Garlic and the Vampire

Written by: Bree Paulsen

First line: I tried to wake you so it's your fault if you're late today. 

Why you should read this book: Garlic, an anthropomorphic vegetable given life by Witch Agnes along with numerous other fruit and vegetable folks, is clumsy and anxious but dedicated to her work: providing garlic to the people of the village. One day, chaos and terror arrives in the form of a vampire inhabiting an ancient castle in the woods, and the other vegetables decide that Garlic, who naturally repels vampires, must go into the woods to investigate. Can Garlic overcome her fear and anxiety and defeat an enemy whose name strikes fear into her heart in this cozy tale of unearned terror? 

Why you shouldn't read this book: It's a little bit silly, even for a children's vampire story.

Jabberwocky: a Pop-up Rhyme from Through the Looking Glass

Written by: Nick Bantock and Lewis Carroll 

First line: 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves/ Did gyre and gimble in the wabe/All mimsy were the borogroves,/And the mome raths outgrabe.

Why you should read this book: It's a tiny volume comprising the famous nonsense poem, illustrated in a delightfully nonsensical and 3-dimensional style by the inimitable Nick Bantok. The poem's narrator is kind of drawn like Santa Claus and the young hero takes with him on his quest a tiny green monster for no discernible reason, and the vorpal blade goes snicker snack. It's just how you remember, although possibly not how you imagined.

Why you shouldn't read this book: Pop-up books are notoriously fragile and this one was published 35 years ago.

Super Boba Cafe

Written by: Nidhi Chanani

First line: OHMYGODTHISISHOWIDIEOHGODDDTHEWATERAH

Why you should read this book: Aria's excited to spend the summer with Nainai, her grandmother, and determined to put her sleepy little neighborhood boba cafe on the map by leveraging the power of kittens and social media, but her plan is too good. The shop is suddenly, virally successful, making it hard to ignore some of the Nainai's more peculiar behavior, especially the way she vanishes every night into her secret kitchen. Aria is determined to uncover Nainai's secret, and then, when she realizes the seriousness of her grandmother's secret work, to find a way to make life easier for her heroic grandmother. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: You don't care if California falls into the ocean. 

My Life as a Fake

Written by: Peter Carey

First line: I have known John Slater all my life. 

Why you should read this book: Inspired by a real life literary hoax, this is a fictional novel about a literary hoax, but in the story, the literary hoax literally grows legs and walks around terrifying its creator in the manner of Frankenstein's monster. It's one of those strange, dreamlike narratives where you get the sense that absolutely every character is lying about almost everything they say, including the first person narrator, and everybody in the story is kind of unlikeable at the core, but the reader is drawn in enough to keep reading just to figure out what's actually going on. Sarah Wode-Douglass, the editor of a prestigious British literary magazine, takes a weird vacation to Kuala Lumpur with John Slater, a famous poet she doesn't like at all, and meets a disgraced Australian writer who once perpetrated a literary hoax that, if he is to be believed, was way too successful. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: I'm not entirely sure it ever explains itself satisfactorily. 

Took: A Ghost Story

Written by: Mary Downing Hahn

First line: The old woman stands on the hilltop, just on the edge of the woods, well hidden from the farmhouse below.

Why you should read this book: Daniel and Erica are not thrilled about their family's downgrade to living in an old farmhouse in West Virginia, which is creepy enough on its own without the locals warning them about local cryptids Old Auntie and Bloody Bones, who kidnap a little girl every fifty years, and force her to do chores. When Old Auntie comes for Erica and turns out her last servant, Selene, everyone is convinced that there is nothing to be done but wait another fifty years for her release, but Daniel is determined to use every resource within reach to bring his sister home again and save Selene as well. With his parents paralyzed with depression and almost everyone else too terrified of the ghost witch and her skeleton ghost pig, Daniel will have to confront the evil himself. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: Honestly, Daniel is kind of a boring and undeveloped character, but perhaps the rest of the story is developed enough that you won't notice. 

Nightbooks

Written by: J. A. White

First line: After his family had finally fallen asleep, Alex slung the backpack over his shoulder and snuck out of the apartment, easing the front door gently home so it didn't slam shut. 

Why you should read this book: Alex has loved scary stuff ever since he was little, but when his notebooks full of handwritten spooky tales start to feel like a liability, he has no idea that his plan to dispose of them will land him smack in the middle of his own horror story. Kidnapped by Natacha, a witch who wants his stories for her own diabolical purposes, he's trapped in his own building, in an apartment that is much bigger on the inside, and much more mysterious than anything he's ever imagined. Along with another kidnapped child, Yasmin, and a seemingly hostile cat called Lenore, Alex must figure out how to defeat Natacha and escape his strange prison before Natacha or her strange domain turn on him.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You accidentally saw a zombie film when you were four and it scarred you for life. 

Carmilla

Written by: Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

First line: In Styria, we, though by no means magnificent people, inhabit a castle, or schloss.

Why you should read this book: This is a vampire novel—a gothic vampire novel—a gothic LESBIAN vampire novel—a gothic lesbian vampire novel, which predates Bram Stoker's Dracula by a quarter century, which is likely enough information to sway the type of readers who would enjoy this book. The narrator, an innocent but isolated girl who craves the friendship of other girls, is enchanted by the random beautiful stranger who appears on her land while she's mourning the death of another girl she had hoped to visit. While constantly praising her new friend's looks and engaging in constant shows of physical affection, the protagonist begins to suffer a mysterious illness exactly like the strange malady that killed her old friend.

Why you shouldn't read this book: Can't handle the thought of girls engaging in trembling embraces and soft kisses.

The Night Marchers & Other Oceana Stories: A Cautionary Fables and Fairy Tales Book

Edited by: Kel McDonald, Kate Ashwin, and Sloane Long

First line: Family. Always respect them. No matter what.

Why you should read this book: It's a delightful collection of "cautionary fables and fairy tales" appropriate for young readers, collected from the continent of Oceania (mostly Hawaii and the Phillipines). As the series subtitle suggests, these stories offer examples from mythology of what people should and shouldn't do, explaining superstition, ranging far into the past and even into the future to show the consequences of poor actions. There are gods and monsters, princesses and talking animals, everything you would expect from fairy tales, but stories you probably haven't heard before unless you hail from these cultures. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: Two of the comics are inexplicably not in English and not translated.

Camp Spirit

Written by: Axelle Lenoir

First line: The legend of Bear Lake tells the story of the Spirit of the Forest.

Why you should read this book: It's 1994 and disaffected young adult Elodie is still reeling from the death of Kurt Cobain, and to make matters worse, her mother is forcing her to work as a counselor at an overnight camp the summer before she starts college, and she already hates all the other counselors, especially "Little Miss Perfect: Catherine," but off she goes to have the worst summer ever. Her campers are all crazy redheads, she can't poop in a public toilet, and there's definitely something very strange going on at Bear Lake, including all the camp songs being mildly satanic, the very strange camp chief being very strange, and also there might be an actual monster in the woods. But it turns out that Little Miss Perfect Catherine isn't any of the things Elodie thinks she is, and the camp chief is not dangerous to humans, and whatever is lurking in the woods can be handled, one way or another. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: This is like Lumberjanes for big kids, but it's probably too sexy for little ones.

Get Camp Spirit here

Gris Grimly's Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus

Written by: Mary Shelley and Gris Grimly

First line: You will rejoice to hear that no disaster has accompanied the commencement of an enterprise which you have regarded with such evil forebodings.

Why you should read this book: Unquestionably one of the finest (if not the best) graphic novel adaptations of a classic work of literature I've ever had the pleasure of devouring, and not only because Grimly does an excellent job of preserving the original text while judiciously cutting bits that don't serve his work and won't be missed. With Victor and Elizabeth drawn as OG gothic punks (although this does highlight the fact that Victor is also, at heart, the OG emo kid), the monster looming more physically monstrous than in any other iteration (making his depiction somehow even more sympathetically pathetic), and the whole thing being set in a world that appears simultaneously pastoral and post-apocalyptic, naturalistic and steampunk-infused, this book seems to cut to the heart meat of the tale while also reviving its antique heartbeat for a modern audience. As always, this is a story about the price of being an irresponsible white guy with more money than common sense who isn't accountable to anyone and kind of gets away with murder until he horrifyingly doesn't.

Why you shouldn't read this book: I have to admit that I grabbed it off the shelf without really looking at what I was getting, because I just saw the G G of the author's name and my brain assumed it was a book from a completely different author whose title also contains the initials G G and which also has a powerful steampunk aesthetic (God bless the Foglios, my absolutely favorite webcomic creators of all time, but they simply haven't got the control/love of darkness needed for this undertaking).

Get Gris Grimly's Frankenstein now

The Last Halloween 1: Children

Written by: Abby Howard

First line: Did he die?

Why you should read this book: This is another graphic novel that I originally read in webcomic form, and if you like weird-weird-weird and creepy comics, this is the story for you. The boundary between the worlds of humans and monsters has been breached, and 10-year-old Mona finds herself fighting for her life in the company of the undead just to survive the night and potentially put an end to the terror, but mostly just to not die. It's wacky, and contains graphic depictions of many humans, monsters, and undead creatures dying or being horribly maimed, and it's pretty much a very well illustrated and organized nightmare. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: You're not into dead, dying, and maimed humans, monsters, and undead.

Buy The Last Halloween 1: Children from Amazon here

Living Ghosts & Mischievous Monsters: Chilling American Indian Stories

Written by: Dan SaSuWeh Jones

First line: Ghost stories were a big part of my life growing up as an American Indian.

Why you should read this book: It sets itself apart from most collections of creepy stories and folktales in two ways: first that, many of the stories were personally collected by the author, and second, that many of the stories really happened. It sets itself apart from most collections of indigenous legends in that the author and illustrator, as well as all their sources, are indigenous themselves. This is a kids' book, but the spooky factor is turned up fairly high on some of them—readers will meet all kind of terrifying spirits, monsters, ghosts, and other fairy tale creatures, none of whom have the best wishes of humanity in mind. 

Why you shouldn't read this book: Probably too scary for very young readers.

It Came in the Mail

Written by: Ben Clanton

First line: Liam loved to get mail.

Why you should read this book: Liam is disappointed on a daily basis because he never receives any mail, but has the realization that sending letters might be the answer. Rather than bother his family or friends, Liam chooses to write directly to his mailbox, requesting "something BIG," which arrives in the form of a delightful fire-breathing dragon. Delighted with his response, Liam continues sending similar letters until he is overwhelmed with amazing mail and must think of a solution to his new problem.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You only ever get bills. 

It

Written by: Stephen King

First line: The terror, which would not end for another twenty-eight years—if it ever did end—began, so far as I know or can tell, with a boat made from a sheet of newspaper floating down a gutter swollen with rain.

Why you should read this book: I first read it when I was twelve years old, which I mention by way of defense as I go on to explain that I just finished reading this enduring novel to my fourteen-year-old stepdaughter (by her request) (and also add that, prior to becoming fascinated with King's work at that age of twelve, I was afraid of everything, and this book and other novels of his I read that year, taught me to overcome, at least for the next twelve years, the free-floating terror of my existence). My stepdaughter said, "This is the longest novel we've ever read," to which I replied, "It's the longest novel most people have ever read," but the story of seven kids defeating an ancient evil that lives under their city, enjoys dressing like a clown, makes everyone a little crazy, and eats kids' fear (and other parts) continues to hold a prominent place in the collective conscious by virtue of its unrelenting examination of terror—virtually every trope of terror known to humans in the '80s manages to hit the page. There's something to scare everyone, whether or not you suffer from coulrophobia, including the truly terrifying concepts of racism, sexism and homophobia, in a gripping tale told from multiple points of view.

Why you shouldn't read this book: First, the racism, sexism, and homophobia is pretty extreme, and while King is clearly using it to denote bad characters with bad morality and bad motivations, if you don't personally remember the '80s, you will likely find yourself astonished at the casual use of now-taboo language. Second, like virtually all of King's work, it's ridiculously overwritten and would probably be a better novel with a couple hundred pages edited out.

Only the End of the World Again

Written by: Neil Gaiman, P Craig Russell, Troy Nixey, Matthew Hollingsworth, and Sean Konot

First line: It was a bad day.

Why you should read this book: Sometimes I get the sense that Gaiman keeps a fishbowl of speculative fiction tropes behind his desk and his brainstorming method is to just pull a handful of themes out and call it a comic book. In this case, he pulled out "Cthulhu mythos" and "werewolf" and ran with it, and Troy Nixey's sweet freaky imaginative artwork carries the reader over any chasms between the two. Our hapless protagonist wakes up feeling awful (we know he's the werewolf because he throws up a dog's paw and three child-sized fingers on page two) and trapped in a Lovecraftian landscape (we know it's a Lovecraftian landscape because his landlady leaves him a note about Elder Gods on page four and is cooking three different kinds of eldritch horror in the kitchen on page five) where everyone he meets casually mentions methods for killing werewolves and raising Deep Ones from the ocean, but for a Cthulhu/werewolf mashup, it has a fairly optimistic ending.

Why you shouldn't read this book: I just didn't feel like there was enough at stake: the story is so short that we don't have a lot of opportunities to get to know or care about any of the characters before the events that might lead to their collective demise.

Falling in Love with Hominids

Written by: Nalo Hopkinson

First line: "The easthound bays at night," Jolly said.

Why you should read this book: This deeply imaginative short story collection covers the range of traditional speculative motifs, including ghosts, fairies, monsters, gods, and stochastic flying elephants, while maintaining a modern, enlightened sensibility that injects a bright freshness into familiar tropes along with the voices of queer folks and people of color. From teenage girls taking on the persona of dragons to fight back against sexual harassment to the sibling rivalry between the spirits from Shakespeare's Tempest, these intelligent  stories feel new and smart and forward-thinking. Enjoyable, fast-paced, clever, and wonderfully written, it's both fun and provocative.

Why you shouldn't read this book: Some nasty bits with city rats.

The Hundred Lies of Lizzie Lovett

Written by: Cheslea Sedoti

First line: The first thing that happened was Lizzie Lovett disappeared, and everyone was all, "How can someone like Lizzie be missing?" and I was like, "Who cares?"

Why you should read this book: Hawthorn Creely doesn't understand why everyone is so caught up in the disappearance of pretty, perky Lizzie Lovett, who graduated from her high school three years ago and moved to the next town over, even though Hawthorn's own brother used to date her and there's nothing else going on to talk about in their town anyway. Jealous of the relationships she believes Lizzie had, Hawthorn neglects her own relationships as her obsession with the mystery leads her to insert herself into the life of the missing girl and attempt to recreate some of her circumstances. Fast-paced and fun, this story of a teenager taking a final, convoluted step, toward becoming a grown-up walks a surprising path.

Why you shouldn't read this book: The title is pretty misleading, given that Lizzie Lovett is a maguffin who possibly lies once in a flashback but doesn't actually play much of a role in the book, and the vast majority of lies about Lizzie are the conclusions Hawthorn draws in her head. Also, one of these coming-of-age stories where a teenage girl loses her virginity sort of accidentally.

Dragons Beware!

Written by: Jorge Aguirre, Rafael Rosado, and John Novak

Why you should read this book: The was once a blacksmith named Augustine...he made the most powerful sword ever forged.

Why you should read this book: Here's me, reading a series out of order again, but the book offers enough explanation that the reader can gather the backstory regarding a fearless little girl who is hungry for adventure and desperate to be seen as a warrior, her young brother who thinks he has to be a warrior even though all he wants is to be a chef, and a princess who spends all her time locked in tower surrounded by child-suitors, except when she decides she'd rather escape the tower and haven an adventure. This book offers not only a nice message about the utter ridiculousness of gender roles, but also a sweet focus on non-violent conflict resolution. I was most impressed that no dragons were killed in the telling of this story.

Why you shouldn't read this book: While its cheerful, silly, kid-friendly shenanigans reminded me of the old classic Bone, I personally found the silliness a bit over-the-top; definitely for younger readers.

Vampire Baby

Written by: Kelly Bennett and Paul Meisel

First line: This is my sister, Tootie.

Why you should read this book: Originally the narrator seemed pretty fond of his baby sister, until she anomalously developed canine teeth and began biting everything. Now he's convinced that Tootie is a vampire baby and he's desperate to help her find a more appropriate monster family, until he learns that even vampires don't enjoy being bitten by babies and he has more protective instincts than he assumed. This is a great read out loud book for kids who aren't babies anymore.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You think being saddled with a name like Tootie gives anyone a license to bite.

Strange Weather

Written by: Joe Hill

First line: Shelly Beukes stood at the bottom of the driveway, squinting up at our pink-sandstone ranch as if she had never seen it before.

Why you should read this book: Three perfect contemporary speculative novellas featuring interesting and nuanced protagonists in strange circumstances, and one brutal non-speculative novella, "Loaded," with a horror scenario so realistic it seems surprising it hasn't actually happened yet. The technology components that make "Rain" and "Aloft" work also seem just within the realm of possibility, but it's the characters—strong, scared, scarred, and real—that drag the reader into all these worlds so close to our own. Lots to love in this fast-paced collection.

Why you shouldn't read this book: Gun violence.