The Goosebumps book about Egyptian curses.
Gabe is staying with his Uncle Ben (not that one, or that one
) and bratty cousin Sari in Egypt. Ben is an archaeologist excavating a pyramid; since this is a Goosebumps book, he brings the children along. They end up getting lost, and curses ensue. Well, not really... sort of. It's actually a bit more complicated than that.
It has a direct sequel, Return of the Mummy. It is unrelated to movie of the same name, sharing only general Egyptian-themed horror.
It is one of the nineteen original series books that was not adapted into the TV series.
It was later reissued in the Classic Goosebumps line in 2009 as a companion to Who's Your Mummy?.
The book provides examples of:
- Always Someone Better: Sari is superior to Gabe and won't let him forget it.
- Captain Obvious: Two consecutive chapters end with the lines, "He had us cornered," and "We were being kidnapped." Both of these things are made completely obvious in the lines immediately before that.
- Chekhov's Gun: Gabe's mummy hand ends up saving the day.
- Competition Freak: Sari Hassad. She'll turn anything into a competition, even how much breakfast she and Gabe are having.
- Did I Mention It's Christmas?: Gabe is in Egypt during Christmas break. The locals don't seem to care much, which is plausible since Egypt is predominantly Muslim.
- Horrible Judge of Character: Ben really shouldn't trust Ahmed. Even after being told that he wants to kill and mummify Gabe and Sari, he still thinks they can talk things out rationally "as scientist to scientist."
- In-Universe Factoid Failure: Gabe's parents are telling some facts they learned about the pyramids, and claim that some of the blocks used to make up the pyramids "weighed up to a thousand tons." They actually weigh only about 2.5 tons. The line was probably meant to say that some of the pyramids weigh over a thousand tons (which is correct), but either Stine or an editor screwed it up at some point.
- Mad Scientist: In a variant, Ahmed is a mad archaeologist.
- Never Trust a Title: Nobody actually gets cursed.
- Red Herring: This book has a clever subversion. Early on, Gabe and Sari are chased through a museum by Ahmed, who seems to have some sinister reason for going after them. When he finds them, he tells them he was only trying to give them a message from Gabe's uncle, and isn't sure why they ran from him. However, this turns out to be a lie, and he tries to kidnap them immediately afterwards.
- Riddle for the Ages: At the beginning, Gabe mentions that he bought a mummy hand at a garage sale (which he thinks is fake), and class "The Summoner" It turns out to be the real hand of the Priestess Khala, and he uses it to animate some mummies in the tomb to save him from Ahmed. It's never explained, however, how it got from some previously unexplored tomb in Egypt to a garage sale in the US.
- Sliding Scale of Comedy and Horror: This book is probably the furthest on the horror side of the scale.
- Treacherous Advisor: Ahmed, ostensibly a representative from the university with a lot of knowledge of ancient curses. He's really there to ensure that nobody gets into the Sacred Chamber of Priestess Khala, which is also in the pyramid.
The (non-existent) episode provides examples of:
- Un-Installment: The sequel Return of the Mummy was adapted. The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb, which it was a sequel to, wasn't.
