Robert Lawrence Stine was born on October 8, 1943 in Columbus, Ohio. His mother was a home-maker. His father was a shipping clerk in a warehouse. Bob has a younger brother and sister, Bill and Pam. "We were very poor," Bob says. "I had to wear my cousin's old clothes to school. I think it made me very shy. It's one reason I liked staying in my room and writing."

In school, Bob was not a great student. He was always making jokes and interrupting the class. He got mostly B's on his report cards, but he didn't work very hard. 

He spent most of his time writing stories and drawing comic books. He thought he wanted to be a comic-book artist. But he had no drawing talent whatsoever. 

He was terrible in Math, and he hated phys. Ed. The only sport he was ever good at was ping pong.

Bob headed to New York City to become a writer. He went to work at Scholastic, writing for school magazines. Then he began to write joke books and humor books for kids. He wrote books such as How To Be Funny, The Sick of Being Sick Book, and 101 Creepy Creature Jokes. He created Bananas Magazine, a zany humor magazine, which he wrote and edited for ten years. In those days, he wrote under the name Jovial Bob Stine.

 

R.L. got scary!

He wrote his first teen horror novel, Blind Date. It became an instant best-seller. Many scary teen novels followed, including Beach House, The Babysitter, and Hit and Run. Says Bob: "I told myself, Forget the funny stuff. Kids like to be scared!"

Goosebumps began in 1992. The series quickly became a hit around the world, and it made R.L. a worldwide publishing celebrity. The Goosebumps TV show was the number one kids' show in America for three years in a row. All of the Goosebumps shows can be seen today on Netflix.

2017 marks the 25^th anniversary of Goosebumps. So far, there are over 130 titles in the series—and it's still going strong.

Bob's favorite Goosebumps books? The Haunted Mask—and all of the books featuring Slappy the evil dummy.

R.L. continued to bring out new titles. These included It's the First Day of School Forever, A Midsummer Night's Scream, and Young Scrooge, all published by Macmillan. He revived the teen series Fear Street in 2014. A Fear Street movie is planned for 2018.

The Goosebumps Movie, starring Jack Black as R.L. Stine was released by Sony/Columbia Pictures. Featuring forty monsters from the Goosebumps books and Slappy, the evil dummy, it quickly became the #1 film in America. A second Goosebumps movie is in the works.

Bob has always enjoyed comic books and graphic novels. In 2023, he published his one graphic novels, horror for adults, in a series called Stuff of Nightmares. He is currently writing a new YA series of graphic novels, called The Graveyard Club.