CR-16-07 -Adventures in Babysitting

Midnight on Beacon Street
Emily Ruth Verona

It is October 1993, just after midnight, and six-year-old Ben Mazinski is in the kitchen; there is blood and there is a dead body. So, exactly how did we get here? That is the story that Midnight on Beacon Street sets out to tell. It covers what happened in the lead-up to midnight to Amy (the babysitter) and her two charges, Ben and his older sister, Mira. It doesn’t do this linearly, but rather jumps around in time, revisiting moments from multiple points of view.

I may have been closer in age to Mira than to Amy when 1993 rolled around, but when I was Amy’s age, I was an avid babysitter. I know full well the terror—both of what might be lurking outside those dark patio doors in a house that is not yours and the terror of feeling sometimes like a child who is in charge of other children—that babysitting can bring. This book leans on both things—I mean, right off the bat, a dead body, so you know something outside the norm is happening, and Amy, one of our main characters, struggles with anxiety.

The story manages to rack up the tension as it speeds towards midnight. There are some creepy goings-on (Ben thinks there is a ghost, for starters), and it is not clear what is related to the body in the kitchen and what is not. Additionally, you have characters popping in and out of the narrative. As a reader, you know someone’s body is going to end up in the kitchen, but you don’t know which of these characters it might be.

I initially picked up this book because it was described to me as a love letter to 80’s and 90’s horror movies, and it is! Amy is a movie buff, a very big fan of horror movies in fact, and she drops some movie trivia as the book goes along. The narrative also includes some other 90’s kid easter eggs that were fun to spy. It reminded me of the Fear Street books, but in a slightly more elevated way (no shade to Fear Street; those books are a foundation of my love for horror novels). This novel is a throwback in the best way possible but also has a modern sensibility, as it highlights Amy’s struggle with anxiety in a way that no books from my childhood did. I appreciated that, as a woman who has anxiety and also loves horror movies and novels, even if they freak me out a bit and sometimes add to my anxiety.

Cannonball Read Post: cannonballread.com/2024/02/midnight-on-beacon-street-dreadpiratekel/