Took

When Daniel's dad loses his job, the family decides to downsize.  They leave their comfortable home and private school behind for an old farmhouse in West Virginia and a poorly funded public school.  If that weren't bad enough, the place give him the creeps.  He always feels like someone is watching from the woods surrounding the house.

The kids quickly set Daniel and his little sister, Erica, apart as outsiders and tease them mercilessly.  Even though Daniel and Erica have never been close, they form an alliance to survive.  As time passes, Erica spends more and more time talking to the doll their parents gave her in exchange for giving up their old life.

His parents struggle to find work, and they spend more time arguing with each other than anything else.  This new start is turning out to be a disaster.

Then there are the rumors about about an impossibly old woman who lives in the forest and steals little girls.  Daniel knows it's just a story, but he can't seem to shake the uneasy feeling he gets from the woods.  What if Old Auntie is real?  What if she wants Erica for her next victim?

This is another fast-paced ghost story full of chills and atmosphere from Mary Downing Hahn!  I read Wait Til Helen Comes when I was nine years old and fell in love with ghost stories.  I love passing her books on to my students today!

The Nest

Steve has had issues with anxiety for a while now.  He tries to hide it, tries to pretend he's all better now.  His parents have enough to worry about with the new baby.  The baby has so many problems.  It's just not strong, and it has to go back to the hospital over and over again.

When he has the first dream, he thinks she's an angel.  She has silvery wings and tells him she's here to help because of the baby.  Her words are logical and smooth.  She says they will fix the baby.  It will be perfect, like it was meant to be.

At first Steve wants to believe her.  These creatures will fix the baby, and everything will be fine again.  But it doesn't take long for the uncertainty to creep in.  How exactly can they fix the baby, and what is growing in the nest under the eaves of his house?

By the time he realizes the truth, it may be too late to save the baby or to save himself.

Kenneth Oppel's new book is a masterwork of slow creeping menace and horror.  That preys on the human desire to wish everything could be well and perfect.  I highly recommend this book, but warned it is very creepy, especially if you are afraid of wasps!

The Hollow Boy

I love this series so much!  The third installment takes our ghost hunting trio even further into the mystery of London's hauntings.  There is a massive outbreak in Chelsea, and Lockwood is miffed that his agency isn't in on the action despite a recent spate of high profile jobs.  Even so, the agency is overworked, and Anthony, Lucy, and George are wearing a little thin.

To make matters worse, George and Anthony have hired the beautiful and annoyingly perfect Holly Munro as a secretary/office manager while Lucy was out of town.  Sure, Ms. Munro is practically perfect and they are working higher profile jobs, but Lucy just can't seem to find her way to liking the perfect Ms. Munro.

Lucy's increasing frustration is leading to problems at work, and it's not just with Holly Munro.  After using her gift of listening to resolve a major haunting, Lucy is convinced, this could be a tool for agents to use in the future.  Lockwood and George firmly disagree; they believe listening to ghosts could get Lucy killed.

On top of all this, Lucy can't deny her growing affection for Anthony Lockwood, but he seems even more closed off than ever.  Will our intrepid heroes be able to overcome their problems and get back to being the best, if the smallest, agency in London?  Will they be able to solve the Chelsea hauntings?  Read Jonathan Stroud's new book to find out!

Also, there is a hug cliffhanger at the end.  Why, Stroud, why?!  This is me reading the final sentences:
 
via GIPHY

Nightmares!

Every time Charlie Laird goes to sleep, he has nightmares, but that's not even the worst of his problems.  Even though he is still struggling with his mother's death, his father has remarried Charlotte, and Charlie is sure she's a witch.  He's seen things he can't explain any other way.  Plus, she made the family move from the house they shared with Charlie's mother to the creepy old purple mansion her family has owned for generations.

Things get even worse when the witch who torments Charlie in his dreams comes into the waking world.  That's when he knows he has to do something.  Charlie goes into the nightmare world awake to face his worst nightmares and save all the children of his town.

Jason Segel and Kirsten Miller have created a nightmare world this both frightening and funny layered on to the real world where Charlie is still struggling with grief over his mother's death.

In the After

Amy is home alone watching TV when it happens.  A spaceshift.  Horrible green creatures with razor sharp talons and teeth.  They are so terrifying and so fast.  It doesn't take long for them to decimate the population.  The worst part is the screaming.  They eat their victims alive.

Amy is alone.  She doesn't even know if there are any other survivors.  She doesn't want to venture out of her haven.  She mourns in silence so They won't hear her and come running.  She's safe for a long time.  Her dad was pretty much a hippy who kept the pantry stocked with food storage and the roof top garden thriving.  The solar panels are great, too, because it only takes a few days before the power goes out.

Her mother's paranoia protects Amy, too.  Without that electric fence surrounding the house, she'd probably be dead by now.  The shock is enough to keep the creatures out.  They aren't smart, just hungry.

After a while the food storage runs out, and Amy learns how to scavenge for food and stay safe from Them.  It is on one of these trips that she finds Baby.  Baby is so little, maybe three, and she doesn't talk, but she's plenty smart.  The two girls live alone for several years in silence.  It's seems too good to be true, and their solitary time eventually runs out.  As they venture out into the After, they will face dangers old and new, and in this new nightmare world it's hard to know who to trust.

I could not put Demitria Lunetta's debut novel down.  It is fascinating and terrifying.  Highly recommended!

The Whispering Skull

Following their success in The Screaming Staircase where Lockwood & Co. spent the night in the most haunted house in Britain, our heroes had some business success, but things have been tapering off since then.  The Fittes Agency, with their superior manpower and historic name keeps getting in the way.

When the team is hired by Mr. Saunders to make safe the recently discovered grave of Edmund Bickerstaff, thing start to look up.  Bickerstaff was famous during his time for experiments in attempting to communicate with the dead, and his death is widely reported as horrific.  Everything goes well until they discover a strange bone mirror in Bickerstaff's coffin.  Lockwood and Lucy quickly neutralize the mirror, but it has affected George in some way.

When the mirror comes up missing, Lockwood and Co. must race against their rivals from Fittes to discover the mirror and claim the reward.

Additionally, Lucy's gift seems to be increasing in power, and the skull trapped in the ghost jar that spoke to her at the end of The Screaming Staircase is becoming increasingly talkative.  Can he really help in their investigation, or is he leading them into a trap?

There are even more villains, both spectral and human, in Jonathan Stroud's follow up to the fabulous The Screaming Staircase.  I highly recommend this sequel for more fiendish and Dickensian fun!

The Haunting of Gabriel Ashe

After their home burns down, 8th grader Gabriel Ashe and his family move to the small town of Slade to live with his grandmother.  There isn't much to do in Slade, and Gabe spends a lot of time with a neighbor boy in the woods behind their houses.  The game seemed a little childish at first, but it was fun, and it's not like Gabe had anything else to do.  The two boys become warrior princes who have to save their kingdoms from a creature called The Hunter.

School starts, and Gabe learns that Seth is the school victim.  He feels torn between his friend and the popularity he has always wanted.  When strange things begin happening in town, everyone blames Seth.  Seth insists it was The Hunter.

At first Gabe is annoyed.  It's just a game, right?  But their is a suspicion in the back of his mind that maybe Seth is telling the truth.  Either way, the pranks are becoming more dangerous, and Gabe finds himself in the center as both victim and accused.  Will he discover the truth before it is too late?

This is something different from Dan Poblocki's other stories.  It starts out as a friendship story turns to a mystery and ends up in horror.  It will definitely keep you guessing about who is to blame and how everything will resolve.  It's a bit of a slow start for a horror story, but keep with it.  You won't be disappointed!

Unbreakable

Kennedy Waters is living a pretty normal life.  OK, her dad left when she was a little kid, but she and her mom are happy and healthy.  She has her art, her best friend, and her cat.  All in all, life is pretty good.

Everything changes when she returns home to find her mother dead of an apparent heart attack.  Suddenly, her world is falling apart.  But things are about to get a lot worse.  Worse like a vengeance spirit trying to murder her in her sleep!

She is saved by two guys she's never seen before who break into the house and destroy the spirit.  Lukas and Jared tell her that her mother didn't have a heart attack; the same spirit who tried to kill Kennedy killed her mother.  And it's all part of a bigger plan.

Lukas and Jared bring Kennedy into the world of the Legion, a group that has been battling demons and spirits for hundreds of years all in an effort to keep a world-destroying evil at bay.  They are also convinced that Kennedy has inherited a place in their ranks.

Now she and the other Legion members must battle vengeance spirits to collect pieces of a device that will save the world.

This is Kami Garcia's first solo novel, and the best part about it is the creepy factor.  I loved all the haunted locations in the story.  If you are a Supernatural fan, you will either love or hate this book because it has a lot of similarities to the tv show.

Contaminated

Velvet lives in a world of monsters.  She used to think all that horror movie stuff was a joke, but that was before the first wave, before thousands of people suddenly turned into mindlessly violent creatures.  Connies--short for contaminated.

ThinPro protein water was the most popular diet drink in the country.  People were drinking it everywhere.  It wasn't until after the second wave when Connies were rounded up to be experimented on that scientists discovered the truth.  The protein in the water was contaminated causing a mad cow effect on humans.  Many people know someone contaminated.

For Velvet it's both her parents, and now she is left to take care of her little sister, make ends meet, and try to finish high school.  Add to that the stress of the unaccounted for Connies still living in some remote areas.

Most of the Connies have been rounded up and neutralized with collars that send shocks to their brains to control their violent urges.  These Connies live in kennels like animals waiting for family members to claim them.  Most don't.  Even though they aren't violent anymore, they are like dementia patients.  They can't talk, they need help going to the bathroom and feeding themselves, and they have to be tied up to keep them from wandering off.

But Velvet is different.  When she finally finds her mother, she brings her home where she faces violence and prejudice.  But Velvet is convinced her mom is different.  If she can just get her back into a familiar routine, maybe her mom's brain will be able to repair itself.

Even as Velvet is struggling with all the responsibility of caring for her family, more contaminated are starting to appear.  Is this the beginning of a new wave?  And how will she be able to protect her family and survive in a world gone mad?

This is was a great sci-fi thriller.  There are plenty of dystopian elements with just enough horror to keep you on edge!  Read Em Garner's new book for a new take on zombies.  I already ordered the sequel!

Liv Forever

Wickham Hall is full of snotty rich kids as far as Liv is concerned, but the promise of her own art studio is enough to lure her from Las Vegas to the lush grounds and historic buildings of Virginia.  Liv grew up as a foster child, and she guards her heart closely, but deep down she is a true romantic with a real appreciation of art and poetry.

Soon after arriving she meets Malcolm.  They shouldn't have anything in common.  Malcolm is one of the elite, but the more time they spend together, the more Liv comes to know Malcolm as true romantic, just like she is.

Most of the other kids at Wickham Hall ignore her at best.  She is a scholarship kid after all.  Her only friend other than Malcolm is Gabe, another scholarship kid with a huge chip on his shoulder who believes he can see and hear ghosts at Wickham Hall.  Liv doesn't believe him--at least not until she becomes one of those ghosts herself.

Now she, Malcolm, and Gabe form an unlikely trio determined to uncover the truth behind Liv's death and the history of suicides at Wickham Hall before it's too late for all of them.

Romance, suspense, grisly murders, creep ghosts, secret societies.  This is a good Gothic lite read.  My only real issue with the story is Liv and Malcolm's instant and all consuming love for each other.  It's a little far-fetched, but if you can let that go, you'll get a good thrill from Amy Talkington's paranormal love story.

The Watcher in the Shadows

Irene's family has fallen low since her father died leaving them with a mountain of debts.  As they morn for their father and fall into ever worse circumstances, an offer arrives that seems like a miracle.  Irene's mother has been offered a position as a housekeeper to the reclusive toy maker Lazarus Jann.  The job comes with a large salary and a house for the family to live in.  It seems to good to be true!

Upon their first visit to Cravenmoore, Jann's home, the children are spooked by the life size automatons which fill the house, and they are warned never to go into the east wing of the house where his invalid wife lives.  In addition, the forest surrounding Cravenmoore and the Sauville's new home is filled not with real birds but with strange automatons built by Lazarus Jann.  Despite their uneasiness, the job still seems like a good fit.

Soon after their arrival, Irene meets Ismael, a young sailor with whom she instantly falls in love, and the two begin spending all their time together.

Things quickly turn sour when an unsuspecting housemaid releases a powerful evil that begins to hunt down everyone connected with Lazarus Jann.  Who is the toy maker really, and why does this evil force cling to him?

Read Carlos Ruiz Zafon's thrilling tale of horror and suspense to find out!

Doll Bones

Zach loves playing the game with Alice and Poppy.  Using dolls and action figures they create elaborate long running tales of adventure and intrigue, but when Zach's dad comes home after a long absence, he decides his son is too old for dolls.  With the action figures gone, Zach feels like his characters are dead.  How can the game go on?

That's when Poppy decides to liberate the queen from the glass case in her living room.  The queen is old and kind of creepy, and once she's out, she tells Poppy she is made from the bones of a dead child named Eleanor, and Eleanor isn't going to rest until her bones are returned to her grave.

Zach and Alice aren't sure they believe Poppy at first, but strange things keep happening, and soon the three friends are headed off on a quest to calm and angry ghost.

Read Holly Black's new tale of friendship, adventure, and a haunted doll!

The Screaming Staircase

England is beset by ghosts, and they aren't your average chain rattling variety.  The dead refuse to leave the world of the living.  To make matters worse they are only visible to children and only a small number of children at that.  The true danger isn't in the haunting; it's in the ghost touch which is nearly always fatal causing its victims to swell up, turn blue, and die a horribly painful death.

The Problem has led to the rise of Psychic detection agencies staffed by children who are sensitive in some way to the ghosts.  Lockwood and Co. is one such agency staffed by its founder Anthony Lockwood, the slightly disgusting but analytical George, and newcomer Lucy whose gift for listening may be more powerful than she knows.

When a routine job goes wrong, and Lockwood and Co. accidentally burns down a client's house.   The trio is desperate to restore their reputation, so desperate they may be willing to take the most dangerous job yet.  But is saving the agency worth the price they'll have to pay?

This new series opener from Jonathan Stroud, author of the Bartimaeus trilogy, is filled with ghostly chills, Dickensian plucky orphans, and an intriguing mystery.  The cold weather is perfect for snuggling up under a blanket with a good book.  If you choose to go on this adventure with Lockwood and Co., you won't want to leave the covers any time soon!

The Graveyard Book

When Nobody Owens was a baby, a man came into his home and murdered his family.  It was only because of Nobody's tendency to wander that he survived.  Nobody wandered to the graveyard nearby and was adopted by its ghostly inhabitants and the mysterious Silas who volunteers to become his guardian.

The murderer still hunts Nobody, and it is only within the walls of the graveyard that he is hidden and protected.  Nobody is happy with his spirit companions and their knowledge spanning the centuries back to the time of the Romans.  He will encounter things that are even more ancient and find a ghoul gate.  He learns the tricks of the dead:  fading, haunting, and imperviousness to dark and cold.  But even with all he can learn from his friends and playmates, he eventually becomes curious about the world of the living, and an anger for the man who murdered his family grows in his heart.

The more Bod ventures out of the Graveyard, the more dangerous his life becomes.  Can a boy named Nobody raised by those who are long dead survive in the land of the living and overcome the evil that stalks him?

This is one of my favorite books by one of my favorite authors!  I just reread it in preparation for tomorrow's book club meeting, and it's just as good the second time around.

I met Neil Gaiman this summer and got my book signed in Dallas.  It was worth the drive and the hours of waiting!  If you haven't read this one yet, settle in for a wonderful and surprising experience!

Long Lankin

There's a secret buried in Bryers Guerdon.  It's been haunting this village for more than 400 years, taking children, destroying lives.  It's been asleep for decades, but now it's hunger has been awakened, and Long Lankin is hunting.

It's 1958, and Cora and Mimi have been sent to live with their Great Aunt Ida in the tiny village of Bryers Guerdon.  It's clear Auntie Ida doesn't want them.  Her reaction to their arrival is almost violent, and the girls are terrified by her ancient crumbling home with its locked doors and nailed shut windows.  But there is no where else to go.

Auntie Ida warns them against going out on the marshes, and especially to never go into All Hallows, the ancient nearly abandoned church and cemetery.  But local boys Pete and Roger tell the girls they go there all the time, even though they've been warned not to.  What could it hurt?
There are strange markings inside the church, and four-year-old Mimi wants to leave.   The older children enjoy the thrill of exploring the spooky old building and grounds until Cora thinks she sees someone watching.

Have the children unwittingly unleashed an ancient terror on the village?  No one wants to talk about it, but Cora knows something is wrong.  A monster is stalking the village, and the dead have returned to the world of the living.  Long Lankin is looking for another victim.

This slow boil of a horror story is truly creepy!  I couldn't put it down, and I couldn't go to sleep.  Pay attention, this is the kind of subtle thriller that is all in the details, and a true connoisseur of dark fantasy and classic horror will recognize the warning signs and sense the approach of the beast.  Read Lindsey Barraclough's debut novel if you aren't too afraid.

Far Far Away

I am cheating a little because we don't actually have this book in the library yet.  It is on it's way, I promise!  Despite this, I had to write my review while it is still fresh in my mind because I loved this book!  It is the perfect blend of realism, fairy tale, mystery, and horror.  In fact, I'm not quite sure what section to put it in.  I should just make a section called "Awesome Books That Defy Categorization."

Jeremy Johnson Johnson hears voices, one voice in particular.  It's Jacob Grimm.  Yes, that Jacob Grimm, collector of fairy tales.  Jacob is stuck as a ghost because he has left something, he doesn't know what, undone.  He wondered the earth searching in vain for his brother Wilhelm  until he heard about the boy who could hear ghosts.  Since that time, he has been Jeremy's best friend in the small town of Never Better.

Jacob hopes that protecting Jeremy from a mysterious person known as The Finder of Occasions will help him pass on.  The only problem?  He doesn't know who this person is, only that he is a threat to Jeremy.

Aside from his friendship with a ghost, Jeremy leads a fairly lonely existence.  When his mother left years ago, his father hid away from the world in a deep depression, and Jeremy was left to fend for himself.  Now in addition to the looming specter of the Finder of Occasions, the Johnson home is in foreclosure, and Jeremy may soon be homeless.

Jeremy's life will take a turn for the interesting one day when flame-haired beauty, Ginger Boultinghouse, takes an interest in him.  Ginger starts to break loner Jeremy out of shell.  Even as Jeremy starts to feel real happiness, danger creeps ever closer.

You must read Tom McNeal's new book.  It is just so wonderful and charming and complex and steeped in the ancient world of fairy tales.

Every Other Day

Kali D'Angelo isn't a normal girl; she's just pretending to be one.  From the outside she looks normal, maybe a bit of a loner, and no one knows about her practically nonexistent relationship with her father.  But all this pretending to be normal is a cover for her secret.  Every other day Kali is anything but normal, she's a superhuman hunter, unstoppable and gifted with incredible strength and healing powers.  Even on the days when she is human, she's not normal.

In Kali's world, Darwin didn't just find proof of evolution, he found proof of preternatural beings that once discovered seemed to pop up everywhere--chupacabras, zombies, hell hounds, dragons.  You name it, Kali feels the overwhelming desire to fight it.

Now she's in bigger trouble than she's ever imagined.  It all started when she saw the mark on Bethany Davis's back.  Kali could have ignored it, but she didn't.  In her efforts to save Bethany from a death sentence, Kali sets off a chain reaction even she couldn't have predicted.  Now she has a voice in her head that may or may not be trustworthy giving her advice and direction, and the girl that has kept all her secrets close for years will have to learn to trust an odd assortment of people who may just be able to help her get some answers about who and what she is.

But the truth will come at cost that may break her heart.

Jennifer Lynn Barnes's new thriller is filled with monsters, gore, and plenty of plot twists!

The Ghost of Graylock

Every town has it's secrets, and Hedston is no exception.  Everyone know the story of Graylock Hall, the mental hospital hidden in the woods outside of town.  Everyone knows about the kids who died there and Nurse Janet who killed them.

It's no surprise that ghost hunter Neil discovers the story soon after moving to town.  One of the first things he does is venture into the forest to investigate the abandoned building.  Once they are inside, though, Neil and his sister sister Bree have some ghostly experiences that seem all too real.

Bree wants to put this behind her and move on with her summer, but Neil wants to investigate.  As they unravel the mystery of Graylock Hall, it is clear they are in danger from forces both natural and supernatural.

And the ghost of Graylock isn't going to let them go so easily.

Visit author Dan Poblocki's website for more information about him and his books.

On the Day I Died

It's after midnight, and Mike Kowalski is speeding home in the hope that his parents won't be too angry if he's at least close to his curfew.  That's when he sees her standing in the road in an old-fashioned white dress.  When he decides to give her a ride home, he begins the strangest and most frightening night of his life.

Instead of hurrying home to his family, he spends the night in a cemetery for teens, filled with ghosts desperate to tell their stories.  He will hear tales of betrayal, horror, and madness as he is held captive by their ghostly tales, but maybe these spirits want more than just an audience for their stories.

Be sure to read the author's note at the end to learn about the inspiration for each story ranging from real people and events to classic tales of horror.

Author, Candace Fleming's, new book is filled with horrors from the past two centuries of its Chicago setting.

This Dark Endeavor by Kenneth Oppel

This is a reimagining of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein which just means the author took the basic ideas of the original story and looked at them in a different way or in this case, fleshed out part of the story.  Oppel looks at Victor Frankenstein as a teenager.  Victor and his twin brother, Konrad, are best friends, but that doesn't mean there isn't a touch or jealousy and competition in their relationship.  This competitiveness only increases for Victor when he thinks of the lovely Elizabeth. 

Life is relatively peaceful until Konrad becomes unexpectedly ill, and all medical efforts fail.  Victor remembers a dark library hidden in the house with alchemy books and papers.  He struggles to create an Elixir of Life to save his brother and to glorify himself.  Victor and Elizabeth must battle vicious creatures and cunning enemies to meet their goal, but Victor finds the danger exhilarating. 

This book was a heart pounding thrill ride that manages to be character driven at the same time.  Oppell looks further into Victor's motivations than the original story does, and he creates a character who is believable and disturbing.

The best compliment I can give This Dark Endeavor is it inspired me to read the original Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.  I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I'd never read it, but I thought I knew the story based on a jumble of movie clips and cultural references.  I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was wrong and that Shelley's novel provokes questions about loneliness and personal responsibility.  We also have Shelley's book here in the library.  Both are challenging reads, so I would recommend them for 8th graders and 7th graders who are strong readers.

This Dark Endeavor was also named as part of the 2012-2013 Lone Star List!