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It Happened At Halloween- Scary Books for the Middle Grades

There’s an awkward age between 10 and 14, where picture books don’t seem to be enough anymore, but some kids (or maybe their parents or teachers) aren’t quite ready for the intensity and content of YA fiction. There are some great books for kids this age, though, with pivotal scenes that take place at Halloween, so if you’re looking to mix it up a bit and add some books for this age group to your Halloween display, check the shelves for these titles.

 

Bunnicula by James Howe

This will fall at the lower end of the age range in terms of reading level, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be enjoyed by older kids. Really, how can anyone resist a cute, cuddly vampire bunny? There are several sequels and another spinoff series, Tales from the House of Bunnicula, for younger readers.

 

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

This book starts with a major character, Turtle Wexler, taking a dare to enter a haunted house on Halloween. Of course, the dead body she finds inside is just the beginning of a complicated puzzle of a mystery. The Westing Game is an award winning book, and rightfully so. Kids who liked Chasing Vermeer will probably also like The Westing Game.

 

Horror at the Haunted House by Peg Kehret

When Ellen Streeter signs up to participate in the historical society’s haunted house fundraiser, she doesn’t expect to encounter a real ghost. Kids who like fast-paced horror and mystery will love this book. Peg Kehret is a fantastic writer who has written dozens of books with plenty of mystery and suspense, including a series called Frightmares, so once kids are hooked, they can keep going with her books for a long time!

 

The Ghost Witch by Betty Ren Wright

Jenny moves into a house haunted by the ghost of a local witch, who is delighted to have the opportunity to scare children again at Halloween.  This book falls in the lower end of the age range, as it is aimed at grades 3-5, but Betty Ren Wright has written some gems of ghost stories for kids who are slightly older as well, including The Dollhouse Murders and Crandall’s Castle.

 

Ghosts I Have Been by Richard Peck

There aren’t too many narrators in children’s literature that are as memorable as Blossom Culp. Blossom is from the other side of the tracks, too smart and outspoken for her own good, with a crazy mother who works as a psychic. Also, she can see ghosts. On the Titanic. Peck hits all the right buttons to grab kids this age with this book, and the outhouse scene that takes place on Halloween is hysterical. There’s a previous book, The Ghost Belonged To Me, where she plays a secondary role, and a sequel, The Dreadful Future of Blossom Culp, which is terribly dated now (although still a fun read), but this is Blossom Culp at her best.

 

The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keately Snyder

When April moves into Melanie’s apartment building the two girls form an unlikely friendship as both are swept away by April’s imagination. Together they find an abandoned yard where they can create their own world of ancient Egypt as authentically as possible. If that doesn’t sound scary, just imagine it at night, on Halloween, with a killer on the loose. The main characters here are mostly middle schoolers, so it’s probably best to hand it to kids reading at that level. The story does feel a little dated, but that answers the obvious question of why the kids aren’t carrying cell phones.

 

The Best Halloween Ever by Barbara Robinson

The six Herdman children are a constant source of chaos for their town. They’ve caused so much trouble on Halloween in the past that the mayor cancels trick-or-treating in favor of a Halloween celebration at the elementary school. Of course, nothing can slow down the terrible Herdmans…  can Halloween be saved after all? This is the third book starring the Herdmans, who first appeared in The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, followed by the less well-known The Best School Year Ever. All three books are funny and suspenseful, and this one also has some scares. The Best Halloween Ever is a good choice for kids reading on a lower level, and older kids may enjoy it too.

The Grey King by Susan Cooper

Most of the books I’ve mentioned are solidly set in the “real world”, be it contemporary or historical. The Grey King is far removed from anything resembling that. This is the story of Will, a boy who is sent to convalesce with relatives in rural Wales after a serious illness. Except that Will is much more than a boy, and he’s in Wales to do much more than heal. The Grey King is the fourth book in Susan Cooper’s high fantasy series The Dark is Rising, but stands alone beautifully, and of all the books, I think this is the most readable and most memorable.  I was assigned it in sixth grade, and it has always stuck with me, maybe because of the riddle that begins it:

On the day of the dead when the year too dies

Must the youngest open the oldest hills…

It’s part of a long, cryptic, and graceful poem that foreshadows the entire plot of the book… if you can figure it out. The day of the dead part, though, should be obvious. This is not the easiest read, as there is a lot of Welsh in the text, and it’s impossible to identify or pronounce most words in Welsh, but it is completely worth it.

 

Set these out for your 10-14 year old readers, and give them a chance at a spooktacular Halloween read!

 

 

Is Any Book A Good Book?

Well, the answer to that question is obvious, I think. Of course not. Some books are just not very good. As a review site, of course we discriminate between what makes a story worth reading, and what doesn’t. Otherwise, what good would we be as a resource for readers and librarians? We all have limited time and money for books.

But MonsterLibrarian.com is just that. A resource. People see what we have to say and make their own choices based on that, and probably also recommendations from friends, colleagues, Goodreads, and other review sites, advertisements on the Internet, catalogs and flyers in your mailbox (if you’re a librarian) and reviews in magazines and publications of various kinds. You choose where you’ll go for recommendations, and who you’ll trust to direct you to the “next good book” as we like to say here. I hope you choose to come here and take advantage of our hard work.

To go a little further, is any book that gets people reading a “good book”? I think Dylan, the Monster Librarian, would say yes. And this is a philosophy that I see a lot. Are the Twilight books good books? They got a lot of people reading. That’s a good thing… but are they good books? I think the writing is pretty bad, so I’m going to say no, I don’t think they are. Would I buy them for my YA collection, if I were buying for one? With such high demand, you’ve gotta give them what they want. You don’t take books out of the hands of people who are desperate to read them, especially if this is the first time they’ve ever really wanted to read a book. And I do know people for whom Twilight was the first book they read from cover to cover. But not the last.

I don’t especially like the school of thought that says “well, it’s okay to let them get the bug with R.L. Stine, because at least they’re reading, and that will transfer into a love of great literature in the future”. Maybe, but that’s condescending to those kids. Stine doesn’t even pretend that his books have classic literary value. Like a lot of series books, his books use fairly simple language, predictable structure, and cliffhangers at the endings of chapters to keep kids going. Not everything kids read is great literature, even in the classroom. If you have seen some of the little phonics readers kids use you know that is not even expected. “I put my hat in the van. I put the map in the van. Dad gets in the van”. Simple language, predictable structure (no cliffhangers, though, sadly). We can share the cool books that aren’t Goosebumps or Twilight without seeing them as just a stepping stone. They’re where the reader IS. And maybe the reader will be there for a long time. There are enough Goosebumps books and knockoffs to last the kid who wants them or needs them for a very long time.

But there are also a lot of other books– fiction, nonfiction, and graphic novels for kids that are funny and suspenseful and unbelievable. And someday kids will be done with Goosebumps, just like kids from 30 years ago eventually outgrew the series adventures of Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield and kids from 60 years ago eventually outgrew Nancy Drew to go on to other kinds of books. Maybe their interests will take them in the direction of new, similar series and genre fiction(which is often, despite its disreputable status in literary circles, extremely good) and maybe their reading will be shaped by other interests and experiences. Some of those books might be food for thought– but maybe not the ones we might expect. And some may be pure escapism (also maybe not the ones we might expect).

Not every book is a good book. But sometimes it’s enough to tell a good story, one that fits readers at their particular time and place. But those books don’t exist in isolation, even if the reader has a narrow view. Put those stories in the midst of many, and let serendipity take us on its meandering course on the shelves and through the stacks, whether that’s in the classroom, in the library, or at home.

Help a Reader Out: No Twilight, Please

Tajah writes:

Do you have any werewolf books that is a series and the werewolves are in
high school and are in love (not twilight) thanks?

Well, right off the bat this makes me think of Maggie Stiefvater’s Wolves of Mercy Falls books but with the massive quantities of paranormal fiction for teens out there right now, surely you all can come up with some other recommendations?