids out when he discovers they have been turned into monsters.
- Animorphism: The entire plot revolves around this, as kids are transformed into monsters.
- A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing: Despite her reputation, Mrs. Eakins is actually nice to the kids. Turns out she is flat out evil and was only pretending.
- Chekhov's Gun: The "Beast Bars."
- Cranky Neighbor: Mrs. Eakins, who is infamous for being mean to kids. Eventually to the extreme when she turns the kids into beasts.
- Disproportionate Retribution: An equally extreme example to Chicken Chicken. The protagonists are turned into wolf-like monsters by Mrs. Eakins, their grouchy neighbor. Their crime? Kicking a soccer ball through her living room window.
- The Freakshow: The kids in monster form get captured by someone who puts them in one of these.
- Halloween Episode: It starts out as one, although only the inciting incident is set on Halloween.
- The Hermit: The book actually gives us two: the old woman who told Grandpa John the Full Moon Fever story, and Dr. Thorne, both of whom live alone deep in the Canadian wilderness.
- Horror Hunger: The protagonists turn into wolf-like monsters who are constantly hungry, eating anything they come across.
- Insistent Terminology: The book really wants us to understand that the kids are beasts, not werewolves or animals or anything else.
- Monstrous Cannibalism: At one point, Robbie bites a man's arm in self-defense and admits that he liked the taste. He and Alesha also come perilously close to eating several other humans, including their own Grandpa John, while in thrall to their hunger.
- Not Using the "Z" Word: The book pulls this despite a full moon seemingly being the cause of the fever. Grandpa John even calls this out but the book still insists they aren't werewolves. However, Robbie and Alesha differ from traditional werewolves in that they remain transformed and don't turn back into humans at daylight.
- Paranormal Mundane Item: There are chocolate bars called "Best" (actually "Beast"; turns people into werewolves) and "Cure" (actually "Curse"; makes people shrink in size) that look like your everyday shop merchandise.
- Red Herring: The titular "Full Moon Fever" itself. It was actually the candy they ate on Halloween, which was cursed, that caused the transformation.
- Shoot the Shaggy Dog: Robbie and Alesha suffer through a horrible transformation, narrowly escape being killed or captured several times and travel all the way to Canada to find a cure...only to discover that the whole thing was a legend made up by an old lady. And then, when they finally discover the real culprit, they're almost immediately victimized by another curse, with little hope for recovery.
- Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing: Played with, the transformation seems to rip them out of their clothes but they get to keep their shoes. Although this isn't mentioned until the very end.
- Verbal Tic: Robbie and Alesha's mom tells the kids "you two are as funny as chapped lips" multiple times.
