From: Karen Cruze <kcruze>
Date: Fri, 21 Oct 2005 10:19:03 -0500

For my money Coraline is the scariest book I've read in the last four or five years. I think it's the creepy mirror family that got to me, largely because of the button eyes. It's kind of primal when you think about it
... like a voodoo doll standing in for a person. Funny thing is it's older kids who get creeped by it more than younger kids. Is it because the older you are the more distant you are from make-believe, so a life-size doll family is just plain scarier once you're past playing with dolls?

When I recommend scary books and booktalk them I've had the most success with Naylor's Jade Green. The intrigue of the color green sparking a ghostly apparition draws them in, and the disembodied hand has them shrieking. It goes out particularly among 5th, 6th and 7th grade girls.

I find boys less attracted to ghosts. They seem to prefer monsters of all sorts. And Darren Shan's Cirque du Freak books are very popular with them.

Karen Cruze - Youth Services Librarian Northbrook Public Library Northbrook Il
Received on Fri 21 Oct 2005 10:19:03 AM CDT