Scan barcode
libreroaming's review
3.0
Overall 2.5. There were a lot of clunkers in this collection. Some were overly long which is odd to do in a short story, some read like an adult who hadn't spoken to a child in a very long time. The good ones weren't memorable enough to bring the collection up. Even consumate middle grade horror master R.L. Stine gave a story that turned disappointing by the end.
chelseajo43's review
4.0
Cool anthology collection of spooky short stories! If you’ve ever listened to the No Sleep podcast I think you’ll enjoy this book!
costumeparty's review
4.0
Mixed feelings here. If this were just presented as a collection of scary short stories for kids, I’d have fewer issues. But since this is an attempt to honor Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, I have higher standards.
Horrifying illustrations aside, the things that really make Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark so endearing and memorable are the stories’ brevity and their vagueness. Most of Alvin Schwartz’s tales are old folk legends (for which he carefully cites sources! I love him) and have a very “this could have happened to anyone in any town” feel. Well, any town in like the early 20th century. They usually have a very old-timey feel and leave the reader wondering if cars were commonplace yet in the story’s setting. Most of the stories don’t have dialogue at all, while in this new collection, characters have awkward clunky conversations that often place them firmly in this decade. There’s a lot of “boomers write 11-year olds” energy here. One particularly egregious example is the lines:
“‘You’re so lit,’ he said imitating the new SoundCloud rapper of the month
Everybody was listening to Kendrick and K.Flay, though none of them understood what the artists were talking about, or they would have been kinder to Katya”
That’s what the kids these days call cringe. Meanwhile the classic Scary Stories feature lines like “there was an old lady who got sick and died.”
Much more campfire-friendly.
Some of these stories are really great, just would be better suited for a different format or a different compilation. The “pixagram” story is surprisingly not super out-of-touch (but I still think actual middle school kids would laugh at it) would be a really killer creepypasta I think, just isn’t very Alvin Schwartz.
Maybe I’m wrong, maybe the kids of today read the originals and think “the butcher of the village? What?” But I know when I read those as a kid, these weird concepts (taking the cattle to different fields? On foot?) were weird, but almost gave the stories more of a timeless effect. But I think some of these had seriously weird issues with dialogue and overall ideas of kid life.
The highlights that I think capture the spirit of the originals: Whistle Past the Graveyard, the Kite Man, In Stitches.
Alrighty then, I’m off to yell at a cloud.
Horrifying illustrations aside, the things that really make Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark so endearing and memorable are the stories’ brevity and their vagueness. Most of Alvin Schwartz’s tales are old folk legends (for which he carefully cites sources! I love him) and have a very “this could have happened to anyone in any town” feel. Well, any town in like the early 20th century. They usually have a very old-timey feel and leave the reader wondering if cars were commonplace yet in the story’s setting. Most of the stories don’t have dialogue at all, while in this new collection, characters have awkward clunky conversations that often place them firmly in this decade. There’s a lot of “boomers write 11-year olds” energy here. One particularly egregious example is the lines:
“‘You’re so lit,’ he said imitating the new SoundCloud rapper of the month
Everybody was listening to Kendrick and K.Flay, though none of them understood what the artists were talking about, or they would have been kinder to Katya”
That’s what the kids these days call cringe. Meanwhile the classic Scary Stories feature lines like “there was an old lady who got sick and died.”
Much more campfire-friendly.
Some of these stories are really great, just would be better suited for a different format or a different compilation. The “pixagram” story is surprisingly not super out-of-touch (but I still think actual middle school kids would laugh at it) would be a really killer creepypasta I think, just isn’t very Alvin Schwartz.
Maybe I’m wrong, maybe the kids of today read the originals and think “the butcher of the village? What?” But I know when I read those as a kid, these weird concepts (taking the cattle to different fields? On foot?) were weird, but almost gave the stories more of a timeless effect. But I think some of these had seriously weird issues with dialogue and overall ideas of kid life.
The highlights that I think capture the spirit of the originals: Whistle Past the Graveyard, the Kite Man, In Stitches.
Alrighty then, I’m off to yell at a cloud.
situationnormal's review
4.0
These are new stories, but they feel so nostalgic because they have a similar feeling to the Alvin Schwartz stories. The unfortunate thing about short story collections (especially when they're part of an anthology) is that some stories are always going to be better than others. I'd say the majority of stories were just OK, with a few that I didn't like at all, and a few that I really liked thrown in. But the nostalgia factor weighted it to the positive side.
So 4 stars for vibes, and for the stories I liked best, including:
"Strange Music" by Joanna Parypinski
"Jingle Jangle" by Kim Ventrella
"The Neighbor" by Amy Lukavics
"The Open Window" by Christopher Golden
and
"The Garage" by Tananarive Due
And I listened to the audiobook which is great because it gives the stories a told-by-the-campfire feeling, but that means I didn't see the drawings inside of the book.
So 4 stars for vibes, and for the stories I liked best, including:
"Strange Music" by Joanna Parypinski
"Jingle Jangle" by Kim Ventrella
"The Neighbor" by Amy Lukavics
"The Open Window" by Christopher Golden
and
"The Garage" by Tananarive Due
And I listened to the audiobook which is great because it gives the stories a told-by-the-campfire feeling, but that means I didn't see the drawings inside of the book.
callme_tippy's review
4.0
For some reason I was expecting more of Goosebumps feel with these, where things kind of "work out" in the end for the main characters and I was mistaken.
There is something eerie about reading a book that mostly features children where there isn't a happy-ish ending and things just are the way they are. I think that was most interesting and scary part for me at least.
I enjoyed reading this collecting as there is something unsettling about it, which is exactly how I want to feel when reading scary stories.
There is something eerie about reading a book that mostly features children where there isn't a happy-ish ending and things just are the way they are. I think that was most interesting and scary part for me at least.
I enjoyed reading this collecting as there is something unsettling about it, which is exactly how I want to feel when reading scary stories.
cannibaldear's review against another edition
4.75
Some stories were better than others, as is true for any anthology. A wonderful tribute to the first books that made me want to be scared