The Goosebumps Series 2000 books where body hugging aliens invade.
Plenty of Goosebumps books have sequels. Invasion of the Body Squeezers: Parts One and Two are unique in constituting a single story that takes up two books.
Aliens are invading Earth, starting with Los Angeles. By default, they are the giant green monsters seen on the cover; however, they can possess humans by hugging them tightly until they take over their bodies. Once they do this, they can reproduce by spreading to other hosts, all by hugging.
The only person aware of what's happening is 12-year-old Jack Archer. Unfortunately he's a bit too fond of trying to trick people into thinking he's seen aliens when he hasn't, and so nobody is going to believe him.
The Body Squeezers saga continues in Revenge of the Body Squeezers.
These books provides examples of:
- Alien Invasion: The plot revolves around one, as the Body Squeezers land and try to take over.
- Annoying Younger Sibling: Billie, who is always trying to one up Jack.
- Crying Wolf: Jack is constantly telling people he's seen aliens, so naturally nobody believes him when he tells the truth.
- Competition Freak: Billie is always trying to claim she has better things than Jack, which is implied to just all be a way to get attention. Her claiming to see a blue alien is written off for this reason but it turns out to be true.
- Face Full of Alien Wing-Wong: The G-rated version. The eponymous Body Squeezers spread by hugging.
- Fluffy the Terrible: The story revolves around aliens that hug people, literally called Body Squeezers. Harmless, right? Except that this is how they reproduce... oh, and they grow sharp claws to stab into the backs of their victims, it's really more like an angry bearhug tackle if they can't trick you into a hug, and they're hell-bent on murder and world domination.
- Hearing Voices: The device that Jack takes from Mr. Fleshman's house causes him to hear a chirping sound, which he can apparently understand subconsciously and which puts him under Mind Control.
- Here We Go Again!: The ending sees the invasion averted... only for a blue Body Squeezer to be discovered.
- Idiosyncratic Cover Art: The covers of both books combined forms a complete picture; the first book features a single body squeezer, and the second shows the rest.
- Keystone Army: Destroying the aliens' power source disables the entire alien army.
- Mind Control: Jack spends a chunk of the first book this way. When hearing the aliens' voices, he finds himself uncontrollably standing at attention, saluting and shouting things like "I will obey!," even around other people.
- Multi-Part Episode: For the first time in the franchise, a complete story is told across two books rather than one (not counting the sequel Revenge of the Body Squeezers, which was part of a separate series and released over a year later).
- Sequel Hook: The blue Body Squeezers appearing. Unusually for the series, this hook was actually used for a direct sequel, in the form of the Give Yourself Goosebumps book Revenge of the Body Squeezers.
- Weaksauce Weakness: Subverted — Jack thinks the Body Squeezers are weak to plain water, but it turns out they aren't.
