What do you think?
Rate this book
Terror Academy #3
Sixteen Candles
When the biggest wallflower at Central Academy undergoes a sudden transformation into a pretty, popular girl, she is suddenly swamped with attention from the opposite sex, but popularity could prove fatal when one of her dates turns up dead. Original.
186 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1993
3 people are currently reading
180 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
October 31, 2021
OHHH NICHOLAS PINE. He definitely likes to follow his patented formula of Run of the mill teen melodrama for the 1st 70% of the book...and then complete bat shit crazy for the last 30%.
Lots of fat-shaming for our poor protagonist Kelly who is bullied in school AND lives on the wrong side of the tracks with her poverty-stricken Aunt Doris, who can't afford to get her a class ring (YOU'RE NOT A PROPER SENIOR IF YOU DONT HAVE ONE). Buuuut, cue the makeover montage! Kelly gets a job, can now start buying her own clothes, starts an exercise regimen, buys contacts, and VOILA! She's now a popular girl who gets the popular dude. Lose weight and buy new clothes and you too can be pretty and popular!! 😑😑😑
Anyway, things don't start getting juicy til' Chapter 10. Then accidents and murders start happening 😱😱😱
The reveal of the murderer caught me by surprise and there's a dramatic finale at the lighthouse, in the dead of night. Bones are smashed, blood is shed, and all bets are off as Kelly confronts the murderer.
A wild ride, but you gotta WAIT to get on 🤣🤣
3 out of 5 whacks of the sledgehammer to the head for this one!
Lots of fat-shaming for our poor protagonist Kelly who is bullied in school AND lives on the wrong side of the tracks with her poverty-stricken Aunt Doris, who can't afford to get her a class ring (YOU'RE NOT A PROPER SENIOR IF YOU DONT HAVE ONE). Buuuut, cue the makeover montage! Kelly gets a job, can now start buying her own clothes, starts an exercise regimen, buys contacts, and VOILA! She's now a popular girl who gets the popular dude. Lose weight and buy new clothes and you too can be pretty and popular!! 😑😑😑
Anyway, things don't start getting juicy til' Chapter 10. Then accidents and murders start happening 😱😱😱
The reveal of the murderer caught me by surprise and there's a dramatic finale at the lighthouse, in the dead of night. Bones are smashed, blood is shed, and all bets are off as Kelly confronts the murderer.
A wild ride, but you gotta WAIT to get on 🤣🤣
3 out of 5 whacks of the sledgehammer to the head for this one!
May 15, 2020
This was a quick read that I finished in only a couple of hours. This book was a bit more of a slow burn than the other book I read in this series. I liked the characters and found them to be believable. I thought the twist was predictable but I liked it and I'm glad I was right.
October 23, 2021
One very long fat-shamey makeover montage. Ending was a bit predictable and ahhh it doesn’t have a plot
March 18, 2023
That last page…wow 🤣
May 15, 2020
Good book, fills the need for 90s high school teen slasher books. Though my girlfriend would argue it was a tad predictable, I'd personally say it keeps you on your toes enough and keeps you guessing, even if it is a tad obvious. The killers motivation felt kinda out of left field, but I guess it made sense. I had fun reading this with my gf and discussing who we thought would do the deed. Good, fun, and investing short read (:
September 9, 2020
First half had promising character development, suspenseful pacing and an unsettling atmosphere. Second half was so rushed in every way that it felt like a different writer had taken over and the surprise proposal ending was cringy.
May 28, 2024
I’d rate this book 3.5 rounded up to 4. It follow Kelly who at the start of the book is a “fat” if you call 140 something pounds fat, nerdy outcast who is ending her junior year. She lives in the poor side of town with her aunt Doris and lives on the same street as her best friend Rachel and other outcast and fellow member of the computer club. Because computer club is totally for nerds lol. Popular Jeremy pretends to like Kelly so she will change is failing grades so he doesn’t have to go to summer school. But when Kelly says no he and fellow popular kid Liza decide to make a Kelly’s life miserable. Because Kelly is such a loser (not really but the book piles it on) her guidance counselor gets her a paid summer job at the school where Kelly loses 29 pounds and wears contacts. Omg she’s a new person suddenly she’s now the most beautiful person at the school and every boy wants her and every girl hates her. Her dreams come true. She becomes a bit bitchy and fights with her best friend and they stop speaking (this has happened so far in every terror academy book btw) and meets the love of her life Brad a jock on the swim team. Nothing really big happens until two thirds of the way through when someone finally dies, I mean Kelly receives notes and phone calls calling her a fool. Not very suspenseful and the villain was different than I immediately thought but was a nice surprise. But the ending was just ugh Kelly and Brad are in love and talk marriage. Like gross I mean they were in love after knowing each other a week and said it before they even officially went steady. I hope they didn’t end up happily ever after lol
July 2, 2013
Shouldn't sixteen be a year of happiness, new independence, a fun time? For Kelly Langdon, a strange premonition and strange events make Kelly's new start less than exciting.
Nicholas Pine's Sixteen Candles is a good read. I didn't want to put it down. Pine's choice of the killer surprised me, but after reading the story, the logical part of my brain kicked in, and it made sense. Reading Sixteen Candles reminded me of the show Criminal Minds. I can't wait to read the other Terror Academy books. If you like crime books or crime shows you should read this.
Nicholas Pine's Sixteen Candles is a good read. I didn't want to put it down. Pine's choice of the killer surprised me, but after reading the story, the logical part of my brain kicked in, and it made sense. Reading Sixteen Candles reminded me of the show Criminal Minds. I can't wait to read the other Terror Academy books. If you like crime books or crime shows you should read this.
March 21, 2025
Got my hands on another Terror Academy book through Thriftbooks in pretty good condition.
It is so much easier to get through a book when you are actually interested in what is going on with the story. Reading about teenagers is just so much more fun because they have the petty problems that turn most of them and the adults around them into psychos.
Kelly Langdon starts out the book as pretty much the bottom of the high school pyramid. She is about to be a senior at Central Academy at only sixteen years old because she skipped a grade, but her life isn't exactly so sweet. Her parents died in a car crash when she was eight and she has had to live with her maternal Aunt Doris since then.
Her aunt doesn't make much at the hospital where she works so Kelly gets clothes from the thrift store and has to wear the cheapest glasses that her aunt can afford. One part that kind of gets under my skin is that Kelly is fat shamed in the beginning of this book. When I read that a girl weighs 148 pounds and is 5 feet 5 inches tall and is considered fat...I just want to punch someone.
This book was written in 1993 when supermodels were very popular but is this really considered fat? Even today, I want to know really what is the perfect weight?
We'll come back to that point later...
Kelly doesn't have many friends except for her bestie Rachel and a husky boy named Marshall who are both a part of the computer club at school. Marshall has a big crush on Kelly, but she only sees him as a friend, and he gets huffy at her when Kelly keeps very politely blowing him off.
It is established her aunt won't let her date or have a job of her own so add that on top of Kelly's insecurity. Rachel tells her that popular boy Jeremy Rice has been asking about her, but Kelly knows that he is going with bleach-blonde mean girl Liza Brown. After school, Jeremy follows the girls in his red Buick and asks Kelly if she would like to go for pizza.
Jeremy keeps getting Rachel's name wrong and doesn't invite her along, but Rachel clearly thinks this is a match made in Heaven. Kelly knows better once they get to the mall and Jeremy makes cracks about her not eating and looking around as if nervous to be seen with her.
He says he will invite Kelly to his pool party that Saturday after the last day of school before summer break but only if Kelly can use her computer skills to change Jeremy's grade, so he doesn't have to go to summer school. Kelly is furious and throws her Coke in Jeremy's face and Liza shows up to get in a few digs, but Kelly ends up pushing her into some tables.
They all leave before mall security gets called and Kelly is forced to take the bus home. That last week of school, Kelly has an appointment with the guidance counselor, Ms. Monica, who offers Kelly a job over the summer. It involves working with the school's track coach for a community outreach program with swimming and exercise as well as using computers to organize files and inventory.
Kelly knows her aunt might not be thrilled with the idea, but she will be paid, and Kelly knows her Aunt Doris can't even pay for Kelly to get a senior class ring, so she accepts. Soon, Kelly's Sweet Sixteen party arrives, and her friends are gone for the summer as she works...Jeremy has to go to summer school.
Kelly is astounded when Coach Sikes has her step on the scale after running two miles on the track to find she now weighs 119 pounds. At the start of the job, she was put on vitamins to help reduce her weight and Kelly started avoiding all of the fatty and sugary foods Aunt Doris would bring home since she didn't have time to cook or afford much else. Kelly gets an even bigger shock when she runs into Jeremy, and he doesn't recognize her as she had her glasses off and is himself confused at how she turned into a fox.
Rachel returns and doesn't recognize Kelly when she meets her at the bus stop, but the other girl is happy that her friend has lost weight, been able to afford contacts and better fitting clothes and is eager to show Kelly how to use makeup and fix her hair. The only two people who don't seem impressed with Kelly's new look are her indifferent Aunt Doris and Marshall once school starts back on their senior year.
All of the girls are clearly jealous, Liza the most, but only because Jeremy is now practically drooling over Kelly and boys are now flirting with Kelly. The attention is great but only one of them really catches Kelly's eye and that is Brad Edwards, swim team captain who has always been a little shy yet nice to Kelly in Chemistry last year.
Speaking of chemistry, Brad and Kelly really start hitting it off but then Kelly starts getting notes and creepy phone calls and the tires on Brad's car end up slashed. So, it seems someone is not happy with the new Kelly and out to ruin the best year of her life, making sure she never makes it to seventeen...
When you get to the reveal, it isn't that surprising, but it doesn't make it any less bonkers I'll tell you that much. The ending of the book is actually really sweet and cheesy, but I like it regardless.
Sixteen Candles is sort of a mix of the John Hughes movie and Carrie with a little bit of a bad Lifetime movie but that makes it so enjoyable! Kelly is actually a very likeable main character of which any female reader can relate in having low self-esteem, but she also isn't the complete wallflower since she does stick up for herself.
Maybe not as much horror as one would like but a good entry in the Terror Academy series.
It is so much easier to get through a book when you are actually interested in what is going on with the story. Reading about teenagers is just so much more fun because they have the petty problems that turn most of them and the adults around them into psychos.
Kelly Langdon starts out the book as pretty much the bottom of the high school pyramid. She is about to be a senior at Central Academy at only sixteen years old because she skipped a grade, but her life isn't exactly so sweet. Her parents died in a car crash when she was eight and she has had to live with her maternal Aunt Doris since then.
Her aunt doesn't make much at the hospital where she works so Kelly gets clothes from the thrift store and has to wear the cheapest glasses that her aunt can afford. One part that kind of gets under my skin is that Kelly is fat shamed in the beginning of this book. When I read that a girl weighs 148 pounds and is 5 feet 5 inches tall and is considered fat...I just want to punch someone.
This book was written in 1993 when supermodels were very popular but is this really considered fat? Even today, I want to know really what is the perfect weight?
We'll come back to that point later...
Kelly doesn't have many friends except for her bestie Rachel and a husky boy named Marshall who are both a part of the computer club at school. Marshall has a big crush on Kelly, but she only sees him as a friend, and he gets huffy at her when Kelly keeps very politely blowing him off.
It is established her aunt won't let her date or have a job of her own so add that on top of Kelly's insecurity. Rachel tells her that popular boy Jeremy Rice has been asking about her, but Kelly knows that he is going with bleach-blonde mean girl Liza Brown. After school, Jeremy follows the girls in his red Buick and asks Kelly if she would like to go for pizza.
Jeremy keeps getting Rachel's name wrong and doesn't invite her along, but Rachel clearly thinks this is a match made in Heaven. Kelly knows better once they get to the mall and Jeremy makes cracks about her not eating and looking around as if nervous to be seen with her.
He says he will invite Kelly to his pool party that Saturday after the last day of school before summer break but only if Kelly can use her computer skills to change Jeremy's grade, so he doesn't have to go to summer school. Kelly is furious and throws her Coke in Jeremy's face and Liza shows up to get in a few digs, but Kelly ends up pushing her into some tables.
They all leave before mall security gets called and Kelly is forced to take the bus home. That last week of school, Kelly has an appointment with the guidance counselor, Ms. Monica, who offers Kelly a job over the summer. It involves working with the school's track coach for a community outreach program with swimming and exercise as well as using computers to organize files and inventory.
Kelly knows her aunt might not be thrilled with the idea, but she will be paid, and Kelly knows her Aunt Doris can't even pay for Kelly to get a senior class ring, so she accepts. Soon, Kelly's Sweet Sixteen party arrives, and her friends are gone for the summer as she works...Jeremy has to go to summer school.
Kelly is astounded when Coach Sikes has her step on the scale after running two miles on the track to find she now weighs 119 pounds. At the start of the job, she was put on vitamins to help reduce her weight and Kelly started avoiding all of the fatty and sugary foods Aunt Doris would bring home since she didn't have time to cook or afford much else. Kelly gets an even bigger shock when she runs into Jeremy, and he doesn't recognize her as she had her glasses off and is himself confused at how she turned into a fox.
Rachel returns and doesn't recognize Kelly when she meets her at the bus stop, but the other girl is happy that her friend has lost weight, been able to afford contacts and better fitting clothes and is eager to show Kelly how to use makeup and fix her hair. The only two people who don't seem impressed with Kelly's new look are her indifferent Aunt Doris and Marshall once school starts back on their senior year.
All of the girls are clearly jealous, Liza the most, but only because Jeremy is now practically drooling over Kelly and boys are now flirting with Kelly. The attention is great but only one of them really catches Kelly's eye and that is Brad Edwards, swim team captain who has always been a little shy yet nice to Kelly in Chemistry last year.
Speaking of chemistry, Brad and Kelly really start hitting it off but then Kelly starts getting notes and creepy phone calls and the tires on Brad's car end up slashed. So, it seems someone is not happy with the new Kelly and out to ruin the best year of her life, making sure she never makes it to seventeen...
When you get to the reveal, it isn't that surprising, but it doesn't make it any less bonkers I'll tell you that much. The ending of the book is actually really sweet and cheesy, but I like it regardless.
Sixteen Candles is sort of a mix of the John Hughes movie and Carrie with a little bit of a bad Lifetime movie but that makes it so enjoyable! Kelly is actually a very likeable main character of which any female reader can relate in having low self-esteem, but she also isn't the complete wallflower since she does stick up for herself.
Maybe not as much horror as one would like but a good entry in the Terror Academy series.
March 14, 2017
Man I miss the Terror Academy series. It was incredibly well-written compared to other Point Horror books, and the mystery of whodunnit was always impossible to solve. These books are incredibly hard to track down, but I managed to get a copy of this one through Interlibrary Loan and had a blast re-reading it. Hopefully I can get some more through ILL, because now that I remember how good these were I want to re-read them all!
June 10, 2019
An entire plot based around the protagonist being fat then "escaping" fatness. Awful.
I read this for our podcast Teenage Scream, which dissects the best (and worst) of 90s Teen Horror.
https://soundcloud.com/teenagescream
I read this for our podcast Teenage Scream, which dissects the best (and worst) of 90s Teen Horror.
https://soundcloud.com/teenagescream
September 5, 2025
In a nutshell: I'm pretty because I lost weight.
It's disheartening when an author tries to show that bigger girls are people too and ends up contributing to everything they think they're trying to mend. Take, for example, the notion that someone can be pretty because they're no longer overweight. Also, the sheer iteration and reiteration of terms like fat, chubby, sweaty, etc, etc do an incredible disservice to so many. Additionally, protag Kelly is devoid of true character, which simply enhances the caricature on offer.
On a positive note, Kelly does have a few instances of getting one over on her tormentors. It's not enough, but at least it's there at all. The three-star rating is because it's almost unheard of in a novel of this type and era to contain a non-willowy person. If I'd read this when I was young I probably would have liked it a lot more because there was no one in literature, television or film I could relate to, and there were some really great ideas at play, genre-wise. Now, however, I am conscious of how Sixteen Candles perpetuates the evils of weight variation among already vulnerable young people.
It's disheartening when an author tries to show that bigger girls are people too and ends up contributing to everything they think they're trying to mend. Take, for example, the notion that someone can be pretty because they're no longer overweight. Also, the sheer iteration and reiteration of terms like fat, chubby, sweaty, etc, etc do an incredible disservice to so many. Additionally, protag Kelly is devoid of true character, which simply enhances the caricature on offer.
On a positive note, Kelly does have a few instances of getting one over on her tormentors. It's not enough, but at least it's there at all. The three-star rating is because it's almost unheard of in a novel of this type and era to contain a non-willowy person. If I'd read this when I was young I probably would have liked it a lot more because there was no one in literature, television or film I could relate to, and there were some really great ideas at play, genre-wise. Now, however, I am conscious of how Sixteen Candles perpetuates the evils of weight variation among already vulnerable young people.
November 30, 2017
Life has always been difficult for Kelly. Her parents died when she was young, she is teased by the kids at school and her aunt raising her has no money. However one summer changes everything for her. She becomes popular and gets a boyfriend, but someone is displeased. They don't think she deserves her new found happiness. Can Kelly make it out of senior year alive?
September 18, 2017
Great story, especially for teenagers trying to make that transition out of the teen years and into adult hood.
April 27, 2025
i wasn't expecting that twist at all.
March 7, 2015
Actual page number- 174
It's pretty solid thriller with decent amount of suspenseful action to fit in the book's length.
The mystery aspect actually kept my attentions because the book doesn't have too much red herrings that are obvious so I keep thinking who the killer and the killer's reveal is a really good twist.
The only problem is that it takes a couple of pages in till the horror kicks in since the first couple of pages consist of the main character suffering from unpopularity and her transformation process.
Kelly is likable and sympathetic since she is poor, is considered the loser at school, and is shown that she doesn't seem tempted to join in the popular crowd quickly when the jock asked to do something deceitful and will have her hang out with the popular crowd. Props to her for doing that. However, her popular side character is pretty typical in all popularity stories as she ditched her unpopular friends, cares about her looks, and gets moody but later on she does see how her actions are wrong so it's all good.
It's overall a solid thriller with enough moments to keep your attention and a really unpredictable twist you would never see coming.
It's pretty solid thriller with decent amount of suspenseful action to fit in the book's length.
The mystery aspect actually kept my attentions because the book doesn't have too much red herrings that are obvious so I keep thinking who the killer and the killer's reveal is a really good twist.
The only problem is that it takes a couple of pages in till the horror kicks in since the first couple of pages consist of the main character suffering from unpopularity and her transformation process.
Kelly is likable and sympathetic since she is poor, is considered the loser at school, and is shown that she doesn't seem tempted to join in the popular crowd quickly when the jock asked to do something deceitful and will have her hang out with the popular crowd. Props to her for doing that. However, her popular side character is pretty typical in all popularity stories as she ditched her unpopular friends, cares about her looks, and gets moody but later on she does see how her actions are wrong so it's all good.
It's overall a solid thriller with enough moments to keep your attention and a really unpredictable twist you would never see coming.
January 14, 2011
This is you typical "Ugly High School Duckling turned Into a Swan" story, but with a thriller twist to it. It was entertaining enough when I read it as a teenager. I also had high hope about turning into a swan myself.
December 1, 2015
4 stars
One of the best books I read when I was younger, still enjoy it and it is an extremely quick read. Love it.
One of the best books I read when I was younger, still enjoy it and it is an extremely quick read. Love it.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews