Editor's note: As of 02/24/24, I have books 4, 6, 8, 9 and 14, and am still looking for more.
Michigan Chillers is a series of middle grade horror novellas by Christopher Wright under the pen name of Johnathan Rand. Its first ten volumes were released in 2000 and 2001, with each book featuring its own set of protagonists and taking place in major cities and places in the author's home state of Michigan. The books are all set in the same continuity, as the original eight (and many more afterward) each ended with the main character of the current book meeting or learning about a kid who had their own scary adventure elsewhere in the state, which is the focus of the next book in the series.
Book #9 marked a divergence from this usual ending style, as it instead concluded with a lead-in to the Adventure Club spinoff series. Said series features six kids — Shane Mitchell, Tony Gritter, Lyle Haywood, Holly O'Mara, Dylan Bunker and Parker Smith — from the town of Great Bear Heart, Michigan, who've formed a group dedicated to finding interesting things in their hometown.
Book #10 likewise featured a divergence, as it ended with a lead-in to a second spinoff series — American Chillers, with similar themes to the parent line. However, rather than towns, each book covers a different American state.
Since 2005, Wright/Rand has been writing both Chillers series on and off.
The Michigan Chillers series consists of:
- #01: Mayhem on Mackinac Island (2000)
- #02: Terror Stalks Traverse City (2000)
- #03: Poltergeists of Petoskey (2000)
- #04: Aliens Attack Alpena (2000)
- #05: Gargoyles of Gaylord (2000)
- #06: Strange Spirits of St. Ignace (2000)
- #07: Kreepy Klowns of Kalamazoo (2000)
- #08: Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit (2000)
- #09: Sinister Spiders of Saginaw (2001)
- #10: Mackinaw City Mummies (2001)
- #11: Great Lakes Ghost Ship (2005)
- #12: AuSable Alligators (2005)
- #13: Gruesome Ghouls of Grand Rapids (2007)
- #14: Bionic Bats of Bay City (2007)
- #15: Calumet Copper Creatures (2011)
- #16: Catastrophe in Caseville (2013)
- #17: A Ghostly Haunting in Grand Haven (2016)
- #18: Sault Ste. Marie Sea Monsters (2017)
- #19: Drummond Island Dogman (2017)
- #20: Lair of the Lansing Leprechauns (2020)
The Adventure Club series consists of:
- #01: Ghost in the Graveyard (2001) note
- #02: Ghost in the Grand (2004) note
- #03: The Haunted Schoolhouse (2006) note
Michigan Chillers contains examples of the following:
- Alliterative Title: The majority of the books have these (Aliens Attack Alpena, Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit, etc.) or close to it with a connecting word interrupting the alliteration (Poltergeists of Petoskey, Gargoyles of Gaylord).
- Sequel Hook: Each book ends with the main character meeting another kid and learning about their own scary adventures, usually through being told directly, though book #8 (Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit) has a variant in that its main character is instead given a journal kept by the main character of book #9 (Sinister Spiders of Saginaw), which in turn ends with its main character meeting Parker Smith from the Adventure Club spinoff series, who starts telling her about his adventures in the town of Great Bear Heart. Book #10 (Mackinaw City Mummies) does much the same, as the epilogue has its main character meet Rick Owens, narrator of the first American Chillers book.
- Trapped in Another World: Book #1 (Mayhem on Mackinac Island) revolves around siblings Sandy and Tim Johnson being transported to another world via being swallowed by a tree. Subsequently, they have to deal with that world's problems and then find their way back to their own world.
- Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: Book #2 (Terror Stalks Traverse City) has Matt Sorenson dealing with, among other things, a bigfoot-like monster that he accidentally conjured up.
- Haunted House: Book #3 (Poltergeists of Petoskey) revolves around fraternal twins Adrien and Alex moving into a farmhouse haunted by a pair of twin Poltergeists, along with other more malevolent spirits.
- Alien Invasion: Book #4 (Aliens Attack Alpena) revolves around a pair of kids who have to join forces with a friendly alien to stop a hostile alien fleet from taking over Earth.
- Our Gargoyles Rock: Book #5 (Gargoyles of Gaylord) revolves around a race of living gargoyles abducting people, including main characters Corky and Ashley, who have to escape and thwart the gargoyles' plan to take over Gaylord.
- Evil Sorcerer: An evil sorcerer named Avan-Dar is the main antagonist of book #6 (Strange Spirits of St. Ignace), who seeks to use his army of wicked spirits to claim the Realm of the Underforest and then the main world for his own.
- Monster Clown: Book #7 (Kreepy Klowns of Kalamazoo) revolves around a number of these, actually robot clowns, that seek to take over the world.
- Blind Mistake: At one point in book #8 (Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit), Mr. Mulrooney — the town dogcatcher — tries to catch what he thinks is a dog with his slip collar (a leather collar on a long steel pole). Because he's missing his glasses, he doesn't realize he's trying to catch a baby T-Rex instead, and the animal nearly kills him as a result.
- Butt Biter: Implied, and not played for laughs, in book #8 (Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit). Town dogcatcher Mr. Mulrooney tries to catch, and is consequently attacked and bitten by, a baby T-Rex; the narration mentions that "I'm not going to go into details about where Mr. Mulrooney had been bitten by the baby dinosaur, but let's just say this: he won't be doing much sitting down for a while."
- Delicious Distraction: In book #8 (Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit), Nick and Summer end up using cheeseburgers to lure the baby T-Rex in, including once when they toss one that draws it away from town dogcatcher Mr. Mulrooney before it can do any more harm to him.
- Embarrassing Nickname: Book #8 (Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit) notes at one point that Nick's mom has started calling him "Nicky" lately, which he finds embarrassing and asks her not to do.
- Portal to the Past: Book #8 (Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit) involves one of these, which opens every fifty years and only stays open for seven days. Nick and his friend Summer McReady use it to travel back to the Cretaceous, and accidentally lure a couple of fully-grown T-Rexes into their own time when they swipe the pair's egg.
- Terrifying Tyrannosaur: Book #8 (Dinosaurs Destroy Detroit) revolves around a pair of rather angry T-Rexes following the main characters forward in time and proceeding to rampage through the city of Detroit, letting nothing stand in their way as they search for their stolen egg.
- Alien Invasion: Book #9 (Sinister Spiders of Saginaw) revolves around a race of alien spiders, the octogores, who intend to make humanity their slaves and take over the world. They previously invaded the homeworld of the arachno-sapiens, a race of beings who look like humans but can change into spiders, and are working to stop their plans on Earth.
- Sizeshifter: The arachno-sapiens of book #9 (Sinister Spiders of Saginaw) have the ability to go from human to spider forms, but as spiders, they can also change their size, from giant to tiny and back again.
- Tomato in the Mirror: Throughout book #9 (Sinister Spiders of Saginaw), Leah Warner has been terrified of spiders, and it doesn't help that she gets caught up in a plot by the alien spiders known as octogores to enslave mankind, while the similarly alien arachno-sapiens (shapeshifters who can change from human to giant spider forms) try to stop them. Then, after the octogores are all dealt with, she finds out her parents are arachno-sapiens too... and thus, she is as well.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: Book #9 (Sinister Spiders of Saginaw) revolves around Leah Warner and her friends Conner and Angela discovering the existence of "arachno-sapiens", an alien race that can shift between human and spider forms. And Leah, it turns out, is actually one of them — she just hadn't known until after her adventure with the octogores is over.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Book #9 (Sinister Spiders of Saginaw) features Leah Warner, who's always been scared of spiders. She gets better after learning she is a spider — or rather, an arachno-sapien, a race of aliens who can shift between human and spider forms.
- Evil Sorcerer: Book #10 (Mackinaw City Mummies) revolves around Josh Patterson and his inadvertent awakening of Akbar, who has abandoned his duties as tomb guardian and become an evil sorcerer intending to conquer the world with mummies.
- Continuity Nod: Emilee Beech, the main character of book #11 (Great Lakes Ghost Ship), is revealed partway through the book to be a cousin of Jarred Rook, a supporting character from book #9 (Sinister Spiders of Saginaw).
- Never Smile at a Crocodile: Book #12 (AuSable Alligators) features Craig Piece and his friend Heather Penrose discovering gigantic, potentially man-eating alligators in the AuSable River.
- Continuity Nod: Book #13 (Gruesome Ghouls of Grand Rapids) mentions weird events happening all over the state, including events from five earlier books, plus a reference to American Chillers book #6 (Invisible Iguanas of Illinois).
- Invisible to Normals: The titular ghouls of book #13 (Gruesome Ghouls of Grand Rapids), which can only be seen by certain people. They intend to use this to their advantage, possessing normal humans and eventually taking over the city.
- Bat Out of Hell: Book #14 (Bionic Bats of Bay City) involves the main characters having to deal with giant man-sized bats, hiding out in an announcer's building next to their baseball field to escape them.
- Abandoned Mine: Book #15 (Calumet Copper Creatures) involves the defunct Calumet copper mines, which Mikayla and her brother Calvin sneak into, only to find they're occupied by metal monsters.
- Continuity Nod: Book #15 (Calumet Copper Creatures) concludes with Mikayla and Calvin meeting a now grown-up Sandy and Tim Johnson from book #1 (Mayhem on Mackinac Island).
- Attack Drone: Book #16 (Catastrophe in Caseville) revolves around a giant cheeseburger-shaped robot, remotely controlled by its creator, wreaking havoc on the annual "Cheeseburger in Caseville" festival.
- Haunted House: Book #17 (A Ghostly Haunting in Grand Haven) revolves around Quinn, his friend Angela, and Quinn's father investigating an old haunted mansion in Grand Haven, Michigan.
- Who You Gonna Call?: Book #17 (A Ghostly Haunting in Grand Haven) involves Quinn, the son of a man who investigates paranormal activity, who accompanies his father as he investigates a haunted mansion.
- Fish People: The titular creatures of book #18 (Sault Ste. Marie Sea Monsters) are amphibious humanoids, lurking in the Michigan waterways.
- Our Cryptids Are More Mysterious: Book #19 (Drummond Island Dogman) revolves around a wolf-like humanoid known as the Dogman.
- Alien Invasion: Mentioned in the description. Details to come.
- Leprechaun: Naturally featured in book #20 (Lair of the Lansing Leprechauns).
''Adventure Club" contains examples of the following:
- Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: Book 1's first short story, "Bigfoot Runs Amok", revolves around a hunt for bigfoot.
