Jaclyn DeForest lives with her aunt Greta in Chicago, until Greta insists on moving them to the town of Sherpia, a village near the Arctic Circle. It's a strange place, with a menacing mountain nearby said to be home to a monster snowman. And all the houses have identical ones in front of them, to ward him off. Despite all warnings, Jaclyn's determined to figure out the truth about the snowman, and the strange childhood memories that are suddenly cropping up in her head.
It is one of the nineteen original series books that was not adapted into the 1995 TV series. It would later have a questline in Goosebumps HorrorTown.
The book provides examples of:
- Accidentally Broke the MacGuffin: The storybook, the item that has hidden spells in them along with nursery rhymes, ends up being brought up the mountain by Greta to the snowman's lair. She plans to use it to trap the snowman in his snowy body forever. But Jaclyn, wanting to have the snowman freed to find out the truth for herself, grabs the book out of her aunt's hands to find the poem that she was struggling to fully remember throughout the story (and would also free the snowman). But when they wrestle over it, the fragile storybook tears apart, and the page containing the specific poem ends up in the hands of Aunt Greta. However, Jaclyn gets ahold of it and memorizes the second verse just in time.
- Big Damn Heroes: Conrad's army of snowmen, which come to save Jaclyn from the evil snowman at his command.
- Big "NO!": The snowman yells this when Greta is accusing it of lying to Jaclyn about actually being her father. He is lying, in order to trick her into releasing him from his snowy form.
- Blatant Lies:
- When Jaclyn first meets Eli and Rolanda and says she's going up the mountain, they panic and try to stop her. Eli finally comes up with the flimsy excuse of "You can't go because it's closed for repairs." Jaclyn immediately sees through it.
- Jaclyn's aunt Greta claims to not to know anything about any rhyme about a snowman. Jaclyn can again tell she isn't being honest, just from her reaction.
- Blunt "Yes": Right after Jaclyn inadvertently frees the monster disguised as a snowman, the latter tries to throw the former and her aunt off the edge of the mountaintop to their death. Jaclyn incredulously asks the monster if this is her reward for saving him, to which the monster smugly answers, "Yes. That is your reward."
- Creepy Cave: The ice cave, the lair of the living snowman. Eli, when telling Jaclyn about it, admits that it is sort of pretty. Yet he makes it clear that it is also sort of scary high up in a dark mountain with icicles hanging around it, not to mention the beastly snowman whom lives in there.
- Don't Look Down: Jaclyn says this to herself as she's climbing up the ice ledge to the ice cave.
- Dramatic Wind: When Jaclyn wrestles with Greta over the poetry book to free the snowman, it rips apart and the pages fall out. Greta then finds the page that contains the rhyme that Jaclyn was looking for and tossed it over the edge. But then, to Jaclyn's amazement, the swirling wind carried the page back up through the air for her to grab.
- Dream Melody: After moving to her new town, Jaclyn suddenly remembers the opening lyrics to a nursery rhyme from her childhood. Unfortunately, she doesn't know the meaning of the lyrics or the second half of the poem.When the snows blow wild and the day grows old.Beware, the snowman, my child.Beware, the snowman.He brings the cold.
- She eventually finds out the rest:
When the snows meltAnd the warm sun is with thee,Beware, the snowman —For the snowman shall go free! - Earn Your Happy Ending: The story ends with local hermit Conrad using his magical powers to direct an army of snowmen to attack and seal the evil monster that was about to kill the protagonist, Jaclyn, after it tricked her into releasing him, then Jaclyn's aunt Greta reveals that Conrad and Jaclyn are father and daughter, and they're thrilled to finally meet each other.
- Endless Winter: The village of Sherpia is constantly filled with snow. Jaclyn asks Rosalyn if it ever stops snowing here, and she replies that it stopped once for ten minutes, and jokes that the village took a summer vacation during that time.
- Exactly What It Says on the Tin: The ice cave, at the top of the nearby mountain, is a cave cut out of ice.
- False Innocence Trick: Jaclyn runs into the living snowman in a mountain cave. The snowman claims he is her long lost father who was trapped in that form and trapped on the mountain by an evil witch. He gets her to recite a special song to free him. It turns out he is not her father, he is an evil demon whom the benevolent witch trapped.
- Forgotten First Meeting: Jaclyn meets Conrad at the mountain, and both of them think that this is their first interaction towards each other. However, Jaclyn did not know her father since she was a baby long ago, and Conrad had not seen her daughter for so long that she didn't recognize her at that moment.
- Here We Go Again!: Subverted. At the end, after the evil snowman has been defeated, Jaclyn sees the army of snowmen surrounding she and her family and friends, and looking unfriendly... and then it turns out they don't mean any harm, they just want to ask a question.Snowman: Can we go back down now? It's really cold up here!
- An Ice Person: Conrad, a sorcerer who can bring snowmen to life, and uses his ability to trap a red monster in a snowman.
- I Just Like Saying the Word: Jaclyn in the beginning of the story narrates how she likes to say "weird" a lot, as it is her favorite word. She then notes how this causes her aunt Greta to tell her she needs a bigger vocabulary.
- Kill It with Ice: When the army of enchanted snowmen reach the original snowman, they overpower it and encase it into the side of the mountain with ice, which they then leave it for dead.
- Legend Fades to Myth: Greta claims, while trying to prevent Jaclyn from learning the truth, that this is why everyone's afraid of the mountaintop — because something bad happened up there and in time, as the story changed in the retelling, the true story was forgotten and now everyone believes the changed story about an evil snowman is what really occurred.
- Luke, I Am Your Father: The titular snowman claims this to Jaclyn. It's lying — it's a monster trapped by her real parents, and only said this so it could trick her into freeing it. After it's beaten for good, she finds out that Conrad, the sorcerer who came to save her, is her real father.
- MacGuffin Melee: Jaclyn and her aunt Greta are fighting over the poetry book, with the former wanting to find the poem to free the nearby snowman, while the latter is trying to prevent the other from doing so. The book breaks apart in their hands, sending pages scattering around, and Greta gets ahold of the one containg the freeing poem. She tries to throw it away, only for the wind to blow it back for Jaclyn to get. She starts to read it, but Greta snatches the page out of her hands, and rips it apart with her convinced that she succeeded. However, it is revealed that Jacyn quickly looked it over, and she says it aloud anyway.
- My God, You Are Serious!: When Rolanda finally tells Jaclyn about the snowman and how the village fears it, Jaclyn bursts out laughing thinking it's one big joke. But then she sees the serious look in her face, and realizes that Rolanda truly believes in it.
- Nightmare Sequence: Jaclyn has one in which dozens of fluffy snow-white kittens with sky-blue eyes are climbing over one another. They started hissing and screeching, and suddenly wore red scarves around their necks just like the village snowmen.
- Noble Wolf: Conrad has a tamed white wolf named Wolfbane, who serves as a guard animal for him.
- Rapid-Fire "No!": Aunt Greta does this when Jaclyn says aloud the second verse of the poem, which is what frees the snowman from his icy exterior.
- Red Herring: While staying in her bed in the attic at night, Jaclyn hears an ominous whisper telling her to beware the snowman, which frightens her yet also makes her curious, making her constantly wonder if she can hear ghosts now. But it turns out that it was Aunt Greta who was doing a voice behind the attic door to try to scare her away from investigating the snowman.
- Right Behind Me: When the snowman tells Jaclyn that the only way to free it from it's snowy exterior body is if she reads the second verse from the poem that she had heard from her childhood, she tells the snowman that she's going back to her house to get the nursery book from her Aunt Greta. But as she whips around to head down the hill, she comes face to face with Aunt Greta herself, who is defiantly holding the poetry book.
- Sealed Evil in a Can: The evil snowman's final fate — it's pushed inside the icy walls of the ice cave, trapped for good (and supposedly dead as a result).
- Serious Business: When Jaclyn tells Rolanda and Eli to distract Conrad, the two insist that first they build a snowman for her house just like the rest of the village. Jaclyn is annoyed by this, but goes along with it so they can do what she wants.
- Snowlems: The book features an animated snowman that lives on the mountain. Supposedly. He turns out to be a monster trapped in the form of a snowman. Played straight with the army of real snowmen who come to defeat him.
- Supernatural Repellent: According to Rolanda and Eli, all the snowmen in the village are a version of this. They're duplicates of the snowman on the top of the mountain, and as long as everyone has one, he'll think they're honoring him and so stay away from them.
- Tear-Apart Tug-of-War: This happens to the storybook, when Jaclyn and Aunt Greta are fighting over it for the snowman, only for it to collapse. The specific page that contains the poem to free the monster falls out.
- Trailers Always Spoil: The advertisement for this book gives away the part where the snowman claims to be her father.
- Why Isn't It Attacking?: Jaclyn is running from Wolfsbane after she first comes across Conrad's cabin and is caught breaking in there, she trips on a rock in the road and falls to the ground, leaving her to be cornered by the wolf. Yet the creature just stands there staring at her. She waits there expecting it to pounce on her, but after a few moments, she decides to just get up and continue running. She wonders why she wasn't killed.
- We Need a Distraction: Jaclyn wants to investigate the titular snowman she's heard so much about, but the path up to his lair is guarded by Conrad and Wolfsbane. So, she enlists Rolanda and Eli to go up to Conrad and start a conversation with him, which would capture his attention because he hardly gets any visitors. Then, the two would cause him and Wolfsbane to chase after them and allowing Jaclyn to get past them. Sure enough, it works.
- "You!" Exclamation: Greta does this when she recognizes Conrad after he has her and Jaclyn rescued from the snowman.
