Nuclear Jellyfish of New Jersey

Add jellyfish, New Jersey, and nuclear power to the list of things Johnathan Rand isn't qualified to write about.

Main Characters
Shayleen Mills and her brother Lee, whose believability disappears halfway through the book, and who both could have disappeared into a killer whale throughout the novel.

Plot
Shayleen Mills is running from the law.......... er, wait, no, but it defenitely would have made this book somewhat exciting. She is moving to the extremely polluted and densely populated state of New Jersey from Tennessee. Apparently, she had an encounter with evil, living toys there, and is now moving away from all of the "terrifying" events that she experienced in the book Terrifying Toys of Tennessee. Wow. What are the odds that two scary things would happen to a person who moves to two different states? Good one, Johnathan Rand. Shayleen (Completely ridiculous name) opens this dreadful book by arguing with herself over which state is better, and going over the top in a silly attempt to explain to readers in Tennessee or New Jersey that no state is beter than the other. She introduces her two year old brother, Lee, who she describes like this:
Lee is only two years old, but he manages to get into all sorts of trouble? That sounds like the making of a sitcom to me. Lee was originally to play the role of Tommy on Rugrats.
After all that is over, and a short chapter is gone forever, they describe themselves moving into their new home in Medford, New Jersey. Rand does an excellent job of describing them moving, but flubs it up when he tells the reader that, after only a month of working, they decide to take a vacation. Are you serious?!?!??! One month?!??!? My family hasn't taken a vacation in ONE YEAR and they need to take one after a month of working? Man, his job must be moving mountains, because that is just plain ridiculous. One month. You know what? That will be the twist. And then they took a vacation after one month of working! Anyway, so they go shopping the day before they leave and pack their suitcases (something else Rand describes excellently. He could be a good author if he ditched the "scary" plots altogether and just wrote about real life issues) and they drive off to the coast. To the greatest vacation resort hotspot in the world. The heavily polluted, crowded, horribly disgusting beaches of Wildwood, New Jersey. He does an excellent job describing them checking into their hotel, and then he flubs it up again. Let me explain.
Just listen to this absolutely pointless scene:

Mom asked me to put sun screen on Lee, but he was so freaked out that he ran away! I didn’t know what his problem was. It was just sun screen. I had to chase him all over the beach, catch him, and take him back to the picnic area. He even started crying! Lee shook his head as I opened the bottle. "No, no, no," he said. And that’s when Mom stepped in. "Lee," she said sternly, "if you don’t let your sister put sun screen on you, you’re staying in the hotel room." Lee looked at Mom, and I could tell he got the message. He didn’t fuss a bit as I rubbed sun screen all over him. "There," I said. "All done."Serena takes Lee to the beach and lets him run free for a few minutes. Don't worry about him, he's for comic relief. He'll be fine. So, in the water, Serena is attacked by a shark! Wait a minute, what? Does Johnathan Rand REALLY think that we will fall for our protagonist being attacked in CHAPTER THREE??? AND IT'S NOT EVEN A JELLYFISH! So, I'm goona put my bets on that SHE DOESN'T get eaten and it's going to be something ridiculous instead.

But, it was only a toy shark. Listen to this: More toys, I thought, recalling my recent experience in Tennessee.

Yeah, as if we need to be REMINDED that Johnathan Rand took that much of a cop out by reusing a character in a book that isn't even a sequel. Did he think that we would forget already?

Serena meets the toy's owner, Tony, who introduces her to his sister, Isobel. (Johnathan Rand must have flunked spelling), the children of the resort's owners, who get to enjoy the park for free. They become friends and talk for a bit. Later that night, Serena decides that she wants to go look for rocks, sand dollars and seashells on the beach. Her family prepeares to leave their eleven year old firstborn child on the beach where she is vulnerable to be kidnapped by some maniac by handing her the plastic room key. Serena gives the readers a helpful reminder that the keys are plastic cards, and not actual keys. WHAAAAT????? NO WAY!!! Surely any child of the 21st century believes that room keys are still skeleton keys!!!! But that would be speaking logically, and that is a BIG no-no. Serena goes walking around the beach in SNEAKERS because she is afraid of cutting her feet. Okay, I'll give Johnathan Rand props for teaching kids to be safe and smart, but I doubt that any eleven year old will get perfectly good sneakers wet when they could be wading around the beach. While she looks for seashells, she feels something grasp her foot, and for some reason, instantly assumes that it is a jellyfish, although she hasn't seen any yet. However, it is only a crab, and she later describes how her vacation will soon become a "trip of madness" Madness???

Oh, Shayleen, don't you know?

Shayleen sees Tony and Isobel again and they chat about things on the beach when they see multicolored lights flashing on the ocean. They look to the horizon and see something that appears to be a flying saucer, although none of the children have ever seen one before. Tony begins to insist that it is a UFO (although a UFO is merely ANY AIRCRAFT that hasn't been identified.) and begins to change terms several times during the conversation. Shayleen is reluctant to accept this theory, and Shayleen tells Tony that it is not a UFO. Though, after she says this, strangely enough, she instantly realizes the story that was all the hype in Arizona, about alien androids that tried to take over the Grand Canyon. This is a VERY obvious reference to the book Alien Androids Assault Arizona. My God, if you made a drinking game on these books JUST to see if the book mentions other books by Johnathan Rand, then you'd be wasted within the first few chapters. Shayleen then questions herself on weather they could have actually seen a flying saucer, as she had never seen anything like that before. I must give Johnathan Rand props on this dramatic and well-executed scene as well.

Until now, I'd thought that everyone who believed in UFOs was crazy.

Maybe I'm the crazy one.

When she arrives back at the room, she tells her Father that she saw something that she may think is a UFO. He probes her (get it?) on the subject as to what it looked like, and instantly assumes the logical choice, that it was a helicopter or a plane. Shayleen refuses, stating that neither a helicopter or plane were shaped, colored or flew like the one they saw. When Shayleen tells her Father that she saw a flying saucer, her father openly mocks and ridicules her in front of the rest of her family. He does this somewhat like this:

"Well, it looks like we need to be prepared for an invasion of aliens from outer space! And to think I left my alien-fighting ray gun at home! Bummer."

What kind of Father is this man? But then again, he does think logically, and of course, that is a BIG no-no for American Chillers. Later that night, they see the news report describing the UFO, and the Dad is just like, well, look at that! That plot point is never spoken of again and lost forever. It looks like Dad doesn't like to admit when he's wrong.

The next day, they spot a jellyfish on the beach. The beached jellyfish begins dripping some sort of acidic blood onto the beach, causing it to begin melting the sand, I guess. But get this, the jellyfish RISES INTO THE AIR AND BEGINS FLYING!!!! Holy crap, this is one of the worst plots ever cooked up in the history of mankind. It really is that bad. Shayleen runs into Tony and Isobel, and they proceed to barricade themselves into a dressing room. The jellyfish desperately paw at the enterance, and they scream for help as the jellyfish begin to break down the door. However, by now, everyone has fled the park, and Shayleen assures Tony and Isobel that her parents will be looking for her. Tony realizes that the ship must have been radioactive, and contaminated the jellyfish, causing them to, wait a minute, wait a minute. Why did it ONLY effect the jellyfish? And were the jellyfish already evil? Or did they turn evil? Sadly, none of that is explained, as this is a Johnathan Rand novel. Somebody needs to splash holy water on this inferno. As they are trying to piece together what happened and how to escape the room, a green jellyfish breaks in, but before it can attack Tony, Isobel "karate kicks" the door shut on it, pushing it out, and crushing one of its tentacles, causing its toxic, acidic blood to drip to the concrete floor. The blood actually eats through the concrete and produces toxic gas as a by-product. They flee into an air-conditioning vent as the gas fills the room and the jellyfish finally break in. They go through the vent and find a small electrical room. Tony jumps down and almost gets hurt, and decides to put a table under the vent so they don't have to fall. WHAT HAPPENED TO LADIES FIRST????? Tony peeks outside and sees the jellyfish sucking the neon "juice" out of some neon lights. Neon Juice? There is no such thing. I know that this is a kid's book and all, but this is a very simple fix. All he had to say was Neon Gas. That's just common sense. There is gas in the bulbs, not liquid. Does he even bother to research for his books?

So, yeah, Tony tells them that since they survive off the neon lights, which are situated all over the park, that if they shut off the power, they will lose their energy and die. Isobel is hesitant, however, and says that she is worried about being grounded because she is not supposed to play with electricity or cut the power to the main breaker to an entire amusement park. Tony tells her that they have to do this, or they will die, and they do it. However, there is a problem, because....

THEY DIDN'T SAY THE MAGIC WORD!!!!!!

Anyway, they flee the control room when a jellyfish tentacle slams through a window, and they are cornered by the perimiter fence as they are trying to leave the amusement park. The only thing they could possibly use to their advantage is a couple of trash cans, which Shayleen gets the bright idea to throw the garbage can lids at the jellyfish. And they kill all of them in the dumbest way possible. Because if there is any way to kill giant, radioactive, nuclear, flying jellyfish, it is by throwing trash can lids at the jellyfish! But here's the thing, they are, I don't know, allergic to them, or something.... and they EXPLODE!!!!!

Well, Johnathan Rand took out the trash. If I was him, I would have shouted: 

GARBAGE DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tony, Isobel, and Shayleen wreak havoc on the jellyfish and finally get their revenge by throwing every piece of metal that they can find at them, and every jellyfish explodes into a splatter of radioactive acid goo as the police and fire department FINALLY shows up. Holy crap, some EMTs. They seriously cannot show up for a swarm of radioactive jellyfish that are attacking the coast and destroying a major resort slash amusement park with several children possibly trapped inside, fending off multiple swarms singlehandedly without any weapons? Shouldn't that kind-of be top priority? Well, to be fair, there probably is a lot more important things they must be doing. I managed to obtain this footage about what case the local police department is currently working on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pa8aP6WwI8

But The Twist Is......
AND THEN THEY TOOK A VACATION AFTER ONE MONTH OF WORKING!!!

Things I learned from this book

• Two year olds know what a beach and a carnival ride is, and can not only walk AND talk, but jump. Man, they need to put this kid in the circus.
• Jellyfish can fly if they are radioactive. Really? If I go to Chernobyl, I don't think I will fly.....
• Eleven year olds describe crowds of people as 'gobs'
• Terrifying Toys of Tennessee was 'horrifying'
• Jellyfish are NOT scary
• Children are eager to go wading on a beach in SNEAKERS because of broken glass hazards.
• Something happened in Arizona with alien androids that tried to take over the Grand Canyon.
• Most 21st century children don't know that a hotel key is a plastic card.
• Alien spaceships can cause jellyfish to become giant, flying monsters with acid for blood all in the course of one day.
• Parents will openly mock their child if they tell them that they saw a flying saucer.
• Flying Saucers and UFOs are apparently the same thing (Flying saucers are aliens, UFOs are any aircraft that hasn't been identified)
• American Chillers suck
• Metal garbage can lids can cause jellyfish to explode.
• Drugs are never the answer after reading a book this bad
• Suicide is never the answer after reading a book this bad
• Watching Jay Leno is never the answer after reading a book this bad
• Reading this book's predecessor, Terrifying Toys of Tennessee, is never the answer after reading a book this bad. It was equally bad, and only made me try all of the things above again.
• American Chillers still suck
• Killer Whales are carniverous

Dad's Excellent Advice
"Remember what I told you," he said. "Don’t go in farther than your waist. The ocean is very different than the lakes and pools you’ve been in. The currents here can be really strong. We don’t want you pulled out to sea and eaten by a killer whale."

The Two Year-Old Lee's Incredibly Structured Vocabulary
(When Shayleen goes swimming) Me go! Me go! So, he knows how to swim.
(When he sees the park) Rides! Rides! So, he knows the name for amusement park attractions.
(When he sees the beach) Beach! Beach! Beach! So, he knows what a beach is.
It's almost like Johnathan Rand took the vocabulary of a five year-old and put it into a two year old character. He just basically repeated everything once or twice with an explanation point, and he thought that that would resemble a toddler! How does he know these terms? Does he read his dictionary daily?

Questionable Parenting
They leave their firstborn child on the beach alone at dusk, they leave their secondborn toddler alone with their firstborn child on the beach at dusk, openly mock her about believing in aliens, they leave her alone in an amusement park to be picked off by vicious, man eating, nuclear jellyfish, and they teach their child that harmless Orcas are man-eaters. Parents of the year? Or morons? You decide.

Great Prose Alert
"There were gobs and gobs of people all over the place!"

Record-breaking alert
This book is the first book to be continued by the character from another book! Let's give him a hand, folks! It looks like he's got a whole bunch of new tricks up his sleeve!

Where have I seen this before alert
Giant, carniverous Jellyfish???? Wow, it was all in Deep Trouble II. Only difference is, the jellyfish weren't killed by garbage cans, and they didn't fly.

The Million Dollar Question
Can killer whales eat people in the world of Johnathan Rand? If you answered yes, then you've just won a million dollars!

Conclusions
Johnathan Rand took out the trash..... by destroying the trash he created, the jellyfish, by trash can lids, and ending all of the trash in the book.
This book is a pretty enjoyable read, though, and you don't have to be wasted drunk to enjoy it. It has better writing than most of his other works, and it is actually entertaining. It's bad, but it's pretty good for Johnathan Rand. It's just overall fun, and it's not that bad. The book sucks, but it's so bad, it's good.
This book would have been better if he had made it Nuclear Jellyfish of Jersey Shore.