Daemons Books would like to congratulate author Neil Gaiman and singer Amanda Palmer (from the popular and might I add awesome band The Dresden Dolls) on their wedding this Sunday. It’s great seeing two talented and equally cool people get hitched. I can only hope that they will now have children so they can create a kid that will possess coolness in superhero like proportions. Check out the full story form E! Online here.

Follow me on Twitter @amiedaemons

With new releases by Stephenie Meyer, James Patterson, Nelson Demille, and Danielle Steel, June is another huge month for books. Take a look at the upcoming June releases I think you’ll be interested in.

Bullet (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series) by Laurell K. Hamilton
Available June 1, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:

The music came back up and the next group of little girls, slightly older, came out. There was a lot of that in the next hour and change. I liked dance, and it was no reflection on the kids, but my will to live began to seep away on about the fifth group of sequined children…

Anita Blake is back in St. Louis and trying to live a normal life-as normal as possible for someone who is a legal vampire executioner and a U. S. Marshal. There are lovers, friends and their children, school programs to attend. In the midst of all the ordinary happiness a vampire from Anita’s past reaches out. She was supposed to be dead, killed in an explosion, but the Mother of All Darkness is the first vampire, their dark creator. It’s hard to kill a god. This dark goddess has reached out to her here-in St. Louis, home of everyone Anita loves most. The Mother of All Darkness has decided she has to act now or never, to control Anita, and all the vampires in America.

The Mother of All Darkness believes that the triumvirate created by master vampire Jean-Claude with Anita and the werewolf Richard Zeeman has enough power for her to regain a body and to immigrate to the New World. But the body she wants to possess is already taken. Anita is about to learn a whole new meaning to sharing her body, one that has nothing to do with the bedroom. And if the Mother of All Darkness can’t succeed in taking over Anita’s body for herself, she means to see that no one else has the use of it, ever again. Even Belle Morte, not always a friend to Anita, has sent word: “Run if you can…”

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake: A Novel by Aimee Bender
Available June 1, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:

The wondrous Aimee Bender conjures the lush and moving story of a girl whose magical gift is really a devastating curse.

On the eve of her ninth birthday, unassuming Rose Edelstein, a girl at the periphery of schoolyard games and her distracted parents’ attention, bites into her mother’s homemade lemon-chocolate cake and discovers she has a magical gift: she can taste her mother’s emotions in the cake. She discovers this gift to her horror, for her mother—her cheerful, good-with-crafts, can-do mother—tastes of despair and desperation. Suddenly, and for the rest of her life, food becomes a peril and a threat to Rose.

The curse her gift has bestowed is the secret knowledge all families keep hidden—her mother’s life outside the home, her father’s detachment, her brother’s clash with the world. Yet as Rose grows up she learns to harness her gift and becomes aware that there are secrets even her taste buds cannot discern.

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake is a luminous tale about the enormous difficulty of loving someone fully when you know too much about them. It is heartbreaking and funny, wise and sad, and confirms Aimee Bender’s place as “a writer who makes you grateful for the very existence of language” (San Francisco Chronicle).

The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner: An Eclipse Novella by Stephenie Meyer
Available June 5, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:
Fans of The Twilight Saga will be enthralled by this riveting story of Bree Tanner, a character first introduced in Eclipse, and the darker side of the newborn vampire world she inhabits. In another irresistible combination of danger, mystery, and romance, Stephenie Meyer tells the devastating story of Bree and the newborn army as they prepare to close in on Bella Swan and the Cullens, following their encounter to its unforgettable conclusion.

The Passage by Justin Cronin
Available June 8, 2010 (Order on Amazon)
This is being touted as this summer’s “it” book and the movie rights have already sold for over a million dollars.

From the publisher:
“It happened fast. Thirty-two minutes for one world to die, another to be born.”

First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he’s done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. He is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors. But for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—towards the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterful prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.

The Lion by Nelson Demille
Available June 8, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:
In this eagerly awaited follow-up to The Lion’s Game, John Corey, former NYPD Homicide detective and special agent for the Anti-Terrorist Task Force, is back. And, unfortunately for Corey, so is Asad Khalil, the notorious Libyan terrorist otherwise known as “The Lion.” Last we heard from him, Khali had claimed to be defecting to the US only to unleash the most horrific reign of terrorism ever to occur on American soil. While Corey and his partner, FBI agent Kate Mayfield, chased him across the country, Khalil methodically eliminated his victims one by one and then disappeared without a trace.

Now, years later, Khalil has returned to America to make good on his threats and take care of unfinished business. “The Lion” is a killing machine once again loose in America with a mission of revenge, and John Corey will stop at nothing to achieve his own goal — to find and kill Khahil.

Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook by Anthony Bourdain
Available June 8, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:

The long-awaited follow-up to the megabestseller Kitchen Confidential

In the ten years since his classic Kitchen Confidential first alerted us to the idiosyncrasies and lurking perils of eating out, from Monday fish to the breadbasket conspiracy, much has changed for the subculture of chefs and cooks, for the restaurant business—and for Anthony Bourdain.

Medium Raw explores these changes, moving back and forth from the author’s bad old days to the present. Tracking his own strange and unexpected voyage from journeyman cook to globe-traveling professional eater and drinker, and even to fatherhood, Bourdain takes no prisoners as he dissects what he’s seen, pausing along the way for a series of confessions, rants, investigations, and interrogations of some of the most controversial figures in food.

Beginning with a secret and highly illegal after-hours gathering of powerful chefs that he compares to a mafia summit, Bourdain pulls back the curtain—but never pulls his punches—on the modern gastronomical revolution, as only he can. Cutting right to the bone, Bourdain sets his sights on some of the biggest names in the foodie world, including David Chang, the young superstar chef who has radicalized the fine-dining landscape; the revered Alice Waters, whom he treats with unapologetic frankness; the Top Chef winners and losers; and many more.

And always he returns to the question “Why cook?” Or the more difficult “Why cook well?” Medium Raw is the deliciously funny and shockingly delectable journey to those answers, sure to delight philistines and gourmands alike.

Stories: All-New Tales, Edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio
Available June 15, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:

“The joy of fiction is the joy of the imagination….”

The best stories pull readers in and keep them turning the pages, eager to discover more—to find the answer to the question: “And then what happened?” The true hallmark of great literature is great imagination, and as Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio prove with this outstanding collection, when it comes to great fiction, all genres are equal.

Stories is a groundbreaking anthology that reinvigorates, expands, and redefines the limits of imaginative fiction and affords some of the best writers in the world—from Peter Straub and Chuck Palahniuk to Roddy Doyle and Diana Wynne Jones, Stewart O’Nan and Joyce Carol Oates to Walter Mosley and Jodi Picoult—the opportunity to work together, defend their craft, and realign misconceptions. Gaiman, a literary magician whose acclaimed work defies easy categorization and transcends all boundaries, and “master anthologist” (Booklist) Sarrantonio personally invited, read, and selected all the stories in this collection, and their standard for this “new literature of the imagination” is high. “We wanted to read stories that used a lightning-flash of magic as a way of showing us something we have already seen a thousand times as if we have never seen it at all.”

Joe Hill boldly aligns theme and form in his disturbing tale of a man’s descent into evil in “Devil on the Staircase.” In “Catch and Release,” Lawrence Block tells of a seasoned fisherman with a talent for catching a bite of another sort. Carolyn Parkhurst adds a dark twist to sibling rivalry in “Unwell.” Joanne Harris weaves a tale of ancient gods in modern New York in “Wildfire in Manhattan.” Vengeance is the heart of Richard Adams’s “The Knife.” Jeffery Deaver introduces a dedicated psychologist whose mission in life is to save people in “The Therapist.” A chilling punishment befitting an unspeakable crime is at the dark heart of Neil Gaiman’s novelette “The Truth Is a Cave in the Black Mountains.”

As it transforms your view of the world, this brilliant and visionary volume—sure to become a classic—will ignite a new appreciation for the limitless realm of exceptional fiction.

The Facebook Effect: The Inside Story of the Company That Is Connecting the World by David Kirkpatrick
Available June 15, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:

IN LITTLE MORE THAN HALF A DECADE, Facebook has gone from a dorm-room novelty to a company with 500 million users. It is one of the fastest growing companies in history, an essential part of the social life not only of teenagers but hundreds of millions of adults worldwide. As Facebook spreads around the globe, it creates surprising effects—even becoming instrumental in political protests from Colombia to Iran.
Veteran technology reporter David Kirkpatrick had the full cooperation of Facebook’s key executives in researching this fascinating history of the company and its impact on our lives. Kirkpatrick tells us how Facebook was created, why it has flourished, and where it is going next. He chronicles its successes and missteps, and gives readers the most complete assessment anywhere of founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the central figure in the company’s remarkable ascent. This is the Facebook story that can be found nowhere else.

How did a nineteen-year-old Harvard student create a company that has transformed the Internet and how did he grow it to its current enormous size? Kirkpatrick shows how Zuckerberg steadfastly refused to compromise his vision, insistently focusing on growth over profits and preaching that Facebook must dominate (his word) communication on the Internet. In the process, he and a small group of key executives have created a company that has changed social life in the United States and elsewhere, a company that has become a ubiquitous presence in marketing, altering politics, business, and even our sense of our own identity. This is the Facebook Effect.

Frankenstein: Lost Souls: A Novel by Dean Koontz
Available June 15, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:

#1 New York Times bestselling author Dean Koontz brings his fertile imagination and unparalleled storytelling abilities to one of the most timeless—and terrifying—creations in all of fiction: the legend of Frankenstein. In Lost Souls, Koontz puts a singular twist on this classic tale of ambition and science gone wrong and forges a new legend uniquely suited to our times—a story of revenge, redemption, and the razor-thin line that separates humanity from inhumanity as we consider a new invitation to apocalypse.

The work of creation has begun again. Only now things will be different. Victor Leben, once Frankenstein, has not only seen the future—he’s ready to populate it. Using stem cells, “organic” silicon circuitry, and nanotechnology, he will engender a race of superhumans—the perfect melding of flesh and machine. With a powerful, enigmatic backer eager to see his dream come to fruition and a secret location where the enemies of progress can’t find him, Victor is certain that this time, nothing and no one can stop him.

It is up to five people to prove him wrong. In their hands rests nothing less than the survival of humanity itself.

They are drawn together in different ways, by omens sinister and wondrous, to the same shattering conclusion: Two years after they saw him die, the man they knew as Victor Helios lives on. Detectives Carson O’Connor and Michael Maddison; Victor’s engineered wife, Erika 5, and her companion Jocko; and the original Victor’s first creation, the tormented Deucalion, have all arrived at a small Montana town where their old alliance will be renewed—and tested—by forces from within and without, and where the dangers they face will eclipse any they have yet encountered. Yet in the midst of their peril, love will blossom, and joy, and they will discover sources of strength and perseverance they could not have imagined.

They will need all these resources, and more. For a monumental battle is about to commence that will require all their ingenuity and courage, as it defines what we are to be . . . and if we are to be at all.

Sizzling Sixteen by Janet Evanovich
Available June 22, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:
Trenton, New Jersey, bounty hunter Stephanie Plum has inherited a “lucky” bottle from her Uncle Pip. Problem is, Uncle Pip didn’t specify if the bottle brought good luck or bad luck. . . .

BAD LUCK:
Vinnie, of Vincent Plum Bail Bonds, has run up a gambling debt of $786,000 with mobster Bobby Sunflower and is being held until the cash can be produced. Nobody else will pay to get Vinnie back, leaving it up to Stephanie, office manager Connie, and file clerk Lula to raise the money if they want to save their jobs.

GOOD LUCK:
Being in the business of tracking down people, Stephanie, Lula, and Connie have an advantage in finding Vinnie. If they can rescue him, it will buy them some time to raise the cash.

BAD LUCK:
Finding a safe place to hide Vinnie turns out to be harder than raising $786,000. Vinnie’s messing up Mooner’s vibe, running up pay-per-view porn charges in Ranger’s apartment, and making Stephanie question genetics.

GOOD LUCK:
Between a bonds office yard sale that has the entire Burg turning out, Mooner’s Hobbit-Con charity event, and Uncle Pip’s lucky bottle, they just might raise enough money to save the business, and Vinnie, from ruin.

BAD LUCK:
Saving Vincent Plum Bail Bonds means Stephanie can keep being a bounty hunter. In Trenton, this involves hunting down a man wanted for polygamy, a turnpike toilet paper bandit, and a drug dealer with a pet alligator named Mr. Jingles.

GOOD LUCK:
The job of bounty hunter comes with perks in the guise of Trenton’s hottest cop, Joe Morelli, and the dark and dangerous security expert, Ranger. With any luck at all, Uncle Pip’s lucky bottle will have Stephanie getting lucky—the only question is . . . with whom?

Sizzling Sixteen . . . so hot, the pages might spontaneously combust!

Family Ties by Danielle Steel
Available June 22, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:
Annie Ferguson was a bright young Manhattan architect. Talented, beautiful, just starting out with her first job, new apartment and boyfriend, she had the world in the palm of her hand—until a single phone call altered the course of her life forever. Overnight, she became the mother to her sister’s three orphaned children, keeping a promise she never regretted making, even if it meant putting her own life indefinitely on hold.

Now, at forty-two, as independent as ever, with a satisfying career and a family that means everything to her, Annie is comfortable being single and staying that way. She appears to have no time for anything else. With her nephew and nieces now young adults and confronting major challenges of their own, Annie is navigating a parent’s difficult passage between lending them a hand and letting go, and suddenly facing an empty nest. The eldest, twenty-eight-year-old Liz, an overworked, struggling editor in a high-powered job at Vogue, has never allowed any man to come close enough to hurt her. Ted, at twenty-four a serious and hardworking law student, is captivated by a much older, much more experienced woman with children, who is leading him much further than he wants to go. And the youngest, twenty-one-year-old Katie—impulsive, artistic, rebellious—is an art student about to make a choice that will lead her to an entirely different world she is in no way prepared for but determined to embrace.

Then, just when least expected, a chance encounter changes Annie’s life yet again in the most unexpected direction of all.

From Manhattan to Paris and all the way to Tehran, Family Ties is a novel that reminds us how challenging and unpredictable life can be, and that the powerful bonds of family are the strongest of all.

Private by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro
Available June 28, 2010 (Order on Amazon)

From the publisher:
The police can’t help you

Former CIA agent Jack Morgan runs Private, a renowned investigation company with branches around the globe. It is where you go when you need maximum force and maximum discretion. The secrets of the most influential men and women on the planet come to Jack daily–and his staff of investigators uses the world’s most advanced forensic tools to make and break their cases.

The press will destroy you

Jack is already deep into the investigation of a multi-million dollar NFL gambling scandal and the unsolved slayings of 18 schoolgirls when he learns of a horrific murder close to home: his best friend’s wife, Jack’s former lover, has been killed. It nearly pushes him over the edge. Instead, Jack pushes back and devotes all of Private’s resources to tracking down her killer.

Only one place to turn: Private

But Jack doesn’t have to play by the rules. As he closes in on the killer and chooses between revenge and justice, Morgan has to navigate a workplace love affair that threatens to blow the roof off his plans. With a plot that moves at death-defying speeds, Private is James Patterson sleekest, most exciting thriller ever.

A few weeks ago Amie wrote about the One Book, One Twitter initiative that is being headed by Jeff Howe of Wired magazine. The goal was to get a large group of people on Twitter to read the same book and then tweet about over the summer. A variety of books were nominated, and Jeff announced last week that American Gods by Neil Gaiman won the vote. The current plan is to have people start reading by May 5, 2010. Jeff’s website will have a reading schedule posted in the near future.

I’m planning on joining the effort and purchased the eBook copy of American Gods to test out reading books on the iPad. In case you’re curious about joining the One Book, One Twitter effort, here’s some information from HarperCollins, the publisher:

Released from prison, Shadow finds his world turned upside down. His wife has been killed; a mysterious stranger offers him a job. But Mr. Wednesday, who knows more about Shadow than is possible, warns that a storm is coming — a battle for the very soul of America . . . and they are in its direct path.

One of the most talked-about books of the new millennium, American Gods is a kaleidoscopic journey deep into myth and across an American landscape at once eerily familiar and utterly alien. It is, quite simply, a contemporary masterpiece.

One Book, One Twitter has a twitter account (@1b1t2010), a Facebook page and it’s own hashtag (#1b1t), so be sure to check them out over the summer to see how far people have read and what they think about American Gods. Jeff Howe has a Twitter account as well (@crowdsourcing) and you can also follow the author of American Gods, Neil Gaiman, on Twitter (@neilhimself).


Are you taking part in One Book, One Twitter? What do you think about American Gods as the selection?

I just finished my second Neil Gaiman novel. I chose Neverwhere as the reviews were solid and it looked interesting. Here’s what I’m starting to learn about Gaiman: he chooses some strange names for his main characters. In the last Gaiman novel I completed the main character’s name was “Nobody”, and in Neverwhere the main character is called “Door”. WTH??

Neverwhere tells the story of Richard Mayhew, a twenty something Scottish man who has recently moved to London. When Richard sees a young, injured girl almost appear out of nowhere on a busy London street, he immediately rushes to help her. However, by helping her, Richard is drawn into a magical world and blinked out of existence from him current reality. Richard soon sets out on an adventure with the girl (Door), her fierce bodyguard, and a mischievous Marquis to help Door avenge the death of her family and help Richard to get back home.

Neverwhere is an original story, has fun characters, and is impossible to put down. Although it’s one of Gaimans adult books (a couple f-bombs, a couple sexual references, and some violence), I felt the book was written for a younger audience. Nevertheless, it was a great read and one I would definitely recommend to a friend. For those of you that are familiar with Gaiman, please leave me a comment and let me know which of his novels I should read next.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 Stars | Publisher: Harper Perennial | Pages: 400 | Source:Purchased | Buy on Amazon

Check out an animated book trailer for Instructions, the new book from Newbery Medal winner Neil Gaiman and illustrator Charles Vess.

Instructions synopsis (from the publisher): Trust Dreams. Trust your heart, and trust your story.
A renowned storyteller whose words have transported readers to magical realms and an acclaimed illustrator of lushly imagined fairy-tale landscapes guide a traveler safely through lands unknown and yet strangely familiar…
…and home again.

Instructions by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Charles Vess will be available on April 27, 2010. Check out the trailer below.

This week I read the highly acclaimed Newberry award-winning, The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. Gaiman is known for several popular young adult books, including Coraline, which was adapted into a movie. The Graveyard Book tells the story of a young boy, Nobody Owens. Nobody, or “Bod” as he is affectionately called, is a human boy that lives in a graveyard and is raised by ghosts. Nobody was orphaned as a toddler when the evil “The man Jack” murders his entire family. The ghosts discovered the child and decided to raise and protect him.

Although the murdering of an entire family may sound like a dark way to begin a children’s book, I think Gaiman did a good job of relating this in a way that wouldn’t be too traumatizing to youngsters. In The Graveyard Book Gaiman develops a charming world filled with ghosts, ghouls, magic, and an evil secret society. My only real issue with this book is that it was too short and Gaiman didn’t make it into a series.

I felt like the book ended with some weak explanations and left some questions unanswered. This was the only reason I have it a 4. The book was superbly written, and reminding me a bit of Roald Dahl. The Graveyard Book is the very definition of a page-turner, but it ends almost as quickly as it begins.

Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars | Publisher: HarperCollins | Pages:320 | Buy on Amazon

Neil Gaiman and BBC Audiobooks America are collaborating on an interactive story that’s coming together via Twitter. Gaiman’s first tweet was, “Sam was brushing her hair when the girl in the mirror put down the hairbrush, smiled & said, “We don’t love you anymore.” Fans can tweet the rest of the story using the hashtag #bbcawdio. Follow @BBCAA to see updates to the story. The tweets will be turned into an audiobook that will be available as a free download later this year. Visit the BBC Audiobooks America blog for more information.

Halloween is only a few weeks away and here in Michigan the leaves are starting to change and there’s a chill in the air. It’s perfect weather for curling up with a cup of tea and a good book. In honor of Halloween, here’s a list of spooky/mystery/supernatural stories you may enjoy:

Just After Sunset by Stephen King

This collection of 13 short stories ranges from horror to gross-you-out to more common things we are fearful of like divorce and terminal illness. Stories include “The Cat from Hell” which is about a killer cat and the hit man hired to kill it and “N” which features a mental patient with OCD.

Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger

What could be better for fall reading than a gothic ghost story set in and around London’s Highgate Cemetery? It’s a creepy (but not scary) story and the dreary London weather creates the perfect backdrop. Read my full review here.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

The young at heart might enjoy the latest book from Coraline author, Neil Gaiman. Nobody (Bod) Owens lives in a graveyard and is raised by ghosts after his parents are killed. Unfortunately, the man who killed his parents is also after him. The Graveyard Book has won the 2009 Newberry Medal and the 2009 Hugo Award for Best Novel.

Grave Sight by Charlaine Harris

Speaking of graveyards, this mystery series features a heroine who spends a lot of time in them. Harper Connelly acquired the ability to find dead people and determine their cause of death after being struck by lightning as a teenager. Now, along with her stepbrother Tolliver, she makes her living finding missing persons. I recommend reading this series in order, starting with Grave Sight, followed by Grave Surprise and An Ice Cold Grave.

Abby Cooper: Psychic Eye by Victoria Laurie

Abby Cooper is a psychic who lives in the Detroit metropolitan area. Along with police detective Dutch Rivers, she investigates both human and supernatural mysteries. There are currently seven books in the series, starting with Abby Cooper: Psychic Eye.

The Vampire Diaries: The Awakening by L. J. Smith

If you like your vampires young and broody, the Vampire Diaries series is for you. Stefan and Damon are vampire brothers with a serious case of sibling rivalry. Set in the small town of Fell’s Church, Virginia, the book takes place around fall events like Homecoming and football. Read my full review here.

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

If you prefer your vampires the old-fashioned way – skulking about European locales, biting people in the neck – you will like this story about Dracula. As implied by the title, it contains a lot of historical information about Europe and Vlad the Impaler. This thriller also has elements of mystery and romance and it will grab you right from the beginning.

Dead Men’s Boots by Mike Carey

If zombies are more your thing, the Felix Castor series will appeal to you. The books are set in an alternate version of London where the dead have started to return to Earth as ghosts and zombies. Exorcists like Felix Castor have the ability to permanently banish the spirits. Read my full review here.

Kitty and the Midnight Hour by Carrie Vaughn

Werewolf Kitty Norville hosts “The Midnight Hour” on a Denver radio station and dispenses advice to the supernatural. Her fellow werewolves and the local vampires don’t like the public exposure, which puts Kitty in a dangerous position. This urban fantasy series might appeal to fans of Charlaine Harris’ Sookie Stackhouse books.

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark 25th Anniversary Edition: Collected from American Folklore by Alvin Schwartz

If you want to gather the family and read scary stories on Halloween night, this collection will frighten both children and adults. Many of the stories are based on urban legends and contain very creepy illustrations to go along with them. It’s perfect reading for Halloween, campfires, and sleepovers.