Creepy Susie and 13 Other Tragic Tales for Troubled Children

By Angus Oblong

The first story starts with Helga believing she fits into society and being a source of entertainment for the Debbies which made Helga want to get even with them whilst the Debbies wanted to quash any hope Helga had of believing she could coexist socially with others. Meanwhile Helga goes incognito to learn more about the Debbies habits, interests and whatnot, they soon deciding to have a sleepover and Helga eating all their pizza crusts, in the same night snipping their heads off as they slept.

We then move on to 'Stupid Betsy' who did ridiculously dumb acts for no apparent reason, her mother then needing to get her to the hospital to have the items stowed away in her body, removed. We then get a plot twist, being told as much and how it didn't change how stupid Betsy was, the ending of which is final and her mother being indifferent to the outcome.

We're then introduced to a boy from Nantucket called Waldo and his sausage dog, Bean. When Waldo excitedly shows his mother what Bean had done, his Mother doesn't appreciate it the same way he does, due to her drunkenness and it not being impressive, disposing of the dog and making herself sick.

Next on the docket is Little Scooter who had an irresistible head which left him with a "loose brain" which he couldn't be cured of and getting the medical opinion with the finality one would not be able to come back from easily and still had the same effect on people to harass the little guy.

Little Sammy is then introduced as being happy to a default which he had to be cured of, leaving him normal.

We then meet Milo who sees reality in a different light which permeated his every thought and action, but was cured with the same treatment as Little Sammy also including the same "happy" ending.

The namesake of the collection is then shown, Creepy Susie having odd collection habits and weird objects making her smile; her family was "normal", if not quirky. One day a boy starts crushing on her, she not knowing how to handle his feelings, even though she had similar feelings for him she didn't understand and when she tried to do research, romance novel-style, she had an adverse reaction which didn't work out for her. She decides to ask a three-times-great-grandmother for advice which also didn't give much solace, so Susie comes up with her own way of dealing with her issue, making her smile and leaving her with two ways which could do the job.

We next visit Emily Amputee who has a short and sweet explanation as to how she lost her limb.

Narcoleptic Scottie was a shorty who had odd dreams and hated his lot in life as a dog, realizing it to be an inelegant existence and preferred dreaming. He began sleeping so much though, the same fate occurred to Sammie as a man from a story called, The Handler, from Bradbury Stories, unfortunately for him.

Sibling Rivalry shows Tommy and Patty being evil toward each other for not liking the other, their terrible pranks become so torturous and traumatizing one of them commits murder.

We then see Rosie's crazy mother who would go around topless and shaved their cats and proceeded to gluing long-haired classic singers onto them. Her mother's habits began to worry her early on in life and made her wonder if she'd have the same fate, which we are privy to by the outcome.

We are then shown Siamese quadruplets three of which are named Jenny, the other Babette and how they were such a spectacle, none of the "normal" or deformed children would play with them and their father being intimidated by them and their mother believing them to be an arachnid, so they go off in search of a conventional life. They get a job and vehicle, even getting illegally married and after some time passed, they journey back to their old locale incognito and we see an unfortunate outcome for their parents.

We are introduced to Dick and Muffy after, they playing with each other nicely and having a farm-saturated life-style, we then getting images of them displaying funny, dirty jokes until Dick disappears inexplicably -- unless it had something to do with the exploding champagne bottle.

Mary's chainsaw is in a rhyme which matches Mary had a Little Lamb and left Mary as a butch adult.

These were quite entertaining and I'd gladly read more by Angus Oblong having been a fan of the show The Oblongs and the two being very similar, if for the show being a bit watered down for children viewership, his author's description concluding the book reminding me of The Dark Backward, with Judd Nelson (also entertaining).